Tag Archives: Great Depression

JUST LOVED READING: A Way Down Yonder

JUST LOVED READING: A Way Down Yonder

 

  Just Loved Reading:

A Year Down Yonder

Middle Grade Fiction

Peck, Richard. A Year Down Yonder.  New York: Puffin Books, 2000.

      A Year Down Yonder is the sequel to A Long Way from Chicago and just as touching and funny.

Siblings Joey and Mary Alice have spent several summers staying with Grandma Dowdel in her rural Illinois town. In 1937, however, they go their separate ways. Joey has joined the Civilian Conservation Corps and is heading west with them. Lucky Mary Alice gets to spend a whole year with her tough crusty grandmother while their parents try to reverse the economic hardship brought on by the Recession of 1937.

A bored Mary Alice joins Grandma Dowdel in a series of madcap adventures and misadventures. As the year winds down, fifteen-year old Mary Alice discovers that her rough and tough grandmother harbors a deep affection for her granddaughter which is grudgingly reciprocated.

WHY I LOVED READING THIS BOOK:

Peck’s characters carry the plot along and the plot is often one series of – sometimes improbable ­­- events after the other. His humor enhances the narrative and adds a dimension to the characters and their behavior.

RURAL ILLINOIS 1930’s

http://www.onlyinyourstate.com/illinois/small-town-1930-il/

http://www.cyberdriveillinois.com/departments/archives/teaching_packages/hard_times/home.html

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JUST LOVED READING: Tru and Nelle: A Christmas Tale

JUST LOVED READING: Tru and Nelle: A Christmas Tale

Tru and Nelle: A Christmas Tale

by G. Neri 

Middle Grade/Fiction

 

Neri, G. Tru and Nelle: A Christmas Tale. New York: HMH Books for Young Readers, 2017.

Tru moved away from his mother’s cousins home in Monroeville, Alabama. He thought living in New York with his mother and step-father would be fun but after a stint in a military academy, Tru runs away.

He hops on a train with other hobos and heads back to Monroeville. He becomes friends again with Nelle who lives next door to his cousins. It’s the Christmas season but events happen which dampen everyone’s spirits: the house the cousins live in burns down and they move in with Tru’s aunt and uncle on their farm outside Monroeville.

Nelle’s father takes on a case of two black men accused of robbing a store and killing its owner. Nelle blames herself for arrest. Reminiscent of the case in To KIll A Mockingbird, this case doesn’t end happily, either.  The story does reaffirm the better side of the human spirit when Tru and his family and Nelle and her father celebrate Christmas with the accused in the local jail.

WHY I LOVED READING THIS BOOK:

In a surprising twist, Tru’s cousin, Sook, invites a member of the KKK to the celebration. Only his son, the local bully, shows up and demonstrates how beautifully he plays piano.  It doesn’t turn everyone into good friends but the incident highlights how complex race relations were during the Jim Crow era in the South.

Tru and Nelle: A Christmas Tale is the continuing narrative of the friendship between Truman Capote and Harper Lee which continued into adulthood (until Truman Capote became jealous of Harper Lee’s literary success).

Monroeville, Alabama was founded in 1815 on lands ceded by local Native americans. It was later formally incorporated in 1899 and named after President James Monroe. Monroeville is the seat of  Monroe County, Alabama. In 1997, the Alabama legislature designated Monroeville as the “Literary Capital of Alabama.”

https://www.monroevilleal.gov./

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/whats-changed-what-hasnt-in-town-inspired-to-kill-a-mockingbird-180955741

www,monroecountyal.com

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JUST LOVED READING: Tru and Nelle

JUST LOVED READING: Tru and Nelle

Tru and Nelle

by G. Neri 

Middle Grade/Fiction

Neri, G. Tru and Nelle. New York: HMH Books for Young Readers, 2016.

Tru and Nelle introduces the reader to the Deep South at the beginning of the Great Depression. The Klu Klux Klan’s influence is at its’ height. Tru  is 7 and Nelle is 6. Tru is living with his mother’s cousins in Monroeville, Alabama, next door to Nelle’s family. Nelle’s father is an editor and a lawyer. She has two sisters and a brother; Tru is an only child largely unloved by his mother and often neglected by his father.

Monroeville is a small town surrounded by forests and farms. Even in prosperous times, there wouldn’t be much for children to do. (There was a movie theatre and a public whites-only swimming hole in the book.) Tru and Nelle play games like pirates and detectives especially detectives like Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson. When they discover that someone robbed the local drug store, they put their amateur sleuthing skills to the test. Their attempts at solving the crime gets them into some serious trouble.

Why I Loved Reading This Book:Capote

Neri’s characters ring true to life as they play and interact with adults and other children. He used letters, books and other documents to allow the reader a glimpse into the personalities of Truman Capote and Harper Lee as children and recreates some of their real-life experiences. Many of the characters in To Kill a Mockingbird are also found in Tru and Nelle including Boo Radley ( a character based on an eccentric neighbor) and Atticus Finch (based on Harper Lee’s father).

Children of every generation play games of detective and pirates although nowadays children tend to play games on the computer, X-Box,  iphone, or other technological devices.

But children growing up in the Depression, regardless of class, had little to play with. The Depression hit everyone, some more than others. Tru and Nelle had their love of books, a handful of toys and their imaginations. When they made up their detective stories, they wrote them down (one would dictate and the other would type the stories on Mr. Lee’s Underwood typewriter). Tru especially, constantly wrote (and continued to write stories that he imagined long after he left Monroeville) and like Nelle, they went on to become two of the twentieth century’s greatest writers.

Do today’s children create stories out of their imaginations, act them out and write them down?  Can this book inspire them to do so? Perhaps. Or do technological devices get in the way of children’s imaginations?

Tru and Nelle is a fun book to read even for young readers who don’t know about Truman Capote and Harper Lee. Tru and Nelle get into a mess of trouble and children of all ages like stuff that.

Monroeville, Alabama was founded in 1815 on lands ceded by local Native Americans. It was later formally incorporated in 1899 and named after President James Monroe. Monroeville is the seat of  Monroe County, Alabama. In 1997, the Alabama legislature designated Monroeville as the “Literary Capital of Alabama.”

https://www.monroevilleal.gov./

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/whats-changed-what-hasnt-in-town-inspired-to-kill-a-mockingbird-180955741

www.monroecountyal.com

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JUST LOVED READING: Full of Beans

JUST LOVED READING: Full of Beans

Just Loved Reading:

Full of Beans

Middle Grade/Fiction

Holm, Jennifer L. Full of Beans. New York: Random House Children’s Books, 2016.

Depression-era Key West was no tourist destination. Kids like Beans Curry will tell you. Beans is 10 years-old. His kid brother, Kermit and a stray dog he named Termite, follow him everywhere he goes – delivering laundry his mother takes in, collecting used cans for pennies, shooting marbles for the best team in the Keys or seeing the latest Shirley Temple movie.

One day, men from the Roosevelt administration come to the Keys with the aim of turning the Keys into a tourist destination. No one likes these intruders least of all Beans but he doesn’t let them interfere with his chance to make some easy money by helping a local rum smuggler. His dad is in New Jersey looking for work and his family needs the money.

The government men slowly win over the locals and soon tourists descend on the Keys and improve the local economy. But what will happen to Beans and his family?

WHY I LOVED READING THIS BOOK:

Beans Curry, the central character in Full of Beans of Beans, propels the plot by the force of his personality. The Florida Keys were economically depressed like the rest of the country and hardly able to welcome visitors. Kids ran barefoot and hungry. Full of Beans is based on the true story of the Roosevelt administration’s attempts to turn the Keys into a tourist mecca. Local slang, customs, and foods, add an extra dimension to the story about one summer in the life of a 10-year old boy.

MORE ON KEY WEST DURING THE GREAT DEPRESSION:

http://fcit.usf.edu/florida/lessons/depress/depress1.pdf

http://www.floridahistory.org/depression.htm

TO LEARN MORE ABOUT FLORIDA KEYS AND KEY WEST TODAY:

http://www.fla-keys.com/key-west/

Image result for free photos key west during the great depression

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