I’m up to p. 178 and may pick it up again sometime when I feel bored. My reactions alternate between cringing, then thinking it’s getting a bit better, then cringing again…basically I’m reading it because I’m not too far from completing the whole list.
I see that in 1976, the year that it won, the Honor books were
1 Figgs & Phantoms by Ellen Raskin (Dutton)
2 My Brother Sam is Dead by James Lincoln Collier & Christopher Collier (Four Winds)
3 The Perilous Gard by Elizabeth Marie Pope (Houghton)
4 Philip Hall Likes Me, I Reckon Maybe by Bette Greene (Dial)
I’ve read numbers 2 and 3 and they were good but flawed. I haven’t read 1 and 4 and have to wonder, was M C Higgins
really better?
Somewhere I read a review describing it as a junior version of The Robe–another book with guest appearances and proselytizing.
I just finished Call it Courage, a quick and easy read. Yet another of the international, exotic settings loved by the early Newbery juries. My response wasn’t quite as negative as **wonky’**s upthread, just meh rather than bleh. And yes, the obstacles are conquered all too easily. The protagonist just decides one day that he’ll overcome his deep fear of the sea–by going out to sea all alone. Really?
The Slave Dancer (1974), by Paula Fox. I had read a handful of pages in this, then it had to go back to the library. I wasn’t immediately taken with it, but I’m really glad I went back to it. Really good, though not cuddly at all. The character development and arc of the main character rang true for me.
Recommendation: I think this one has a lot to recommend if for an older kid or an adult. I don’t think it would have resonated for me when I was really young. I think I would have found Jessie not sympathetic enough.
Julie of the Wolves (1973), by Jean Craighead George. I don’t know why I hated this, but I did. This was a DNF. I don’t know that there’s anything actually wrong with the book.
Recommendation: I hesitate to recommend reading or not reading this one.
Julie of the Wolves: I remember having mixed feelings about it, liking it because I like the author (two thumbs up for* My Side of the Mountain*!) but feeling creeped out by other parts. I don’t remember it too well and don’t have any strong desire to go back and reread it. The Slave Dancer: I last read it 25 years ago, liked it well enough then but not enough to want to reread it now.
I finally finished reading M C Higgins the Great–and was so annoyed that I half-threw it across the room. I would have thrown it hard if hubby hadn’t been asleep next to me. It’s way up there with Crispin: the Cross of Lead and Dead End In Norvelt as a top contender for modern winners that I dislike. It’s better written than Crispin, but really, there were no major characters I liked, nothing happened that I liked, and the people whom I was interested in appeared for just a few pages.
So did this win the Newbery because judges thought that it was time for a book about an African American family in Appalachia? Or maybe they didn’t want to vote for the books that ended up as Honor books–an anti-war book about the Revolutionary War, My Brother Sam is Dead, which I think is a better book.
Or maybe they didn’t want to vote for an Elizabethan fantasy/romance, The Perilous Gard, which I also find to be a better book.
I haven’t read the other 2 Honor books but they’re by Ellen Raskin, whose book The Westing Game was named as many posters’ favorite medalist on the other thread, and Bette Greene, whose Summer of My German Soldier was an ALA Notable Book, New York Times Book of the Year and National Book Award Finalist; it’s a book that deserved at least a Newbery Honor.
Anyway with M C Higgins finished, I’ve read all the medalists from 1948 to 2017. Of the rest, there are 9 that I haven’t read at all, several that I’ve started and don’t want to finish (like The Story of Mankind and Tales from Silver Lands) and some that I’ve started and do want to finish, like Miss Hickory.
For those of you looking for some of the older medalists, several are available online, including 3 on Project Gutenberg: The Story of Mankind, Doctor Doolitle, The Dark Frigate: The Dark Frigate by Charles Boardman Hawes - Free Ebook
The Dark Frigate: swashbuckling, swordfights, fistfights, gunfights, treachery, torture, murder, all the 17th Century action and adventure you can think of. I recommend it if you like that genre. The author is probably influenced by Robert Louis Stevenson–it reminded me of Kidnapped.
Have you seen Tropic Thunder? Because this book is nothing like Tropic Thunder. But there’s a character in that movie who’s desperate to win an Oscar, and so he goes all-in on every character cliche he can think of that might win him the award.
I often found myself thinking about that character as I read Hello Universe.
You got yer dyslexic (?) Filipino boy with a grandmother from The Old Country who dispenses wise advice in the form of Filipino folktales. You got yer deaf white girl who’s real nerdy. You got yer Japanese girl who thinks she’s psychic and is nauseatingly whimsical. You got yer fat entitled white boy with daddy issues who bullies everyone.
Saying I loathed the book would be putting it strongly. But it was more than enough to convince me not to read anything else by this author. I hope she enjoys the Newbery she worked for so hard.
Gay-Neck: The Story of a Pigeon (1928), by Dhan Gopal Mukerji. I didn’t read it. I didn’t even read enough to call it a real DNF. I found an anthologized excerpt and read that and said “Life is too short to read this book.”
Recommendation: I just can’t. Out of the Dust (1998), by Karen Hesse. A novel in verse. It wasn’t great poetry, but it worked. Of course, I love poetry, so that has an effect. The story was very atmospheric and compelling for me. Depressing, but not as depressing as I would have expected, given the Dust Bowl setting and some of the horrific events.
Recommendation: If you hate poetry, not a good choice. But it’s short and I found it quite affecting. The Summer of the Swans (1971), by Betsy Byars. Too short to really work, though it’s not a terrible read.
Recommendation: Go for it. I think it handles things in a slightly surprising way.
I found my contender for worst medalist of all time: Daniel Boone (1940) by James Daugherty. IMHO it’s much worse than the books sometimes mentioned on this thread as the worst, The Story of Mankind and Crispin and the Cross of Lead. Who knows why this one won? Not for the characterization or information or human interest–after reading it I had just a hazy idea of who Boone was and what he did. Maybe because World War II had just started and the committee thought it was time for the story of a brave American hero?
The worst element in the book is the racist depiction of Native Americans–they’re savage, sly and tricky. In one horrific scene a Native American woman is killed and her young son is dying; he’s terribly wounded (with so much detailed description of his horrible injuries that I wish I had brain bleach) but keeps on fighting, not because he’s brave, though, but because he’s “sullen”.
The Girl Who Drank the Moon (2017), by Kelly Barnhill. This is lovely. The full cast is simply wonderful, with lovely things to say about relationships and change. Sad, but in a healthy way. I’d recommend this one.
Walk Two Moons (1995), by Sharon Creech. It hides the ball too much and has some tone transition problems for me. The characters are strong. The voice isn’t really quite right. The plot doesn’t work to tie the disparate parts together for me. Sad in that way that Newberys are. It’s not a bad book at all. I’m glad I read it, though it’s not one of the best.
When You Reach Me (2010), by Rebecca Stead. This went in unexpected and really nice directions. Lots of believable characters, an affecting plot told in an understated way, humor, mystery, and a strong denouement. Highly recommended.
Bumping to ask how everyone’s Newbery reading is going?
Since I last posted, I’ve read one medalist and several Honor books.
I thought that the 2019 medalist, Merci Suárez Changes Gears, was just OK. I’d give it 3 stars out of 5. I found nothing particularly annoying but didn’t find it particularly memorable either. With books that I enjoy, I want to go back and look at them again, but there was nothing that drew me back to it.
The reviewers like it better than I did, with praise like “delightful”, “luminous”
“heartwarming” and “important”.
One of the 2016 Honor books, The War That Saved My Life , by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley, is a favorite of mine which I’ve reread several times. 4 out of 5 stars, or even 4.5. I’m not rating it higher because it’s set during WWII in England; I’ve read loads of books written during that actual time period, and some of Bradley’s word usage (like “OK”) bothers me since it’s anachronistic. However I recognize that this wouldn’t be an issue for the target audience.
I also like Kimberly Brubaker Bradley’s Fighting Words, a 2021 Honor book, but it’s an uncomfortable book, about a ten year old narrator and her older sister, who are both sexually assaulted by their mom’s boyfriend. Still, it’s a worthwhile and necessary book.
From the NY Times review: "Ten-year-old Della narrates Kimberly Brubaker Bradley’s novel “Fighting Words,” and she is unflinchingly honest about what she’s been through. “I am 10 years old. I’m going to tell you the whole story. Some parts are hard, so I’ll leave those for later. I’ll start with the easy stuff.”
It’s not a bad book at all. I’m glad I read it, though it’s not one of the best.