Slavery for your 7-year-old

Dear Aunt Debbie, 

I haven't seen I Saw Esau, but clearly it's a book we need to get into this house -- what fun!

I wrote a while ago about reading the Molly books from the American Girl series, and being pleased to find them better than I'd expected. Recently, Eleanor has picked them up to read on her own, and has been ripping through them; inspired, I've gotten us several more from the series via the library. 

For the last week or so, then, Eleanor has been engrossed in the Addy books, by Connie Porter.  By virtue of their main character's story, they are far more intense in their content than the Molly books were. I can see why the first one would have riveted Mona in an ER waiting room. 

Addy Walker is born into slavery, and in her first book, Meet Addy, she lives on Master Stevens's plantation with her parents, her 15-year-old brother Sam, and her one-year-old sister, Esther. There are a few details about her experience of slavery that are quite hard-hitting, especially in a book aimed at ages 7 and up. In one scene, Addy is tasked with picking worms off the leaves of tobacco plants. When she misses some, the overseer follows her down the row, gathering them, then forces her to eat them. This made quite an impression on Eleanor (and on almost 4-year-old Isabel, who heard it from her older sister and then proceeded to repeat it to several people we met the next day).  There is also a mention of Sam having scars on his back from being whipped the previous year when he tried to escape -- we don't see the scene, but it's referred to.

Perhaps the most disturbing scene comes when Addy's father and brother are sold to another plantation owner just before the family had planned to run away together.  Despite the loss of half of their family, Addy and her mother stick to the plan, leaving baby Esther behind with other slaves on the plantation, and eventually make it to a safe house on the Underground Railway.  The next five books take place in Philadelphia, among freedmen.

The level of intensity here led Eleanor to put the book down for a few days after reading about Poppa and Sam being tied up and taken away.  That's when I picked it up: the first time I've had to read on my own something Eleanor was reading on her own, so we could talk about it.  (Hooray!)  Because I knew what was coming, I was able to reassure her: no, despite the picture of Momma flailing in the roaring river, she doesn't drown, and she and Addy do escape successfully.  I didn't push Eleanor to finish the book, but left it out on the coffee table without commenting on it.  A few days later, she sat down and finished it.  In less than a week, she has now read books 2, 3, and 4, and we have 5 and 6 on hold at the library.  Friends, we have a READER.

I'm running a bit behind: I've read  Addy Learns a Lesson, and am just starting Addy's Surprise (so far, it's Eleanor's favorite).  Addy Learns a Lesson introduces Addy's good, kind friend, Sarah, who is also a former slave, and her new nemesis, Harriet, a spoiled girl who was born free.  There is well-woven historical detail, but the focus is on relationships between school-age girls.

One interesting choice in Connie Porter's writing is that the slaves and former slaves don't speak with proper English grammar.  It's not full-on black dialect, but there's a definite voice here: "Momma and me saving for a lamp."  Addy's teacher is a college-educated black woman, and speaks with perfect grammar.  Eleanor hasn't commented on this yet, but it struck me while reading.  I find myself looking forward to the rest of the books, and even more so, to the conversations they'll inspire.

Love, Annie

American girls

Dear Annie,

I have a vivid memory of an emergency room waiting area (Lizzie had broken a wrist falling from a tree) where Mona sat the whole time with her back to the TV, reading Meet Addy by Connie Porter, another American Girl book.  She was in first grade -- I think it was the first chapter book she read on her own.  The American Girl series plug along at the store, selling steadily but not amazingly.  Each of the American Girl historical figure dolls has an accompanying six book series -- and some have a seventh book focusing on a friend of the central character.  The company, which started in 1986, was bought by Mattel (the mega-toy business that brings us Barbie, among many others) 12 years later.  They've kept the basic marketing scheme: upscale dolls, clothing and accessories which are sold directly to consumers, and books and a handful of games that are more widely available.

I suspect you'll find more of the "reasonable writing, interesting historical detail" you describe in the Molly book if you guys keep going.  They deal with historical issues of whatever time they're about in quiet but straightforward ways.  Most of them have the same titles and trajectory in the six books: Meet Molly, Molly Learns a Lesson, Molly's Surprise, etc.   One author, Valerie Tripp, wrote the Molly books, as well as all of Kit, Josephina, Felicity and half of Samantha.  I will admit that I was disconcerted a few years back when they introduced a historical character who is younger than I:  the story of Julie is set in San Francisco in 1974.

The American Girl publications that fly off our shelves, though, are the advice books.  They publish quite a few, all aimed at 8-to-12 year olds, with titles like, A Smart Girl's Guide to Friendship Troubles/...to Staying Home Alone/...to her Parents' Divorce/...to Manners/...to Sticky Situations/ ...to Boys.  Their advice is pretty solid, full of common sense and pushing girls to think for themselves. 

Then there's the runaway bestseller,
The Care and Keeping of You: The Body Book for Girls.  It's the ultimate puberty-but-no-sex explainer.  We've discussed books about where babies come for young kids, and someday we'll do another entry on puberty and periods.  There are other books too, but this one is an excellent place to start.

Love,

Deborah

Traveling with friends

Dear Aunt Debbie,

Thank you for getting us entered into the Independent Book Blogger Awards!  Readers, please go vote for us there starting tomorrow (Tuesday)!  I'm looking forward to perusing some more book blogs I don't know about yet.

Our regular reader (and my former awesome student) Erica has corrected me in a comment on my use of the term "book trailer" to describe John Green's vlog about The Fault in Our Stars.  I spent a little bit of time tonight looking at John Green and his brother Hank's Nerdfighters site, which seems to be a rich and intense world.  Their goal: "We fight to increase awesome and decrease suck."  Looks like a nice community to be able to join, especially if you're a nerdy HS student.

I'm still left with the question: publishers are pushing for authors to make book trailers and have more of an online presence, but are people really watching these things regularly, if they're not part of an organic community with a larger goal?

We've been on vacation this week, which means very few new books, but a lot of good rereading of old ones, especially skinny little books that can slip easily into the back of the diaper bag so I can pull them out when we're waiting in line at an amusement park, or at the table in a restaurant before the food has come.

So hello, old friends: Little Bear, Poppleton, A Bargain for Frances, The Golly Sisters, the Nutshell Library.  Eleanor and I are rereading The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, which is just as gripping as it was for her the first time around, and opens the way for different conversations than it did when she was 3 1/2.  I love that book.

But our Narnia comes in a nice heavy hardcover, so we needed a chapter book of reasonable length to keep Eleanor occupied without weighing down the diaper bag.  Enter Molly Learns a Lesson, the second in a series of six American Girl books which Eleanor received for Christmas and her birthday from her grandmother, my mother-in-law, along with her Molly McIntire doll.  You and I have chatted briefly about the American Girl experience.  I was pleasantly surprised when we read the first one a few months ago: reasonable writing, interesting historical detail.  Molly is the spunky 1944 girl whose father is a doctor over in London helping treat soldiers in a military hospital.  There's a kind of Little Women feel to some of it -- a fatherless family pulling together on the Home Front and trying to help the war effort, while the children are drawn into their own smaller intrigues.  There's also a certain amount of Learning of Lessons, even in the books that don't have it in the title, but all in all both Eleanor and I are engaged.

It's interesting to read them today and think about what aspects are anachronistic -- I remember reading my mom's old copy of Junior Miss, by Sally Benson, published in 1941, and both enjoying it tremendously and feeling a little uncomfortable about the gender roles portrayed in the relationship between Judy Graves and her friends.  (This, in a brief review on a lovely librarian blog, is the copy I read.)  In Valerie Tripp's Molly stories, there's a lot of boys-against-girls stuff going on, but it's also carefully modulated: the very smart girl wins the class multiplication bee, rather than the obnoxious boy, though Molly herself isn't very good at multiplication.  You can feel the hand of the editor urging caution in creating female characters with the right combination of strength, endearing flaws, and historical accuracy.  It's an interesting mix.

Love, Annie