book reviews
Reviews of books that explore the complexities of family throughout history and across cultures.
Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys
I was in a foster home with my little sister for almost 3 years with the most wonderful loving couple Deanna and Richard Lancaster. They wanted to adopt us but because our mother knew she could collect welfare from having us with her so that, unfortunately, didn't happen, and let me tell you, I was angry for a very long time about it. However, with the Lancasters, I found my love for reading books, especially mysteries! During our stay with these kind and loving people, Deanna introduced my sister and me to Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys Mysteries. Deanna was a wonderful woman who worked as a nurse as well as manage a household, with cooking, cleaning, laundry, taking care of us girls and her amazing husband Richard, everyone called him Dick, He was a very kind and thoughtful man, he was a used car salesman by day and on Sundays, he would take us to work with him, we had to sit in the car for a while but eventually he would take us to lunch at a place called Sambos(which was unfortunately torn down because the picture on the building was of a little black boy with a tiger, so they deemed it "racist" which if I am being honest it was.) it always smelled so good there and the food was delicious. Deanna and Dick were also very religious, we went to lots of church and bible studies at other church members' houses and they also had a jewelry sales business they did on the side. This was not junk jewelry, this was real gemstones such as diamonds, rubies, emeralds, and Jade...a lot of Jade. We would take the summers and travel all over California selling these gorgeous pieces. I also learned my love for a lot of good old music like Paul Anka, Diana Ross and the Supremes, Niel Sedaka, Niel Diamond(whom I love to listen to still), and the like. I first started loving Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys mysteries when Deanna would read them to us at bedtime, however, my sister would be asleep the first five minutes she was in bed. Deanna would read three to four pages per night so as to keep the suspense up and make the book last longer. She would change her voice to sound like the characters, making dramatic faces that would make me giggle, and was great at leaving me hanging and very excited for bedtime each night.
By C. M. Sears5 years ago in Families
Three Little Horses
Let me tell you a story of The Three Little Horses. The strangest children’s book I have ever read. It goes back to when I was a child. My grandmother Irma gave me this book to read because she noticed it had horses in it and I liked horses. Appreciating her rationale, I took the book. I never saw her purchase this book for me so I think she must have had it prior to me being born in 1982. The book “Three Little Horses” was published in 1958; my grandmother immigrated to the United States from Germany in 1957. This book was written by Piet Worm and was probably the most bizarrely illustrated and strangely written children’s book I had ever encountered in my young years. It told me a lot about how secretly odd grandma was.
By Nicole Celencevicius5 years ago in Families
Love You Forever
"I'll love you forever. I'll like you for always. As long as I'm living, my baby you'll be.". Those words hit you so differently as a child as opposed to the way you feel them while hearing them as an adult. Love You Forever, by Robert Munsch has always been my favorite bedtime story. I think what had originally drawn me in was the rhythm that you can't help but to form a flow to every time you utter aloud those very words. The more that same phrase is reiterated throughout the story, the more rhythmic it becomes. Honestly, what toddler or adolescent does not start moving to the beat of almost every song they hear. That also makes it memorable.
By Sharon Smith5 years ago in Families
"Wild" read which never gets old
There was and still is something deliciously trippy about Maurice Sendak's "Where the Wild Things Are". I don't know which is crazier -- the storyline about a little boy, Max, who is sent to his room and sails away to an island full of weird and wonderful creatures where he is subsequently anointed King -- or the illustrations themselves, all muted and sepia 1960s colors, grotesque and a tad frightening.
By Shirley Twist5 years ago in Families
Baby Bear
When I was a kid, my favourite book was about a baby bear. It was a story of a bear that got lost in the woods and had to get home to his family. It’s a classic introduction to animals with a basic storyline for babies, with the addition of some fake furs and feathers for some of the animals.
By Blake Smith5 years ago in Families
Dr Seuss; The Maker of Dreams
'One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish' (Dr Seuss, 1960) It was the first book I read. In those long-ago dim memories of near infanthood, I can still remember sitting on the living room floor. Pulling my worn and well-loved copy of One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish out from between The Little Golden Books, it shared a home with.
By J.B. Miller5 years ago in Families
