Rooftoppers by Katherine Rundell

Jun28

Often I read twenty-first century middle grade fiction books in which the writing ranges from average to good, and I could recommend the book as a decent read—except for one minor dealbreaker or content advisory. Maybe the book has an evil character who swears once or twice, or the author has inserted a bit of modern propaganda or a minor character is added only to please the diversity crowd. I can overlook a certain amount of this kind of thing, but others may not be willing to do so. Then, I try to tell people the facts and let them decide.

Rooftoppers, a very popular British import, is in a different class. (Rooftoppers are abandoned and orphan children who live on the rooftops of Paris.) The writing–the metaphors and the sentence structures and the word choice–is excellent. I’ll give you a few examples, chosen almost at random:

“When they began to play, the music was different. It was sweeter, wilder. Sophie sat up properly and shifted forward until only half an inch of her bottom was on her seat. It was so beautiful that it was difficult for her to breathe. If music can shine, Sophie thought, this music shone. It was like all the voices in all the choirs in the city rolled into a single melody.”

“Money can make people inhuman. It is best to stay away from people who care too much about money, my darling. They are people with shoddy, flimsy brains.”

“Sophie looked and gasped. Below her feet, Paris stretched out toward the river. Paris was darker than London: It was a city lit in blinks and flickers. And it was Fabergé-egg beautiful, she thought. It was magic carpet stuff.”

“To most things in life, there is no trick, but to balance, Sophie thought, there was a trick of sorts. The trick was knowing where to find your center; balance lay somewhere between her stomach and her kidneys. It felt like a lump of gold in amongst brown organs. It was difficult to find, but once found, it was like a place marked in a book–easy to recover. “

The story itself is good, too. One year old Sophie survives the sinking of her ship at sea. She is taken in by her fellow survivor and rescuer, the eccentric scholar Charles Maxim. Charles is a wonderful guardian, but the powers-that-be, child care officers and social welfare committees, finally decide, just after Sophie’s twelfth birthday, that she must be removed to an orphanage so that she can be properly cared for–no more trousers and no writing on the walls and and no Charles Maxim to encourage her unorthodox ways. Sophie and Charles are both devastated. Coincidentally, just before Sophie is set to leave, guardian and child find an important clue about Sophie’s mother, who is said to have died when the ship sank. There is just the slightest possibility that she didn’t die, that she is somewhere in Paris. And so Sophie and Charles Maxim run away to Paris to look for Sophie’s cello-playing mother, and there they discover the Rooftoppers.

So far, so good. Excellent writing, a lively plot, endearing characters, building action–I can see why the book was an award-winning, best-selling success in Britain and why it is becoming more and more well known in the U.S. I had a very bright young lady recommend the book to me when I was in Ireland a few years ago, but I’m just now getting around to reading it.

But . . . our young protagonist, Sophie, with “hair the color of lightning”, “tall and generous and bookish and awkward”, also spits and curses. She curses and uses God’s name in vain several times in the course of the story. And it’s totally acceptable to her own conscience and to everyone else in the story. There’s nary an admonition, and no one blinks an eye. And then, there’s the fight scene. Sophie and her friends, the Rooftoppers, are attacked by another gang of young rooftoppers on a roof, of course. The children fight with teeth and nails, sharpened bone daggers, stones, and at least one knife. They bite and scratch and throw rocks and roof slates and draw blood, and Sophie kicks one of her (male) opponents in the crotch, rendering him incapacitated. The advice Sophie gets during the fight is serious and dangerous: “Punch like you mean it.” Kick him if you can’t punch him.” “Kicking is less personal.” “Do not mess with rooftoppers.”

So. Dealbreaker? I couldn’t hand this one to any of my young library patrons without a warning at least. And I won’t shelve it in my library, even though the author, “a fellow in English literature at All Souls College, Oxford’ has talent. I just wish she had left out the cursing and toned down the fighting.

The Apple Pie That Papa Baked by Lauren Thompson

Jun27

Thompson, Lauren. The Apple Pie That Papa Baked. Illustrated by Jonathan Bean. Simon & Schuster, 2007.

This story poem begins, “This is the pie, warm and sweet, that Papa baked.” With a rhythm and pattern similar to “this is the house that Jack built”, the story goes on to tell where the apples that make the pie originated: on the tree, in the earth, fed by rain, from the clouds, in the sky, etc. And it all comes back to a pie made by Papa with love for a little girl to share with friends.

Jonathan Bean has written and illustrated several outstanding picture books, including This Is My Home, This Is My School and Building our House, which are both about the daily life of a homeschooling family. But according to the illustrator blurb, The Apple Pie That Papa Baked was Mr. Bean’s first book. He says his illustrations in Apple Pie “were strongly influenced by the work of Virginia Lee Burton and Wanda Gag, as well as the small family orchard where he picked peaches, pears, and, of course, apples.” The influences were good, and the three-color pictures–red, yellow, and black– in this cumulative poem book are lively and engaging. The style is different from Jonathan Bean’s other books that I have read, but it fits well with this folk tale, nursery rhyme story.

I am excited to add this book to the new edition of Picture Book Preschool that I am working on. It makes a great read aloud, and children can spend a long time just looking at the pictures to find all the details of farm and family and pie.

This Picture Book Preschool book can be borrowed by member families from Meriadoc Homeschool Library.

Two Indian Picture Books by Rajani LaRocca

Jun20

Where Three Oceans Meet by Rajani LaRocca. Illustrated by Archana Sreenivasan. Abrams Books for Young Readers, 2021.

I’ll Go and Come Back by Rajani LaRocca. Illustrated by Sara Palacios. Candlewick, 2022.

Both of these books by the same author tell the story of an Indian American child and her grandmother (Pati) who lives in India. Both are inspired by the author’s childhood experience of visiting her grandmother in India. And both are a delightful introduction to the sights and sounds of South India, in particular, and to the joy of visiting family wherever they might live.

In Where Three Oceans Meet Sejal, Mommy, and Pati travel together to very tip of the Indian subcontinent. Pati is excited to go to the temples (and pray to “the goddess”, which they do). Mommy is anxious to visit old friends. And Sejal wants to see “what’s at the end of the earth” where three oceans–the Bay of Bengal, the Arabian Sea, and the Indian Ocean— meet. The road trip that the three generations of women take includes a boat trip, a train, visits with friends, shopping, Indian foods and snacks, temple worship, and even a sick day in the hotel. The book culminates in the picture of the three women/girls standing on the shore where the three bodies of water meet near the city of Kanyakumari.

I’ll Go and Come Back tells of how Jyoti, another Indian American girl, goes to visit her family in India for the summer. At first Jyoti is homesick, but she and Pati bond over activities that they share despite the language barrier between them. In the second half of the book Pati comes to visit Jyoti in America, and grandmother and granddaughter again find joy in sharing games and books and food and shopping in Jyoti’s homeland of the United States. “Pati flew back home to India, but our love stretched across the world.”

I liked the illustrations, by different illustrators, one of South Indian origin and one not, in both books, but I preferred the stylized people with round faces and the colorful scenery in I’ll Go and Come Back. The pictures in Where Three Oceans Meet are more complex in the backgrounds and more evocative of feelings of family togetherness, but not as simple and straightforward. In the same way, although the stories are similar—a little girl visiting her grandmother in India–I’ll Go and Come Back is more simple and more accessible for preschoolers, even though it includes several Tamil words that are only explained in the context of the story.

As I said before either book would be a lovely introduction to India and Indian culture for preschool or primary children as well as being a reminder of family ties that can bind even across oceans and generations.

Ferris by Kate diCamillo

Jun19

“It was the summer before Emma Phineas Wilkey (who everyone called Ferris) went into the fifth grade.

It was the summer that the ghost appeared to Charisse, the summer that Ferris’s sister, Pinky Wilkey, devoted herself to becoming an outlaw, and the summer that Uncle Ted left Aunt Shirley and moved into the Wilkey basement to paint a history of the world.

It was the summer that Ferris’s best friend, Billy Jackson, played a song called ‘Mysterious Barricades’ over and over again on the piano.”

Ferris is a summer book. It’s filled with quirky, caricature characters. The theme line repeated throughout the book is: “Every story is a love story. Every good story is a love story.” And this story embodies that theme. 

However, the story also gives readers some outlandish, exaggerated characters who showcase the difficulties and barriers to that love in the real world. Ferris, the main character, is a ten year old rule follower and observer. Her little sister, Pinky, is a six year old thief and would-be outlaw bank robber. Seriously, among other unbelievable and laugh-out-loud escapades, Pinky tries to rob a bank to get her name and picture on a wanted poster. Ferris’s and Pinky’s parents are inept at best, but loving and involved even when they can’t do anything about Pinky’s mayhem or the raccoons in the attic. Charisse, Ferris’s grandmother, has a heart condition and sees a ghost who wants someone to light the chandelier in the dining room with forty candles, a chandelier that has never been lit before. Uncle Ted is called to paint a history of the entire world on the basement walls, but all he can do is paint a blob that is supposed to be a foot. 

It all sounds prosaic and weird when I tell it, but when Kate DiCamillo takes over and tells the story it becomes poetic, a love story. I think the basic idea is that we love people even in their weirdness and unfathomability. Love them even when we don’t understand and when their behavior is out of control (like Pinky), and when they see demanding ghosts that we can’t see. Or when they feel a calling that we don’t understand. Love them despite the “mysterious barricades” that attempt to come between us and those that we love.

Vocabulary, language, and words are a big part of this book, too. Ferris’s and Billy’s former teacher, Mrs. Mielk, taught them a lot of words, and that vocabulary is woven into the story of the children and their summer adventures. I loved all of the vocabulary that filled the story with the joy of language.

I’ll close with a few quotes to give you a flavor of the book. It’s definitely odd and unusually humorous and endearing, while dealing with serious subjects such as aging, broken relationships, reconciliation, and death. Ferris is a great narrator, childlike and unknowingly insightful at the same time, and Pinky is amazing in her incorrigible delinquency.

“Pinky was six years old, and even though Ferris was her older sister, she did not understand Pinky on a cellular level. Pinky was a fearsome mystery.”

“Monomaniacal. That was another Mielk vocabulary word. It described Pinky perfectly. She was only interested in one thing: being an outlaw.”

“You are too much of a rule follower, Ferris,” Charisse had said to her once. “You have to insist on being yourself. Do not let the world tell you who you are. Rather, tell the world who you are. Pinky understands this. She takes it to an extreme, of course.”

“These people,” he said, “are afraid to love. Loving someone takes a whole lot of courage. Some people just aren’t up to the task.”

“The dogs bark but the caravan passes by.” (Ferris’s dad’s favorite maxim)

This book can be borrowed by member families from Meriadoc Homeschool Library.

The Secret Language of Birds by Lynne Kelly

Jun12

For some reason that is never really spelled out in the story, Nina has trouble making friends. She’s twelve years old, perhaps a little bit over-enthusiastic about her special interest, birds, and otherwise seemingly normal and likable. But she hasn’t yet found her “tribe”.

Nevertheless, as an amateur birdwatcher and collector of bird facts, Nina is feeling almost at home at her aunt’s summer camp in Bee Holler, TX. Her new camp friends, who call themselves The Oddballs, make Nina part of the group, and when the four girls discover two huge white birds nesting near the old infirmary at camp, they also discover a group mission: protect the birds!

There are mysteries to be solved in this nature fiction story. Are these birds rare, endangered whooping cranes? If so, why are they in Texas, not their natural habitat? Who is the female bird of the pair, and where did she come from? Is there an egg in the nest? Will it hatch? When? How can the girls watch over the birds without alerting the public to their whereabouts?

The story also involves some rule-breaking on the part of The Oddballs, but there are consequences for their disobedience.Everything is resolved satisfactorily by the end of the book. And there are a few mentions of evolutionary theory (“Did y’all know that birds evolved from dinosaurs?”), but most of the science-y information in the book is accurate as far as I could tell. Give this one to nature lovers, bird lovers in particular, and to twelve year olds who are thinking about where they belong in the world and how to fit in without losing themselves. It’s not too preachy, but the story does deal with those issues in an understated and helpful way.

The Night War by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley

Jun11

I’ve read and reviewed a few other books by contemporary middle grade and young adult author Kimberly Brubaker Bradley:

I’ve also read, but not reviewed, The War That Saved My Life and The War I Finally Won. Ms. Bradley tends to write about several topics and settings: World War II Europe, France in particular, Catholicism and religion, abused children, children with disabilities. The Night War is a Jewish Holocaust story set in France, 1942. When Miri (Miriam), a twelve year old Jewish girl, and her parents are routed from their apartment in Paris by the French police and herded onto buses to be taken to the Velodrome d’Hiver, Miri becomes separated from her family but she given the responsibility of escaping with and caring for her two year old neighbor, Nora Rosenbaum. Mrs. Rosenbaum tells Miri to run, to take Nora, and to somehow try to get to Switzerland. And Miri is faced with a choice, the first of many impossible choices: will she try to find her parents in the Velodrome or escape with Nora?

Miri chooses to run, and with the help of a French nun, she manages to get away from the Nazi roundup of Jews in Paris. Eventually, Miri, who takes the name of Marie, and Nora end up in Chenonceaux, near the castle of Chenonceau, which was long ago the dwelling of Diane de Poitiers and subsequently, Catherine de Medici. These women and their history become a significant part of Miri/Marie’s story. (SPOILER WARNING: Here be ghosts and ghost-like characters.)

And so do the nuns of Chenonceaux. Marie is hidden in a convent school, and she again is faced with choices. Does she stay in relative safety in the school, or does she attempt to take Nora and flee to Vichy France and then on to Switzerland? Is Nora safer with her foster family, or is she in danger of forgetting her family and her Jewish heritage? Can Miri pretend to be Catholic and still pray to God in her own Jewish way? And there are other choices to be made as Marie stumbles upon a secret resistance network and is asked to help smuggle others out of Nazi-controlled France.

This story with its emphasis on personal responsibility and making good choices, and the consequences of bad choices, is an excellent one for middle grade readers who are just waking up to their own responsibilities and moral choices in life. Recommended for readers age 10 and up, or as soon as you think your reader is ready for hard things about the Holocaust and the evil that people do. Not graphic.

Linnets and Valerians by Elizabeth Goudge

Jun10

Linnets and Valerians is a beautiful, truth-filled, engaging fantasy story by one of my favorite authors that I’m afraid will be problematic for many Christian readers. It shouldn’t be problematic to acknowledge that there is a spiritual realm of both good and evil and that spiritual battles must sometimes be fought by unconventional means. But witchcraft and spells, even good ones that counter evil, are a snare and anathema to some people, even reading about such things, so follow your own conscience.

Four endearing but rather naughty siblings–Robert, Nan, Timothy, and Betsy– are left to stay with their grandmother while their father is in Egypt with his regiment. “Grandmother said they were insubordinate; Father only thought them high-spirited.” Since the children’s first acts in the book are to run away from grandmother’s house and to “borrow” a pony and cart full of someone’s else’s groceries, I tend to agree with Grandmother. But the children turn out to be charming, nevertheless.

And they don’t stay with Grandmother very long. It’s not much of a spoiler, since the change happens in the second chapter of the book, to tell that the four incorrigible children end up living with their Uncle Ambrose, a Church of England clergyman, former educator, and inveterate bachelor. Uncle Ambrose also claims to dislike children, but he takes his nephews and nieces into his home anyway. And so the adventure begins.

Since this is a fantasy story there is magic, both black magic and white. Since it’s an Elizabeth Goudge story there are families to be reunited. And since it’s essentially a story with Christian underpinnings and a fairy tale of sorts, there is a happy ending where all’s well that ends well. But before we get to the happy ending, there is also a witch and evil spells and good counter-spells. That’s the part that’s going to be a deal-breaker for some readers. In short, if Harry Potter is a an offense to your conscience, then Linnets and Valerians is not for you either. I wish Goudge had used prayer instead of “white magic” to fight off the evil in the book, but in a way the prayers and common sense of Uncle Ambrose are weapons in the battle, too.

Still, I thought it was a fantastic story. Robert is the quintessential plucky British boy with a big, but very practical, imagination. He tends to get himself and his siblings into trouble with his schemes and ideas, but Nan, the sensible older sister, is there to keep Robert somewhat in check. Timothy is imaginative, too, but he tends toward being delicate and sensitive and thoughtful rather than “a force to be reckoned with.” And little Betsy has both the sweetness and the toughness of a youngest child. Uncle Ambrose is curmudgeonly, with a heart of gold, and each of the other characters has his or her own eccentric personality and peculiarities, including Emma Cobley the witch, Ezra the beekeeper servant, Moses Glory Glory Alleluja, Lady Alicia, Abednego the monkey, Hector the owl, and even Daft Davie who lives in a cave up on the hill.

With wonderful characters such as these, Elizabeth Goudge weaves a plot that takes the children all over the surrounding countryside and into the ancient manor house of Lady Alicia, who lives a secluded life after having lost her husband and her only child. Lady Alicia’s only companions are Abednego the mischievous monkey and one servant, Moses Glory Glory Alleluja –until the children intrude on her life and indeed begin to bring her back to life. Full story to follow.

If you can get past the witchiness and “white magic”, this one of only two children’s books by Elizabeth Goudge (the other is The Little White Horse) is, dare I say, pure magic. It reminds me of a hymn of praise and a prayer for protection from evil, and there is in fact a hymn of praise and invocation inserted into the story. I wish I knew a tune for it.

Glory, children, glory alleluja,
Praise to the Lord.
Great glory for sun and moon and star shine,
And for His Word.

Glory that wells, streams, and flowing fountains
Sing to His praise,
That the snows laud him, frost fire, and rainbows
The nights and days.

Glory, children, glory alleluja
For birds and bees,
For shepherd and sheep upon the mountains,
Valleys and trees.

Is it glory for the gift o’ children
To guard an’ keep?
Varmints and scoundrels, I love ’em only
When they’re asleep.

Linnets and Valerians, p.97-98

This book can be borrowed by member families from Meriadoc Homeschool Library.

Once a Queen by Sarah Arthur

Jun8

At first, I thought this 2024 middle grade/YA fantasy novel from Waterbrook Press was Narnia fan fiction, or perhaps a Narnia sequel, Susan’s Story: Once a Queen in Narnia or something like that. (“Once a king or queen of Narnia, always a king or queen of Narnia.”) That expectation was a disservice to the novel as it is. Sarah Arthur’s story certainly has strong echoes of Narnia, as well as being indebted to E. Nesbit, George MacDonald, Elizabeth Goudge, and Madeleine L’Engle, influences the author acknowledges in an author’s Q & A in the back of the book. So in my defense, I didn’t know, and the Narnia-love was there from the beginning.

I would advise readers to take Once a Queen on its own terms and NOT try to compare or find connections to any other stories or worlds until you get to the end. In this particular story, fourteen year old American Eva Joyce comes with her British mother to visit her estranged grandmother in the family manor of Carrick Hall in the West Midlands region of England. The year is 1995. Eva has been nurtured by the classic fantasy tales and children’s books, especially the Ternival tales of Mesterra by A.H.W. Clifton. She’s never actually experienced a magical portal to another world, however, even though this trip to England feels a bit like a fairy tale.

And the story does turn into a fairy tale, complete with magical worlds, an evil queen, secret gardens, fantastical creatures, and a quest to be completed. And secrets. Lots of secrets. Eva’s mum has secrets. Eva’s grandmother has secrets. Eva herself discovers so many wondrous secret things that she finds herself unable to keep all of the secrets straight. Who can be told about what, and when, and how? And what secrets are being withheld from Eva and why? This whole secret motif is the weakest part of the book: too many people keeping too many secrets for too little reason. Nevertheless, I resigned myself to getting bits of information doled out to me in each chapter –reluctantly and incompletely.

The novel itself alternates between strange occurrences in our world as Eva gets to know her grandmother and her grandmother’s tragic history and equally strange events in the world of Mesterra, woven by Magister, and ruled by a long line of kings and queens who built a a great kingdom called Ternival. Of course, there are doors between the worlds, hard to find and harder to open, but real. And Eva and her friend Frankie, the gardener’s grandson, are determined to find the way into the fantasy world that they have read about in books and somehow to solve the problems of their own world by doing so.

Once a Queen is a a lovely story with Christian worldview underpinnings, despite all of the secrets and slow revelations, and I highly recommend it to lovers of high fantasy and adventure stories. The novel is set up for a sequel, perhaps many sequels, and indeed there is a “sneak preview” of the next book in the series that is printed in the back of of this first book. The next book is to be called Once a Castle, and I look forward to its publication. (Once a Queen is complete in itself, and does not end in a cliffhanger.) Recommended for ages 12 and up.

Out of a Far Country: A Gay Son’s Journey to God by Christopher Yuan

Jun3

I’ve wanted to read Christopher Yuan’s conversion story for a while, but just recently managed to get hold of a copy. I think it was a bit anticlimactic for me because I already heard most of the outlines and some of the details of Mr. Yuan’s story. But for someone coming to the story with fresh eyes, this book would be a very powerful testimony to the saving power of the gospel of Jesus Christ, for both wayward sons and their unredeemed parents.

Christopher Yuan is the younger of two sons in a traditional Chinese American family. His parents were immigrants to the United States from Taiwan who struggled but made good in a new country with lots of hard work and determination–the familiar American immigrant success story. Christopher’s father earned a doctorate and a DDS in dentistry and with his wife, Christopher’s mother, Angela’s help, established a thriving dental practice in Chicago. Their two boys grew up in a strict but loving Chinese American family with a somewhat distant father and a proud and deeply attached mother. The book begins with Christopher’s “coming out” story: he tells his parents about his homosexuality, which has been the center of his life for several years before this confession. “It’s not something I can choose. I was born this way. . . I am gay.” The remainder of the book tells how Christopher’s life became more and more chaotic and dysfunctional, with drugs, sex, and illicit money featured prominently until Christopher finally ends up in prison.

In the meantime, Angela goes from suicidal and irreligious to persevering prayer warrior after she relinquishes control of her life and of Christopher’s life to God and begins to know Him as her ever present help in a years long vigil and prayer for the salvation of her son. Both Angela and Christopher eventually learn that their only hope is found in Christ.

“Years of heartbreak, confusion, and prayer followed before the Yuans found a place of complete surrender, which is God’s desire for all families. Their amazing story, told from the perspectives of both mother and son, offers hope for anyone affected by homosexuality. God calls all who are lost to come home to him. Casting a compelling vision for holy sexuality, Out of a Far Country speaks to prodigals, parents of prodigals, and those wanting to minister to the gay community.”

The Mystery of the Pilgrim Trading Post by Anne Molloy

Jun1

This mystery tale of smugglers and Native American artifacts and a fight against bridges and roads being built on top of someone’s home is fairly standard and quite readable. It reminds me of my beloved Trixie Belden mysteries and of the many mysteries by Helen Fuller Orton and the Boxcar Children series by Gertrude Chandler Warner. This one is not part of a series, but if you like any of Ms. Molloy’s many mystery adventure stories, you will probably enjoy this one.

Thirteen year old twins, Will and Lettie Dennis, and their cousin Jonas Wingate are invited to spend the summer at the old TIbbets homestead with Cousin Mary Peter, whose home is set to be demolished soon so that a bridge can be built from the Maine coast out to Eden Island and Smuggler’s Cove. None of the three really wants to sped their summer in Maine with a cousin they never met, but their parents have asked them to give it a week’s trial. Cousin Mary Peter, a pharmacist, storekeeper, and somewhat eccentric caregiver, assumes that the children are staying for the summer. And as it turns out, Will, Lettie, and Jo find more to pique their interest than they thought they would, including a plan to save the old homestead by having it declared a historical site. The family have always “firmly believed that it [the house] was the very place where the Pilgrims set up a post to trade with the Indians when they came from Plymouth to this bay.” If the children can prove it, the house will be protected.

Published in 1964, the mystery adventure story features free-range children exploring and sometimes doing rather foolish things like stowing away on a smuggler’s boat or taking a leaky boat out into the bay, but all’s well that ends well. (Just don’t try these exploits at home.) Even one of the “villains” of the story is redeemed in the end. It all makes for a satisfying middle grade summer novel. And as I said, it’s a stand alone book, for those who prefer their books free of series entanglements.

This book can be borrowed by member families from Meriadoc Homeschool Library.