Ratings

Content Ratings based on a 0-5 scale where
0 = no objectionable content and
5 = an excessive or disturbing level of content

Guide to Rating System

LANGUAGE

VIOLENCE

SEXUAL CONTENT

ADULT THEMES

Language: 1

Violence: 4

Sexuality: 3

Adult Themes: 3

2005 Newbery Honor Book

Ratings Explanation

Language:  One instance of deity taken in vain.  Vulgar phrases like “crapper”  and “take a leak”.

Violence:  The children on the island recount the deeds of criminals.  ie.)  Favorite Crime of Al Capone aka Scar Face:  Dinner party of death!  Invites lieutenants in his organization known to have double-crossed him to a party.  After dessert, Al’s men lock the doors and Capone beats the traitors to death with a baseball bat.  Favorite Weapon:  Thompson Machine Gun.  Piper says, “The cons use shivs to stab each other, or kill our dads.”  Piper explains, a shiv is a dagger made of old silverware, or carved out of a pot handle.  The men imprisoned on Alcatraz have been tried and convicted of the most heinous crimes imaginable.  They are murderers, rapists, hit men, con men, stickup men, embezzlers, connivers, burglars and kidnappers.  The only guns on the island are up high in the towers or the catwalks, because one flick of the wrist and a gun carried by a guard is a gun carried by a criminal.

Sexuality:  Moose thinks, “Something about the way she does this makes me glance down to make sure my fly is buttoned.”  Moose spills ink uncomfortably close to his fly.  No underwear is allowed to be sent through the laundry, since the inmates do the laundry.  The warden warns Moose that many of the convicts have not seen a woman in ten or fifteen years.  While Moose is watching Natalie, he leaves her alone to search for a baseball.  Natalie spends time with convict #105.  Moose is extremely worried, because he has no idea if anything happened to Natalie.

Adult Themes:  Moose is asked if Natalie is retarded.  Moose is asked by the teacher if it is his second time in seventh grade.  The kids on the island try to sneak into the morgue to see the “bread boxes of dead bodies”.   The kids on the island are simultaneously frightened and intrigued by the criminals.  Moose’s mother cannot handle the stress of Natalie’s autism.  His mother insists that Natalie, who is sixteen years old, is ten years old as they re-celebrate her tenth birthday year after year. Moose reaches his breaking point and the entire family benefits when he confronts his mother about her corrosive behavior.

Synopsis

It is 1935 and 12 year old, Moose Flanagan and his family move to the Island of Alcatraz, where his father is an electrician and guard.  The guard’s families are housed on Alcatraz.  Alcatraz is home to the most dangerous criminals of that era.   Al Capone, Machine Gun Kelly, Roy Gardner and many other notorious criminals are prisoners on Alcatraz.  The Flanagan Family moves to Alcatraz to enable Natalie to attend a special school in San Francisco.  Natalie is autistic.

The warden’s daughter, Piper is trouble.  She connives and persuades the children on the island to participate in her countless schemes.  As the warden’s daughter, Piper usually avoids the consequences of these schemes.  Moose also has the added responsibility of caring for Natalie after school.  Moose struggles as he tries to fit in on the island and at school, live up to his parent’s expectations and avoid trouble.

The story was interesting and mature in content.  This book was sold at my children’s elementary school book fair.  This book is more appropriate for an 8th – 9th grade reader.   I enjoyed the historical elements of the story.  Interesting fact, “Al Capone Does My Shirts” was  a phrase GI’s used in WWII to indicate that they were stationed in San Francisco.

©2009 The Literate Mother