In what can only be considered a stroke of brilliance, 10 authors were sent a letter asking for a story about their childhood. This compilation is the result. The audience of the stories varies greatly, so please make your decisions based on individual stories rather than the book as a whole. There are three stories featuring characters of color, the entry by Walter Dean Myers, the one by Laurence Yep and the one by Nicholasa Mohr.
All-Ball by Mary Pope Osborne
In today’s world with so many military families still waiting for their loved ones to come home for good, All-Ball will have much significance. It touches on both a child’s grief and concern over things she can’t control in her life as well as her attachment to a special childhood item. For kids who only know Mary Pope Osbourne as the author of the Magic Tree House series, this will be a very different reading experience. It could be read aloud to students as young as 3rd or 4th grade, but would do well for 5-8 if analysis and deeper understanding were required.
Sex, Nudity, Dating – None.
Profanity – None.
Death, Violence and Gore – None.
Drugs, Alcohol and Smoking – None.
Frightening or Intense Things – The girl’s father is deployed to Korea for a year. A house has lizards, water bugs and spiders. A beloved toy is destroyed.
The Great Rat Race by Laurence Yep
This story was SO much better than Yep’s memoir. Rather than a litany of moments that might have become great story, this was the funny, poignant, warm story that still captured his childhood. Unable to be athletic due to crippling asthma, Yep always felt like his father couldn’t love him as much as his brother. Surprisingly, a hunt for a rat ends up being the event that reveals the depth of his father’s love. Other than the use of a gun, this is a story that will appeal to readers of many ages. Especially funny are the moments when Yep and his father are confronted with the rat.
Sex, Nudity, Dating – None.
Profanity – None.
Death, Violence and Gore – His father broke his nose playing sports. After numerous attempts to kill rats with other techniques, father gets a gun to shoot the rats. They talk about how chickens are killed at the market and grandfather likes a dish made from the blood squeezed from the chicken. His father was bullied by white kids and by American-born Chinese kids when he was younger. There were fist fights.
Drugs, Alcohol and Smoking – None.
Frightening or Intense Things – A child is physically limited due to asthma.
Everything Will Be Okay by James Howe
This is a very sad entry from the author of Bunnicula
Sex, Nudity, Dating – None.
Profanity – “sissy,”
Death, Violence and Gore – James knows boys who would use a kitten for slingshot practice. They had a pet dog that died. His brothers hunt and kill animals (rabbits, pheasant, deer). His brother twists his arm behind his back and makes him promise to do things. A kitten is put to sleep. James hears it scratching to be let out before the gas kills it.
Drugs, Alcohol and Smoking – None.
Frightening or Intense Things – None.
Why I Never Ran Away From Home by Katherine Paterson
Katherine is doomed to the life of a little sister. She’s teased for being a crybaby, given the worst part when the neighborhood children put on plays and is the first out in games. She feels she could never be as wonderful as her big sister. When a visitor mentions that Katherine doesn’t look a thing like the other children and jokes that she must not be one of the family, she is determined to leave and make everyone’s life better. There’s just one thing in her way, her big sister Lizzie.
Many children know this feeling of exclusion, whether it occurs at the hands of siblings or classmates. The ending is reassuring, but I think a bit abrupt and adult; I don’t know that children will find it satisfying. However, if your goal is to have them make connections this provides many opportunities. As a heroine, Katherine is quite young in this one, making it a better choice for elementary age students than middle school or high school.
Sex, Nudity, Dating – None.
Profanity – None.
Death, Violence and Gore – Paterson shares that there were soldiers standing with guns and bombs falling some of the Chinese cities where she lived. Her father is stationed where there is war. They worry he will not be safe.
Drugs, Alcohol and Smoking – None.
Frightening or Intense Things – Chinese children are dressed in rags and some have sores on their bodies. Katherine is excluded and teased. A adult visitor teases her that she is not one of her mother’s children.
Reverend Abbott and those Bloodshot Eyes by Walter Dean Myers
This is a small sketch of Myer’s childhood neighborhood and in particular the church. Reverend Abbott was a conservative white minister who was filling for the summer. He was well meaning, but the children took exception to his intervention, especially when it came to the church dances. They plan a prank to embarrass Reverend Abbott. Myers contribution is humorous and gives a vivid look at his neighborhood. This would work with a wide range of ages, from younger kids up to high school students.
Sex, Nudity, Dating – There are dances.
Profanity – None.
Death, Violence and Gore – Sugar Ray Leonard jokingly challenges children to a fight. There’s a funeral which may be attended by gangsters. A woman is prank called and told of an emergency, but “emergency” always indicated a fire or a death in that neighborhood.
Drugs, Alcohol and Smoking – There’s a song about a man whose eyes are bloodshot after a night of “carousing.”
Frightening or Intense Things – Myers and his friends were a bit afraid of “Root Ladies” who they thought might be doing some magic or such, but they knew they didn’t really have anything to be afraid of.
Muffin by Susan Cooper
This has long been one of my favorites in the compilation. Despite its sad and difficult topic, I used to read it to my third graders. In World War II England Daisy’s biggest fear is not the Nazis, it’s a bully at her school called “Fat Alice” (no I don’t really love that that’s how the bully is named, but I can’t do anything about it). Alice and her friends torment Daisy and any efforts to have the teacher help just mean the bullying increases. Daisy finds a defender in an older woman who lives near the school and her small terrier. But the war has ways of turning everything upside down.
I think a lot of children will understand the bullying scenarios that occur in this book, particularly the way it escalates after help is sought. Older students and readers will be able to think more deeply about the war’s role in the book and the weight of Daisy’s different fears, whereas young readers will better manage with just the bullying themes.
Sex, Nudity, Dating – None.
Profanity – “Jerry” to refer to the Germans.
Death, Violence and Gore – A bully and her friends pin a girl against a wall and push a splinter into her arm. They knock her to the ground, pull her hair and scrape her hand against the asphalt until it bleeds. She kicks to try to get them off her. The bully hits her with branches and pinches her arm until it is black and blue. Her town is bombed. A sympathetic character is killed in the bombing.
Drugs, Alcohol and Smoking – None.
Frightening or Intense Things – The story is set during World War II in England. The children must spend time in air raid shelters and live with the possibility of a German invasion. A girl is a relentless bully. A bully destroys a girl’s painting.
Taking a Dare by Nicholasa Mohr
Nicholasa’s mother is a member of the Catholic Church. She prays and attends mass regularly. Nicholasa’s father is an atheist and wants her to grow up skeptical about religion. Their conflict creates some difficulties for Nicholasa as she’s not really sure what she believes. Feeling jealous and excluded around her friends that attend mass and take Communion, Nicholasa ends up taking a dare. She’ll take her Communion without having gone to confession or following any of the Church’s other requirements. Although she thinks both her parents would disapprove, she knows it is for different reasons.
This is a really interesting peek at how religious differences and beliefs affect a family. Because of the topic, it would probably be most effective with students who are at least in middle school. Also, this is probably best understood by students with familiarity with the Catholic Church.
Sex, Nudity, Dating – None.
Profanity – “hell” is used in a religious context.
Death, Violence and Gore – None.
Drugs, Alcohol and Smoking – None.
Frightening or Intense Things – None.
Flying by Reeve Lindbergh
No one could be more bored with having a famous aviator for a father than Reeve. She found the frequent flying trips with him to be incredibly repetitive and dull. As the youngest of her siblings, she basically was along for the ride, not getting mini instructions from the master. But one day is different. The engine has stopped and her father must force land the plane. It is the first time Reeve really sees her father as the amazing pilot the rest of the world knows him to be.
I found a little much of this story to be about Reeve’s siblings and it means there’s less of a sense of voice. However, the connection to Charles Lindbergh does make this a special entry. This would easily be used with a wide range of ages, but would be more of interest to those who have some knowledge of early aviation.
Sex, Nudity, Dating – None.
Profanity – None.
Death, Violence and Gore – Reeve’s father warns her about limbs severed by propellers. He also warns her about pilots who crash.
Drugs, Alcohol and Smoking – None.
Frightening or Intense Things – The plane’s engine dies and the plane must be force landed.
Scout’s Honor by Avi
Determined to make it above the lowly Tenderfoot rank in the Boy Scouts, Avi and his friends plan a campout. This means leaving Brooklyn for the wilds of New Jersey. Armed with with comic books, an umbrella, a compass that always points north and a pretty random assortment of food, the boys head on their mission, through the subway, over the bridge and into a whole other state. The trip goes exactly as well as you would expect it to, given three unchaperoned young boys who’ve never really left city.
This story would work for a variety of ages, but will be most humorous to people with some city knowledge.
Sex, Nudity, Dating – None.
Profanity – “sissies”
Death, Violence and Gore – None.
Drugs, Alcohol and Smoking – None.
Frightening or Intense Things – None.
Blue by Francesca Lia Block
This is the most fictionalized of all the accounts in the set (each story is followed by an author’s note revealing how much of themselves went into the piece). It’s heartbreakingly sad about a girl whose mother has left and who has no friends. But I did feel a bit manipulated by this when I learned Block had never had such an experience.
Sex, Nudity, Dating – None.
Profanity – None.
Death, Violence and Gore – None.
Drugs, Alcohol and Smoking – None.
Frightening or Intense Things – La’s mother leaves without saying good-bye. She is excluded at school. The other girls tell her that her mother left because she was weird.
What an interesting idea for a series of reviews- especially as you suggest- used in conjunction with the experience of writing for the children/teens themselves!