Touching MIddle Reader Series

All women remember that age. You were about 11 or 12 years old, heading into the stage where boys were cute, brothers were horrid, and parents were embarrassing. It last about until you were 18. And school? Well, school was a battlefield. Essentially they were the hardest years of your life. Now imagine your mother and some other mothers decided to have a Mother-Daughter Book Club with girls you would never speak to in school... unless they were spreading vicious rumors about you, but you can't really call that "speaking", now can you?! In The Mother-Daughter Book Club, Heather Vogel Frederick gives her characters plenty to think about as they survive 6th grade and their mothers.


Cassidy is a tomboy who loves to play hockey and embarrasses her supermodel mother with every burp and outburst. Emma is the poor, pudgy daughter of intellectuals who named her and her brother after Jane Austen characters (Darcy?! No wonder the boy played hockey!). Jess is a shy, sweet farm girl battling her own issues on the home front since her mother moved to NY to be an actress while dealing with issues at school where everyone tells her she stinks and calls her Goat Girl. Megan is one of the popular girls and would sooner die than be caught hanging out with Cassidy, Emma, and Goat Girl. But when their mothers start a book club (sans Jess's mom who is MIA), they have no choice but to all get together once a month. They may have no choice about attendance, but they don't have to pretend they like it.


At first all the girls hate the idea, but slowly they begin to enjoy reading Little Women, especially since Louisa May Alcott lived and wrote the story in their town! Their mothers have made the club pretty fun and not hard, so they can live through the meetings once a month. But the book club is a constant reminder for Jess that her mother has left her family behind. It also reveals the tensions between the mothers and daughters themselves. But when Megan and her followers pull a prank that went way too far, the whole Book Club is threatened. Now the girls and their mothers must decide whether the Book Club can survive a betrayal as bad as Megans, but if the girls didn't want the club in the first place, what is going to make them try to save it?


I had a feeling this was going to be an adorable story, and I was right! These girls are a wonderful mix of characters from the Queen Bee to the target to the hockey playing tomboy/jock. It explores this mix of girls and how they interact when they must be on their best behavior in front of all their mothers. But more importantly, it explores their interactions when their moms aren't around, and it can get ugly! I think my favorite character had to be Cassidy who knew she could never live up to her model mother and just wanted to play hockey. In fact, when there was no hockey team for girls in the town, she didn't hesitate to hide her identity and try out for the boys' team! She was a real butt-kickin' girl, and she wasn't afraid to stand up to Megan and her cronies. I liked the other girls, even Megan eventually, but I loved Cassidy!


This also explores that sacred yet tenuous relationship between mother and daughter. Any of you daughters out there can admit that this relationship is always a little strained but devoted at the same time. I am 31 and my relationship with my mom is that exactly! So the different girls and their wildly different mothers all came together for one big lesson: mothers and daughters love each other, but sometimes they don't see each other enough to understand each other. I think this would be a great lesson for any young lady struggling at this age to traverse life with her mom (or her mom struggling to deal with a daughter this age!). This book is best for a high skilled 4th grader through about 7th grade. It is written in simple language, but the book is fun and has great characters. I look forward to the other books in the series, and might even have to read Little Women again!

Sincerely, Not a Victim

Were you the bully? The victim? Or somewhere in between? Maybe you were more than one through your childhood. Whatever mold you fit into, I am sure you have been a part of bullying from one angle or another throughout your life. As a teacher or parent, you have probably had to witness it. You have tried to stop it, but felt powerless in the face of the beast that has consumed childhoods and ended some. Sure, you can stop what you see in front of you, but the bullying is everywhere, like an omniscient, suffocating monster that is impervious to your efforts. That is why Dear Bully was published.

Dear Bully is a compilation of short essays from 70 authors. These are authors our children have read, and maybe we have read as well. These are adults who write for our children every day, so who better to talk to them about bullying? The stories these adults shared were ones of anger, of survival, and of shame. Some were the victims, the bystanders, or the bullies themselves. This is an amazing compilation of stories that dissect the bullying phenomenon from the inside out. But most importantly, they speak to kids today.

The stories aren't written for parents or teachers. They are written directly for the children surviving in the terrifying jungle that high school has become. Some are stories of triumph while others show pure survival. Either way, bullying is serious, it can kill you, but you don't have to give in to it. Some are funny, some are terrifying. R.L. Stine's story of how coincidence combined with his wise-guy big mouth got him bullied reminded me of why I loved his books as a young adult. He added humor to his story and showed how quick wit can get you into trouble and out of it with quite a flair!

The most touching stories for me were those of the bystanders, the kids who did nothing to stop the bullying or went along with it for fear of being the next target. In my senior literature class this term we have been talking at length about a three character play called Death and the Maiden where the characters represent the victim, the perpetrator, and the bystander. Victims and perpetrators are fairly straight forward, but the bystander is a fuzzy gray area. Sometimes they are guilty, sometimes they are innocent, but one thing follows them and even haunts them- the failure to do anything to stop the hurt of the victim. This is a group my kids and I struggled to define because they are so different. One thing they have in common, though, is that shame of not trying to stop it.

When we are young, we barely know who we are yet. Who are we kidding, I am 30 and I barely know! So how do we empower kids to stand up, stop the bullying, and free themselves from the shame of being a bystander? How do we let kids know that there are people out there to talk to, people who can save them? This book is a huge start. I loved the fact that the stories ranged across the bullying spectrum, but my one criticism is that the stories are predominantly from the female perspective. There are a few male authors, but mostly women contributed their stories. i wish it was more even across genders, but I still love what this book contains. It holds hope. Page after page, from cover to cover, you see hope. This is a message we can't prevent our children from hearing.

The stories themselves are very short- the longest is about 5 pages long. This is great for a student who has a short attention span or struggles with comprehension in a full-length novel. The short snippets are independent and can therefore be used as excellent comprehension checks by themselves without a need to remember everything that came before it. The wide mix of stories is also great to reach many different kinds of children. And if they aren't into a particular story? Skip it! This is an amazing book that should have a home in every classroom, library or home with children. Spread the message:

"Dear Bully, You think you can beat me. But I disagree. Sincerely, Not a Victim"

Where Did it All Begin?

Who doesn't love the "Sex and the City" ladies and all their adventures? Well, upon finding that Candace Bushnell wrote The Carrie Diaries, a young adult novel about Carrie as a senior in high school, I couldn't wait to get my hands on it. I have always wanted to know more about those girls and just how life was like for them in the mean halls of high school.

Carrie hasn't had things easy, but she still has dreams of becoming a writer. She applied to a summer writing program in NYC, but she was rejected. Now she must resign herself to going to Brown and studying science like her father wants. She wishes desperately her mom were still alive to give her advice about what to do. So she keeps going through the motions, hanging out with her friends, chain smoking cigarettes (it was the 1980's after all), and listening to all her friends tell her about their boyfriends, guy friends, and crushes... until Sebastian Kydd arrives.

Carrie's first run-in with Sebastian when they were young was not terribly promising, but he is still as hot as she remembers. At first she thinks he is dating the head cheerleader (and Queen Bee) Donna LaDonna (feel free to gag a little at that name... I did). But soon it becomes clear Sebastian Kydd wants her more. Carrie is thrilled, until Donna LaDonna wages war on her. Carrie keeps trying ot get to the bottom of the LaDonna/Kydd thing, but Sebastian keeps dodging her questions.

Carrie's dad introduces her to a Brown student he knows and encourages her to spend time with him (in a not-so-subtle way of getting her to go to Brown). She likes George, but he just isn't boyfriend material. Still she continues hanging out with him until George finds out about Sebastian. Then she is left with Sebastian and a group of friends that has slowly fallen apart while Carrie was wrapped up in her own world.

When Carrie's sister gets put in jail for shoplifting and her father makes all three daughters go on lock down, she doesn't get to see anyone (including Sebastian) for 2 weeks. Upon her first jailbreak, there is clearly something up with Sebastian and Carrie's friend Lali. When Carrie runs back into the bar, she gets an eyeful of the two of them making out. Now, boyfriend-less, friendless, motherless, and without the summer writing class, Carrie has no idea what to do. Luckily, George forgives her and along with a few other good friends, and they help Carrie realize she has to go with what she believes in. She starts writing articles for the school newspaper under a pseudonym and exposes high school life for what it really is. When she submits those articles to the NY writer's program, she is accepted and her father agrees to let her go. Thus begins the story of Carrie Bradshaw, columnist...

If this story sounds a little thin, its because it kind of is. If it weren't for the ties I already had to the main character, Carrie, I may not have really gotten in to this story. The beginning was kind of slow and it took some real willpower to spend some time getting into it. When I finally did, though, it picked up a bit. The story was interesting, but I think there were a number of flaws. First, the marketing of this book as YA shoots past the mark. In order to really like the story, you should know of the TV show or original novels by Candace Bushnell, but those are certainly not child-friendly. Otherwise, this is only a mediocre story at best.

The other serious flaw was the time period it is set in- she is a senior in high school in the early 80's when kids and teachers alike openly smoked in and around school, the drinking age was 18, so they could easily sneak into bars and get alcohol. This might not seem too much of a stretch for teenagers, but it really seemed like a different world. In fact, I think younger readers would have a hard time relating to the time period- it is that weird limbo where it is close enough to seem familiar but long enough ago to be so wildly different. If it was earlier or later, it might have been easier to relate to.

The writing is fairly simplistic, but some of the circumstances might be better for an older crowd. There is a fair amount of talk about sex, alcohol, and cigarettes, but I wouldn't say it is in excess. I just think this might be a better book for older young adults or adults who are more familiar with the television show. I know they would certainly appreciate the last paragraph where a certain someone comes to Carrie's rescue!

Clothes are More than Just Apparel

Who wouldn't love to work at a thrift store, being the first person to sift through the garbage and find the treasures?! I can just imagine finding all those beautiful dresses from the 1950's and 1960's. I still look around (new) shoe stores for a pair of black shoes with the strap that comes up the front of the foot and connects to the strap around the ankle like my great grandmother wore all her life. Those shoes are in every sepia toned picture of a life I never knew with people I love. They are nostalgia personified. My grandmother's green dress and strand of flawed pearls (that were flawless to me). My grandfather's Italian suits with the mobster collars that cover the tie knot. Clothes may seem purely functional, but the emotions attached to them are what make me keep my "ouchy" shoes that look so cute and the adorable skirt that scratches. In Vintage Veronica, by Erica S. Perl, the clothes may be the background to the story, but for me, they were a main character!

Veronica lied about her age to get a job at a multilevel thrift store most famous for it's "Dollar a Pound" where the worst of the worst is sent unceremoniously sliding down a long chute to the bottom floor. There it sits in a large heap called "The Pile" where the "pickers" come to rifle through stained, torn, tattered clothing to buy for a dollar a pound. Veronica doesn't work at Dollar a Pound. Nor does she work on the Real Deal floor with the other floorons where they sell the better finds. Veronica works in Employees Only! and she loves it there- no customers, no people, no one to mock her for her size or general undesirableness. All that's there is the clothes she loves. A fashion guru of an unexpected sort, Veronica loves clothes. Her outfits are unconventional, full of bowling shoes, crinolines, and 60 year old prom dresses. Veronica is quite simply a thrift store personified!

Veronica hides in Employees Only! and sifts through the clothing, deciding the fate of each piece. Her limited interactions involve her crazy boss who disappears for the entire summer and The Nail. The Nail is a sickly young man named Len. Len comes to get the clothes to bring to Real Deal or unclog the Chute, but they don't really interact. When the two real Deal girls, Queen Bee Zoe and Pleaser Ginger (although they aren't called that in the book, it is difficult not to label them as such) come to Employees Only! to scope out Veronica, she can't resist their gravitational pull. Even though Veronica knows Zoe is toxic, she can't help but being drawn to such a loud and forceful girl. When an unexpected friendship strikes up with Len, Veronica is happy whole floors separate them all so Zoe and Ginger don't know about her time with Len.

The more time Veronica spends with Len, the more she realizes how special he is. He shares with her all his snakes and lizards- reptiles that take the place of people in his life who he cares for from birth until death. He even gives her a small corn snake to take care of and shows her Violet, his beloved blue-tongued skink who is suffering from a rare bone disease. All is going well, and Veronica is finally opening up to someone (Len), when her vintage worlds swiftly collide. Zoe finds her way up to Employees Only! and suspects something is up between Veronica and Dead Man Walking (Len). When she spies the snake Len gave Veronica, Zoe manages to get a hold of it despite Veronica's concerns. Next thing you know, the doughnut shop next door erupts in screams and Veronica knows Zoe is behind it. She rushes to the shop to find the snake dead on the floor. As if this isn't bad enough, Len overhears Zoe grilling Veronica about him, and he hears Veronica make fun of him. Now she has to find a way to make it all up to Len, but when he leaves the store, she thinks it's hopeless. She quickly learns there are things about all her coworkers, Len included, she never thought were possible.

I was torn about this book at first, but the more I think about the story and the characters, the more and more I like it. Veronica is a girl who has never fit in, so she dresses in these fabulous and kooky outfits to set herself apart even more obviously. That way, it becomes her choice to be different and an outsider- not the people who rejected her. She doesn't have any real friends and when Len comes into her life, it takes her a long time to open up to him. But like a lot of girls out there, when the Queen Bee comes to her, she can't resist the possibility of finally being accepted, even if it means losing a real friend like Len. I think when I first read this book, it was the way she treated Len that bothered me. I liked Len, even though he was a bit odd. But I also work at a high school where I see girls make these decisions all the time. Sometimes they realize they have lost a real friend, sometimes they don't. It was hard to "watch" at first, but the beauty of that was just how real the scenarios were.

I think my discomfort with the story at first was how accurate it all was. In my book, that is a good discomfort- it opens our eyes and gets us to look within ourselves. That is why I think this book would be great for those Veronicas out there- the girls who feel uncomfortable in their own skin and choose to put that on display rather than to hide it. These are the girls who join roller derbies and end up being amazing, strong women in a few years. In fact, this story made me think of Ellen Paige and her "Juno" and "Whip it" awkward loveliness. In fact, a chubby Ellen Paige is exactly who I see as Veronica. I think those girls need to see there is more out their for them than just skating around the edges. They can belong without belonging to "that" group!