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

1939 Newbery Medal Winner

Ratings Explanation

Adult Themes:  (Not truly “adult” themes, but worth mentioning:) Eric, a homeless orphan boy, wanders the countryside alone after his father’s death until the Linden family takes him in.  Garnet, who is nine, hitchhikes to the nearest city and back home again.  (The story is written in the 1930s, an era when perhaps hitchhiking was a much safer pasttime, but parents might remind their children that this is neither safe nor recommended today!)

Synopsis

Garnet Linden, “halfway between nine and ten,” is an adventurous girl living on a farm in the Midwest in the 1930s.  During one blisteringly hot summer, she finds a “magic” silver thimble buried in the sand of a riverbed, and almost immediately magical things begin happening.  First the rains come to end the heat and drought; then Eric, an orphan boy who can do just about anything, appears one night and is adopted by her family; and finally, Garnet takes her beloved pig Timmy to the county fair and wins the blue ribbon.  In between these singular events are the little misadventures of childhood that bring shimmer into Garnet’s simple life: getting locked in the library with her best friend until they are discovered at midnight; running away from home for a day and hitchhiking into town with a fifty-cent-piece in her purse and the promise of excitement.  By summer’s end, Garnet is convinced her thimble is the source of such good fortune, and her happiness is so overflowing it bursts the seams, causing her to turn handspring after handspring through the pasture.

Call me old-fashioned, but I couldn’t help loving this charming story of Garnet and all the pleasures that came with her simple farm life.  Why couldn’t I have grown up on a Wisconsin farm in the 1930s?!  Life was good then, and Ms. Enright’s beautiful metaphoric writing enhances the story all the more.  Some of my favorite descriptions from the book: Grasshoppers popped and scattered like sparks from a fire. Describing the heat of summer:  It was like being inside of a drum. The sky like a bright skin was stretched tight above the valley, and the earth too, was tight and hard with heat. But my favorite is when Garnet, having hitchhiked into town by herself, grows tired of city life and being alone: Her shoes hurt her; and with her aching feet, and her bundle and empty pocketbook she felt like an old, old woman coming home from seeing her grandchildren who didn’t love her.

If your child is looking for a book to get lost in over the summer, travel back to a simpler time where hot dogs cost a nickel and the county fair was something never to be forgotten.  I highly recommend this Newbery Medal winner.