Well my resolve to stick to my 2023 book list for the rest of the year did not even last a month. In return for making her read letting her borrow Anne of Avonlea, a friend of mine lent me this sweet little 2001 Newbery Medal winner and I loved it.
A Year Down Yonder by Richard Peck was published in 2000 and it is actually the middle installment of a trilogy. I tried to get the first book, A Long Way From Chicago, from my library, but after waiting on it for a few weeks without it ever becoming available for me to check out, I decided to just go ahead and read this one.
Set in the midst of the Great Depression, fifteen year old Mary Alice Dowdel is sent downstate to live with her grandmother while her older brother goes out West to join the army and her parents stay in Chicago. Mary Alice is less than thrilled to be leaving Chicago to stay with her hard-nosed country grandma. But what follows is a string of laugh-out-loud funny stories that eventually bond Mary Alice to her grandmother in a hilariously charming way, and by the end of her year down yonder, Mary Alice doesn't want to leave her Grandma Dowdel to go back home to Chicago. We even get to see her come back years later at the end of WWII so that Grandma Dowdel can give Mary Alice away in the front room to her handsome bridegroom.
Richard Peck's delightful slice-of-life novel had me grinning from ear to ear, beginning to end. While A Year Down Yonder doesn't offer much in the way of a sustained plot, the episodic nature of this short, middle grade book brought to mind a lot of my all-time favorites like Anne of Green Gables or Little Women. Grandma Dowdel is a force to be reckoned with and it was gratifying to watch Mary Alice's perception of her no-nonsense grandmother change as the book went on.
This little book clocks in at under 150 pages, and it makes for a great reading experience either for yourself or aloud with some young'uns. It's got my enthusiastic stamp of approval, and I'll probably get the other two installments in the trilogy at some point in the future.
What's your favorite Newbery winning book?
the subtle shade to your library is greatly appreciated; I'm highly invested in this growing relationship, please continue to keep us posted.
ReplyDeleteand more strikethroughs, Hannah. MORE STRIKETHROUGHS.
Hahaha! I'm really coming to have a lovehate relationship with the library. This one was supposed to come through as an inter-library loan and it never showed up!! But I may request it and the third installment sometime next year anyway. This one was so fun.
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