The Twenty-One Balloons (1948)--William Pène du Bois

I found my attention waning and wandering a lot as I read this whimsical fantasy about the 1883 volcanic explosion of Krakatoa. Maybe it's because the light, comical handling of that event seemed tasteless in the wake of last week's disaster in Japan (since, you know, the explosion of Krakatoa actually did cause tsunamis that killed thousands of people). Or maybe it was the lack of any real character development or a truly captivating plot.

The Twenty-One Balloons just isn't that type of book. But it is short, and there are lots of pictures (drawn by du Bois himself).

Basically it's a fanciful narrative told by Professor William Waterman Sherman, a retired schoolteacher who wants to get away from the bustle and bother of the world for a while by taking a nice, slow trip around the world in his hot-air balloon. He designs quite an elaborate little basket "house" for maximum comfort on his journey (and goes into quite a bit of detail describing all its attributes). Alas, he's only aloft for a few days when a seagull rips a big hole in his balloon, all his possessions fall into the sea, and he crash-lands on Krakatoa. Turns out the island is secretly inhabited by refined, English-speaking people in impeccably clean pastel clothing.

For a minute I really thought the book was going to turn into an 1880s version of that weird late-sixties TV show The Prisoner, but no. Instead there are lots and lots of descriptions of Krakatoan inventions and contraptions--complete with many Rube Goldberg-ish illustrations. And then the island blows up. Balloons, of course, save the day (at least for Sherman and the Krakatoans).

Up A Road Slowly (1967)--Irene Hunt

A rather flat coming-of-age story about a girl growing up in her spinster aunt's large country home. It's hard to imagine this one appealing to very many children, or even "young adults."

This is what it reminded me of. An elderly relative asks if you'd like to hear about her childhood, when she attended a one-room country schoolhouse. "Sure," you say, "that sounds interesting." You mean it, too. But then the elderly relative starts rambling on about the smelly mentally retarded girl she always had to sit next to, and how she and the other kids always tried to shun the stinky retard during recess, but later they all felt really bad about that because the poor dimwitted girl stepped on a rusty nail and died of tetanus. And then you sit there in awkward silence.

There's nothing wrong with historical fiction--however, this book tends to come across as merely outdated versus historical. Part of the problem: it's very hard to tell when exactly it takes place. 1930s maybe? 1940s? I'm unsure. And without a clear historical context, many of the lessons Julie learns--such as "a woman is never complete until she loves a man" (groan)--will probably strike most modern readers as simply odd vs. an accurate reflection of the times.

Strawberry Girl (1946)-- Lois Lenski

Strawberry Girl was still pretty popular when I was a kid, but I never read it, as I detested anything involving farms (no high-rise apartments with doormen? Not interested!). Reading the first few sentences, I regarded the southern dialect with great fear and loathing and wondered how I'd ever get through this book. Well, surprise! I actually enjoyed it quite a bit.

Unlike some authors (ahem, Monica Shannon), Lenski is able to present a vivid picture of life on a Florida farm--and work it into an actual plot! There are actually quite a few rather scandalous plot points: a teacher is severely beaten, the neighbor gets drunk and shoots the heads off all his chickens, a donkey is poisoned... of course, religious conversion solves everything in the end. Sigh.

Birdie, the story's heroine, is quite charming, though I think I would have found her really annoying when I was a kid--she's a little too good. I always preferred those flawed protagonists I could relate to (Ramona! Again! I will be bringing her up constantly, as I think she's pretty much the pinnacle of children's literature).

The View from Saturday (1997)--E.L. Konigsburg

Man oh man, I hated this book. Hated it. Didn't expect to--the same author wrote the thoroughly enjoyable From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. And in theory, the story of a group of intelligent, social-misfit kids finding each other and forming their own friendly circle sounds fine. But ugh, in practice it was totally insufferable. So much stilted dialogue. So much lazy writing (at least fifty inconsequential events, we're told, happened "Just. Like. That."). And symbolism so heavy-handed I think I was briefly knocked unconscious after getting hit over the head with it one too many times. (Example: at one of the kids' first gatherings, they sit down together and work on a jigsaw puzzle of a great big, warm and loving pink heart. Yes, really.)

Noah, the first kid introduced, was decently entertaining and rang pretty true as a 12-year-old. I'm afraid I can't say the same about any of his friends. (Nadia, whose schtick is never using contractions, was probably the most annoying and wooden, but believe me, she's got competition.) I have issues with "child genius" characters in general, though. They're such a cop-out. Authors who employ this type of character too often think they don't have to create an authentic child's voice; they can just make the little prodigy sound like a stiff adult, and if anyone questions this, they can say "oh, but she's really advanced for her age."

I was also turned off by the novel being centered around an Academic Bowl competition. Look, I'm no anti-intellectual…but seriously, who the hell cares about an Academic Bowl? Please do not expect this sort of event to have me on the edge of my seat with nail-biting suspense. Do not expect me to believe the cool middle school kids give a rat's ass who wins the Academic Bowl. And please do not expect me to find a scene in which the kids review flash cards with their teacher exciting.

God, the teacher. I haven't even mentioned her yet. So, all through the book, there's a big mystery dangling over our heads regarding the supposedly unorthodox method she used to pick the members of her winning Academic Bowl team. The mystical, turban-wearing father of the Indian kid on the team tells her he knows how she chose them, and the teacher is just astounded anyone could have possibly figured it out. Then, at long last, the big secret is revealed…

…and it turns out…

…she picked the four most studious, courteous students in her class. Oh my God!! Talk about a shocking twist!! Who would have ever guessed that?!?! It's gonna take me a week, at least, to wrap my mind around that one.

Roller Skates (1937)--Ruth Sawyer

This one's a bit of a head-scratcher. For the most part, I really liked it (and I think I would have as a child, too), but every once in a while the story veered way off into crazy territory and left me asking "WTF?" I think I'm just going to pretend those parts* didn't exist.

Anyway. Roller skates are a symbol of freedom in this children's novel set in New York City at the turn of the century. Ten-year-old Lucinda--a tomboyish, Anne of Green Gables-esque chatterbox--comes from a relatively well-to-do family and has always led a sheltered existence, carefully shepherded around by her nurse or governess. This year, however, her parents have gone to Italy and have arranged for her to stay with family friends who believe a young girl should be allowed much more independence. Thrilled to spend a year as an "orphan," Lucinda straps on her skates daily and explores the city, befriending all sorts of people from different social classes and ethnic backgrounds along the way. She's soon--much to the chagrin of her more conservative relatives--engaging in activities such as sharing a back-alley picnic with an Italian kid and a local bum.

Oh, and she also has an awesome-sounding homemade puppet theater she uses to put on elaborate shows. Love that!

*SPOILER ALERT:
Most glaring example? One day, on her way home from school, Lucinda decides to visit one of her friends, an Asian lady she calls "Princess Zayda" (OK, she also calls her a "heathen Chinee," but let's ignore that for now). So: la, la, la, Lucinda scampers up the stairs, enters the lady's apartment…and FINDS HER EFFING DEAD ON THE FLOOR, BLEEDING ALL OVER THE PLACE WITH A SWORD IN HER GUT. Lucinda runs off to a trusted adult in a neighboring apartment and tells him what she saw. He replies that he doesn't want to get a little girl involved with the law and a trial and all that messy business, so why doesn't she just go home and not mention this to anybody? So that's what she does. Of course, the trauma of having witnessed such a thing bothers her from time to time, but not enough for her to ever say anything about it to anyone. Seriously. W? T? F?

The Voyages of Dr. Dolittle (1923)--Hugh Lofting

These days, the 1923 winner is mostly notorious for its egregious racial slurs and ethnocentrism. And yep, the unabridged version is indeed pretty cringe-inducing. When the Doctor's pet monkey disguises himself in women's clothing, everyone on the streets thinks he's a "well-dressed Negress!" Ha ha ha! A large section of the book deals with Dolittle and his entourage exploring an island where the native "Red Indians" are so bumbling and backward they've never seen or heard of fire. Oh, those silly natives! And then there's the Doctor's good friend Bumpo, a barefoot African caricature who's trying to adopt the ways of nice educated Europeans, but just can't help feeling a little bit cannibalistic now and then. Oh, Bumpo, you crazy but lovable n-word, you!

You get the idea.

However, I actually won't denounce Lofting's picaresque talk-to-the-animals tale completely. Despite his unfortunate handling of all non-white characters, he does seem to be genuinely trying to make a noble point about the importance of getting along peacefully with those who are different. It's just that he only succeeds in making that point metaphorically--through the animal stories. As seen through the eyes of narrator Tommy Stubbins (the Doctor's young apprentice and quasi adopted son), Dolittle is a Jesus-y figure, performing a laundry list of seeming miracles and facilitating amazing new understandings between animals and humans.

At times, what with his condemnation of bullfighting and his adamant stance against keeping wild animals in captivity, Dolittle's a regular Peter Singer, ahead of his time. For a man who regularly converses with his pet pig, though, he sure eats a lot of sausage. (I guess those ground-up pigs died of old age?)

Maniac Magee (1991)--Jerry Spinelli

I really enjoyed this one! A book with many lengthy descriptions of baseball and football plays, clearly targeted toward a young male audience, would not normally be my thing. But Spinelli's style won me over immediately. The story of a runaway orphan kid searching for a home on the streets of a fictional Pennsylvania city--and becoming an inscrutable neighborhood legend in the process--is written in an appealing narrative voice that struck me as very Modern Mark Twain. Part realism, part tall-tale, part playground mythology. The language is inventive, evocative, and musical--it draws you right in.