Mock Newbery 2010

There were a lot of things I disliked about this, but let's start with the positives: it portrays homelessness in an interesting way, from the family being evicted, to living in a motel, to pitching a tent in the woods, all the while making the best of it and trying to stay together and support each other. It also features one my my favorite books, To Kill a Mockingbird, heavily.

But To Kill a Mockingbird it is not. I thought Harper Lee's voice as a narrator was too flowery. It just didn't sound real. Harper Lee is a poet, and her poems are featured in the book, but honestly there isn't much difference between the language of her poetry and the way she tells the story. Both are full of Southern folksiness that sounds forced; it's like I can see the author trying to be artful, which really bugs me. I also had this problem with [b:Crows and Cards|4818478|Crows and Cards|Joseph Helgerson|http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/516ukAsLFNL._SL75_.jpg|4883620] and [b:Return to Sender|3236586|Return to Sender|Julia Alvarez|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1234063391s/3236586.jpg|3271108]. I think I'm being extra hard on them because they're Mock Newbery books and I expect better writing.

I imagine this book is so well-received because there are so many serious issues in it: the death of a baby (no, two babies), a girl so traumatized she doesn't speak, an alcoholic father who abandons his already poverty-stricken family, the aforementioned homelessness, an old lady who's been driven a little crazy by grief, kids who can't go to school because they're poor, mothers who labor day after day but can't afford to take care of their kids, families hiding from Child Protective Services to stay together, a stinky bully of a girl named Winnie Rae. I mean, this book has more than its share of injustice in it, but it was not inspirational or fun to read. The ending was unbelievably convenient and depressing at the same time

So, yeah, not a fan. ( )

This is the compelling story of a young poet (named after writer Harper Lee) and her struggle to take care of her younger brother while her mother tries to make ends meet

Summary: This book is about a fifth grade girl that loves writing poems. Her life is uprooted when her father left, her mother lost her job, they lost their house, and were living in a old building. The only hope holding her together was her love for writing poems and her new friends Lorianne and Dorothy.
Critique: I think this book was a good read. Although it is targeted for younger audiences, I still enjoyed it. It was a book that made you want to know if they would be okay.

When Harper, her mother and brother Hemingway are kicked out of their rental home for being behind on rent, it is Harper's poetry writing and the chance to share them at a school poetry contest that keeps her head up in challenging times. They live in a motel for a few days and, when her mother loses a housekeeping job, they move into an abandoned drive-in movie concession stand. At the motel, Harper meets an older woman named Dorothy and Lorraine, a girl muted by tragedy. These two understand where Harper is coming from and their empathy helps open her heart in a hopeful way. ( )

I had mixed feelings about the book Also Known as Harper by Ann Haywood Leal. I found myself going through mixed emotions, one second I’m loving the book, the next I’m dreading to read it. The book is awful lengthy for a student under the age of thirteen to be reading, as it would be hard to keep focus of the plot. I liked how the book portrayed the homeless characters in a positive light, which tends to be unusual. I did not like the narrative of Harper Lee’s voice, it was too flowery and just didn’t sound real. Another problem I had was that Harper Lee’s poems were featured throughout the book, which was nice but the language of the poems resembled the language of the book all too identically. ( )