Yesterday's Young Adult Novels

The Family Name (1971)

2018-01-07T19:11:00.000-08:00

The Family Name
Jan Washburn
illustrator Lee Styles (cover)
A Whitman Novel for Girls
1971, Whitman Publishing Company

And there was nothing left for me, she thought gloomily.

Kathryn Drews is 17 and living in Coral Grove, Florida. Her odd nickname "Ryndy" arose because her mother is also Kathryn and has already snagged the normal shortening "Kathy" for herself, an early sign of Ryndy's major hang-up - she is the youngest of 4 sisters and feels like she got the very short end of the stick. The other 3 have already snagged such family/social positions as "the pretty one (Vicky - green-eyed strawberry-blonde), "the smart one" (Virignia/Ginny - currently working on her doctorate in atomic research), and "the popular one" (Val, a little, peppy cheerleader captain who sings, plays guitar and wins votes). Ryndy, laboring along as a grade-C student with lines where Vicky had curves, has pinned her hopes on chasing one of Val's accomplishments - cheerleading.

It's now or never, she thought grimly. I've got to make the cheerleading squad.

Somewhat miraculously, Ryndy does make the squad. And longed-for pretty boy Brad notices her. And she gets to sit at the very special popular kids' lunch table. And you know this is going nowhere good.

Ryndy and co. live in Florida. Shortly after the spring-time tryouts that determine Ryndy's role on the cheerleading team the next school year, she and BFF are water-skiing when an accident sends Ryndy flying. She breaks both legs, badly, and ends up sitting out the summer and then into the fall. Desolate, she falls into a sulk that only her best friend's dogged determination and a sullen boy's nagging can drive away.

Oh, Dirk.

She was just an arm's length from him now. She recognized the broad shoulders and the crop of white-blond hair. She had never met Dirk Hudson, but she knew the other football players called him "The Dutchman."

Dirk is mysteriously nasty to Ryndy, who promptly forgives him when they meet again. And then he's mysteriously nasty to her again. In what would seem to bode ill for Ryndy, she again promptly forgives him because he has an awesome reason. Ish. Awesomeish. Okay, not awesome, just a reason. Because the best way to save a girl from a cad is to be a surly jerk to her yourself. Long literary tradition of that NOT WORKING, Dirk.

Also, I just re-watched Bridget Jones which once again showed that boys need to SHARE their knowledge of bad boy's evildoing with girls or the girls just have no idea WTH he's so surly about and go running to the bad boy for comfort. And the fight scene.

So, Ryndy, Dirk, hospitalized tots (oh, backstory, Ryndy's otherwise-never-mentioned church has a youth group which visits hospitalized children and Ryndy becomes entangled with a sad tot who's been stuck in the pediatric ward for months. Named Pieter. Is it sad that I didn't see the Pieter/Dirk-the-Dutchman connection coming? It's sad, isn't it?

It all works out. Ryndy decides that she's really more of a swimmer than a cheerleader, sis Val confesses to envying her swimming prowess, and Dirk stops being mysteriously nasty now that his Great Dark Secrets are revealed. For now.

Well written, with a heroine who's realistic and believable.

About the Author
Janice "Jan" Louise Prince was born in Brockton, MA in 1926. She earned an English degree from Bates College in Maine in 1947, married John Roger Washburn and became a German and English teacher in Florida. Later, she worked her way up from an entry-level job to VP of Human Resources at Southeast Bank. She died in April 2017 at the age of 90.

This was Washburn's first book, written while she was a high school teacher in Fort Lauderdale, where her husband was a swim coach and all three of their children swam competitively. She wrote two more teen novels, The Secret of The Spanish Treasure (1979) and Finder's Keepers/Sweet Dreams #213 (1994). She also wrote adult fiction More Than Great Riches (2009).

An interesting fact mentioned in her obituary was that she translated reparations documents for Holocaust victims early in her career.

Links
Author obituary
Author obituary

I Met A Boy I Used To Know (1967)

2017-07-07T20:15:00.000-07:00

I Met A Boy I Used To Know

Lenora Mattingly Weber

1967, Thomas Y. Crowell Company

Katie Rose Belford met the boy with the restless black eyes, the cockey toss of head, and the appealing flash of smile, on the first day of the mid-year semester.

This is Gilmartin “Gil” Ames, new boy in Katie Rose’s Colorado town. Katie Rose, laboring under a dual name and a weakness for victimized boys, falls hard. The fact that Gil speaks longingly of a beloved horse he had to leave behind in his old home in California makes it official – Katie Rose is infatuated.

Couldn’t the students and teachers realize his showing off was just a cover for his inner insecurity and unhappiness?

Gil is as shallow as a mud puddle, but Katie Rose is in love. She’s far too enraptured to credit any of the negative features everyone else in town mentions to her about him – the whining, the laziness, the exaggeration.

Of course our heroine must realize Gil for what he is – but the book has a two-piece method for that. Katie Rose discovers Gil in an ugly, cruel crime – dognapping pets and holding them for ransom – and is the unwitting vehicle of his downfall. For which she is castigated as a rat and suffers mightily because she doesn’t fall out of love at all. Despite despising him, she feels locked into her weakness for his stories, his many, many stories of neglectful mothers and cruel fathers. Katie Rose, despising herself for her inability to shrug him off, seizes the chance to accompany a neighbor on a long car trip to California, to visit her uncle, only to discover that Gil, using an assumed name, is also ride-sharing with the neighbor to get out of town.

A prolonged, torturously hot and slow trip ensues, which rips off the very last of Gil’s mantle of sad appeal.

Tedious Good Boys Make Girl Craziness Understandable

Katie Rose, like so many misled heroines, has a pelican in the form of a dreary, dull, relentlessly goody-goody Husband Material boy. In her case, dreamy Miguel. Oh, dreamy, boring Miguel, who is temporarily out of the picture by virtue of visiting his dad in Hawaii. Katie Rose, having finally fled Romantically-Misunderstood-turned-Whiny-Jerk Gilmartin, doesn’t do anything as crazy as take a moment’s breath, but immediately turns to Miguel, who’s due back in a month. Oh, reliable Miguel!

For she knew suddenly that a girl wasn’t supposed to feel maternal and protective – even apologetic – for the boy she dates.

While true, this like so many old teen novels seems to feel the only alternative is for a girl to feel apologetic to the boy she dates. Because you know old Miguel is getting an armful of “Oh, I’m a silly thing! Let me confess!” the minute he plods back into town.

Clothing porn

KR (I can only write that out so many times) opens the book pining over another girl’s ‘it’ look:

The flecked tweed skirt and soft pull-over of solid color to match. Right now that “Heather and Knit” outfit was the most at Adams High.

She notes but disregards the very first warning sign of Gil’s unstable, unreliable nature – his insanely cowboyesque and overly sharp clothing choices.

His attire differed noticeably from that worn by other boys at Adams. Instead of a T shirt, he wore a tailored Western one of maroon wool broadcloth with white piping edging the yoke and wide cuffs. It fitted tight over his shoulders and ribs, and his creamy white pants were snugged even closer over slim hips. The heels on his black half-boots added an inch to his height; and he was already taller than average.

Inverted universe

The Belford clan boasts the usual single-parent household of teen novels, but with the twist that the father is dead and their mother is alive. Even better, she’s a singer/pianist at a nightclub/Italian restaurant.

Zany 1960s nostalgia

Negroes pop up, always in a positive and completely forgettable way. Thanks, Negro Home Ec teacher! Hey, Negro fellow pupil who Katie Rose is super cool about! Bye, now!

Irish-American relatives who faith and beggorah incessantly. I take umbrage at this fluffery – half my family had accents like leprechauns after 40 years in the US, and they managed not to lilt like a drunk on Saint Patrick’s Day.

The lovingly and perhaps overly impressed manner in which the Foods of Italy are described in a scene at an Italian restaurant. Called Guido’s.

About the author

1895-1971

Born in Missouri, but spent most of her life in Colorado. She rode horses, played sports and wrote from a young age. Her Beany Malone series was her most popular. She married Albert Herman Weber in 1916, at age 21, and had 6 children.

Books in the Belford series

Don’t Call Me Katie Rose (1664)

The Winds of March (1965)

A New and Different Summer (1966)

I Met A Boy I Used to Know (1967)

Angel In Heavy Shoes (1968)

How Long Is Always? (1970)

Hello, My love, Goodbye (1971)

Sometimes A Stranger (1972)

Links

Image Cascade reprints

Denver Public Library has a collection of Weber's papers.

Mini reviews

2016-12-14T19:04:00.001-08:00

Step To The Music
Phyllis A. Whitney, il. Jack Keats (cover)
1953, Thomas Y. Crowell Company

It was the chin of a girl who possessed more determination and spirit than was always good for her. The face as a whole was more striking than pretty, yet suddenly, foolishly, Abbie Garrett longed to be pretty.

Abbie Garrett is 17 when her southern cousin Lorena arrives at her Long Island home. At the same time, her former neighbors, Douglas and Stuart McIntyre, arrive back from years in southern schools. The lives of all four quickly become overwhelmed by the outbreak of the Civil War, which pits the southern-sympathizing Douglas and Lorena against their neighbors. Pretty, headstrong Lorena frustrates the plainer (in all senses) Abbie, but what would be a minor irritation in peace becomes a much bigger issue in war as the men begin leaving and Abbie's fragile southern mother withdraws into herself.

The romances are predictable and the male hero, Stuart, is just another irksome know-it-all, but there's a real charm in this old book. A strong sense of place and the well-drawn characters make it an interesting read despite the general dullness of the main characters.

Armitage Hall
Eleanor Noyes Johnson
1965, The Macmillan Company

When I thought of all the perfectly fabulous girls I'd met that day, it did seem mean that the only goop should be my roommate.

16-year-old Navy brat Judith Clearmont heads off to Armitage Hall, the Maryland boarding school where her mother and grandmother spent happy girlhoods, in a state of excited expectation which can't live up to reality. But it does! Armitage Hall is fabulous! Her new friends Bo and Moonie and Cynthia are fabulous! The really wonderful team rivalry of the Green and the White is fabulous! Life in fox-hunting Maryland is fabulous! If only that goopy Laura hadn't arrived.

Dad always says that I jump to conclusions about people, and I guess he's right. I took one look at Laura and decided she was a goop. I'll admit I was half asleep, but honestly, I never saw a girl before who was so all one color. She had on a camel's-hair coat, which would have been all right except that her shoulders sagged as if it were too heavy for her. Her hair was just the same shade as her coat, and I couldn't see her eyes because she wore glasses with tan rims.

Judith eventually relents, but not before you've developed a lasting dislike for her, one which taints the rest of the meandering book. Judith's none-too-interesting life at an all-girl boarding school in deepest Maryland is skimmed, the action skipping ahead every few months. A little sympathy for her develops when she reveals her fear of horseback riding - her mother was a good rider - but it's squandered by the flat, vague nature of her riding lessons and the horse show she attends.

An odd, English-boarding-school narrative set in America, which points up the worst of that genre without really using much of the very appealing side, the one which J.K. Rowling used to such good effect in the early Potter books. I suppose part of it is the age; the Potter books also started becoming nasty as the kids got older.

Other books by Johnson
Buffington Castle
Mountaintop Summer
King Alfred The Great
The Wishing Year
Mrs. Perley's People

Some Merry-Go-Round Music
Mary Stolz
1959, Harper and Bros.

Pumfret And Son, Knit Goods, was a small firm in a huge, dark building near Wall Street. All day, now that it was summer, embattled traffic sent its roar through open windows, and in Miranda Parrish's corner of the outer office a dusty fan on top of the filing cabinets turned its big head from side to side and wheezed and stirred the heavy air like batter in a bowl.

19-year-old business school grad Miranda's stuck in a boring office with five male bosses she sums up, silently, as three cowards and two bullies. She loves her working-class family, but her parents' unending arguments and her brother's union speeches are slowly driving her nuts. At work, the owner's awkward, snobby son has a crush that's half flattering and half creepy. One friend is getting married out of sheer desperation -

I absolutely hate being poor... Making do is the worst expression in the world, and it's what we're having to do all the time.

- and another is determined to get out of her bland office and into a shiny office tower. Miranda's frustrated conclusion is that:

It isn't the job that counts, but where you do it. I'll be there are lots of girls like us who aren't ambitious but have to work, and of course it's where we do it that matters to us... Connie and I, we're just marking time.

Miranda's shocked back to life, finally, and begins taking steps to push herself back onto a real course.

Links
Obituary for Eleanor Noyes Johnson

A Place of Her Own (1962)

2016-05-22T21:42:00.001-07:00

A Place of Her Own

Ann Mari Falk (translated from the Swedish by Annabelle MacMillan)

English translation 1964 by Harcourt Brace & World Inc.

"Since when did you begin to classify peopl eas 'nice' and 'not so nice'?" Lottie inquired.

"Yesterday," Stina said. "Back home everyone is pleasant."

15-year-old Stina Sandblom is leaving her island home after the death of her parents, and going to the big city, Stockholm, to live with her recently married sister Lottie and her husband Olaf.

The young couple is welcoming, but their apartment is tiny, Lottie is pregnant, and Stina finds adjusting to her new school difficult. A quiet person, she is bothered by teasing about her rural accent, and distracted by how hard it is to study in the cramped living quarters. But one girl seems nice, and Stina decides to take a chance and invite Astrid home for a visit.

And of course, a romance. Stina falls for Markus, a studious and nerdy boy she treats with more affection than passion until he helps her solve a major problem - Lottie's newborn and the fraying nerves of his young parents is making study impossible.

Oh, how the baby cried! Olie paced the floor, holding his son in his arms. Finally he would begin to gurgle contentedly and put his fist in his mouth, but the minute he was put back in his basket, the noisy concert began afresh... But now Olie and Lottie had begun to quarrel over the most trivial matters - things they would have laughed at a few months before.

Nice problem novel from Europe.

Links

Kirkus review

About the Author

1918-1988

She seems to have written a number of books in various genres – some are clearly children’s picture books, some seem to be murder mysteries (going by the covers), but only one is pretty obviously also a young adult novel, Who Is Erika (1959)

Other editions

Paperback
1972, Scholastic Book Services

Book Search!

2016-04-04T16:20:00.001-07:00

A reader writes:

Hello. I am on a quest to remember a book I read a long time ago. I THINK the book involved twins. One part I remember clearly, the girl or girls were giving tours in an old house. They accidentally found a loose panel in a stair railing. In it was a letter written by a man that was in love with the then owner of the house. She was told about the letter and realized her love from long ago hadn't deserted her, he was waiting for her. It was a touching story in a great book AND I can't remember the title! Can anyone help me?

Vicki’s Mysterious Friend (1947)

2015-12-25T17:21:00.003-08:00

Vicki’s Mysterious Friend

Emma Atkins Jacobs, il. Jean MacLaughlin

1947, The John C. Winston Company

Her upstairs room was none too warm in winter; so Vicki wriggled herself into a faded brown wool jersey and jerked the side zipper snugly into place.

A very promising beginning, with clothing porn. In a small city in Washington, nineteen-year-old Vicki Burnett has been stand-in mother for her four younger siblings since their mother’s sudden death five years earlier. She (of course) has someone to do the heavy lifting in Aunt Bertha, but it’s to Vicki that all the million small chores come – keep Bob (14) from drifting into trouble with his pals, wrangling the small children Donald (7) and chatty Susan and, most of all, dealing with pretty, popular little bulldozer…er, sister, Margery. As the book opens, Margery blows into Vicki’s bedroom to demand big sis do some sewing for her (she’s got a hot date). Vicki weakly protests she has to work on her sketches (she’s a budding interior designer in college) but capitulates quickly.

At that moment the door burst open and Margery swept in. She wore a dark gray Chesterfield coat with a scarlet beret and mittens. Gold-blond curls framed her gay young face. Her eyes were very blue and her saucy mouth was vividly accented with cherry-red lipstick. She carried a green frock, which she tossed on the bed.

Somehow, it’s obvious the underlying theme of this book is going to be sister rivalry. And indeed, a handsome young man soon arrives at the door. He has nearly killed Donald, who was sledding on a dangerous street. The kid’s fine, so we’re told – he then vanishes from the book. He existed only to bring together Brian Royce with the mostly legal female members of the family. They will fight over him like cats over a fish head.

And then we switch gears and discover that their father is sick. He owns a bakery and his hard work and stress over supporting a large family have given him a “bad digestive condition” and his doctor says he needs a six months break in a warmer climate – say, southern California – to recover fully. He stresses over who will run the business, and Vicki volunteers.

For a while, we watch Vicki struggle mildly to learn the baking business and make inexpensive décor changes to the shop and sign. She realizes how hard her father’s worked to support them all, and begins to wonder if she really wants to finish that design course instead of staying with the family business.

And then we switch out again. While the above action was going on, Margery and Vicki had been jousting for the McGuff.. er, Brian Royce. He seems a swell guy, charms the family, dates both sisters genteelly. But Bob, drifting into a tough part of town, finds Royce in a seedy bar. The man manipulates Bob, who’s found himself in a bit of a argument with the bar owner, into keeping his mouth shut about seeing Bob in this disreputable place.

The first half is snappy and interesting enough, if not fully realized. The mystery that begins with Royce’s strange, unsavory behavior simply ruins the book.

Other books by Emma Atkins Jacobs

The Secret Spring (1944)

Far West Summer (1949)

Trailer Trio (1942)

Smooth Sailing (1954)

A Chance To Belong (1953)

For Each A Dream (1958)

Links

Kirkus review

Book search!

2015-10-18T19:43:00.003-07:00

A reader writes:

I am looking for a book printed sometime in the 1940 or 1950s. Set in pioneer America about a young woman, poor relation, unpaid servant type being forced to marry much older wealthy abusive widower. Rescued by long lost brother taken as a child during Indian raids. Girl is taken to woods by brother taught to live in woods as mountain man type. Brother halls build sturdy cabin and such. Then one day disappears back to life he misses leaving sister to fend for self. After much time she rescues man from marauding Indians. Escape to Fort rescued at last minute by brother who has reverted to Indian. (Long but thought more detail better.)

I have to say, this one sounds wonderful and I'd like to read it myself. Some of it is similar to a very, very good book from 1946 called Moccasin Trail by Eloise Jarvis McGraw. I don't think it's the same book, though. Anyone?

More long-lost books

2015-10-07T21:01:00.001-07:00

Two more book requests!

1) I'm looking for a vintage teen novel from the fifties or sixties about a girl who goes out for cheerleader. On the day of tryouts she realizes she has chosen an outfit that looks almost like the uniform--white sweater and navy blue skirt. She's embarrassed about that but she winds up making the squad and a bunch of new friends.

2) I'm looking for a teen novel about a girl going to Marde Gras for the first time. She winds up walking thru the streets alone. At first she enjoys her freedom but then she playfully sticks her hands in a fountain that is changing colors. It turns red and that reminds her of blood. It's sort of a gothic mystery novel.

The first doesn't ring a bell for me, but the second reminds me of Phyllis Whitney, who wrote many gothic mysteries and some for teens. She did write a New Orealeans-set book, Creole Holiday (1959). Anyone else?

Another lost book

2015-09-21T19:10:00.000-07:00

Another reader in search of a long-lost teen novel. Anyone recall this one?

I'm looking for a book where a young girl was attacked from behind, hospitalized and was sent drugged chocolates which her nurses ate. She recovered and went home to her father, David's estate. Her boyfriend, a photographer, turned out to be the bad guy. Her father's partner, Blair/Bruin protected her as best he could from everything, Something about a boat explosion at the end. Thanks if you can help me find this book!!

Flair for Fashion (1967)

2015-09-07T18:02:00.002-07:00

Flair for Fashion

Betty Ferm

1967, Julian Messner

A Career Romance for Young Moderns

Her black hair was brushed to perfection and capped her head in a casual, to the shoulder length. A new white lace blouse enlivened the dark V of her jacket, and just the right amount of powder duster the tip of her slightly tilted nose.

And thus are we introduced to Ellen Matthews, en route to New York to claim her prize from fashion school; a six-month internship with Countess Gardella at the House of Etienne.

She gave the gown a pin-tucked shirt waist bodice with a long, cuffed sleeve. The suggested fabric to be used was chiffon, with a low-cut matching colored slip. She added a billowing skirt and indicated that the half-inch belt was to have a round buckle made of the same chiffon.

This design wins her the internship, and is later dubbed Black Magic. It not only wins Ellen her shot at New York success, it will affect all her relationships at the House of Etienne. Starting with the Countess’s son, Tony. Because the Countess is ill when Ellen reaches New York, and Tony is in charge. And her introduction to Tony is to overhear him say he needs an experienced assistant, not “some callow kid who’s still wet behind the ears.”

Meanwhile, in Ellen’s personal life, she’s bunking with conveniently placed relative Aunt Laura, who lives in New York and is largely dismissed by Ellen and her cozy nuclear family for being a finicky spinster. Already interested in the Saint Louis ingénue is handsome blond ad man Bill Jennings, whose company handled the contest for the House of Etienne. Bill’s a slick native New Yorker whose innate sneakiness fascinates and repels Ellen in equal amounts. And of course, she ends up with a thing for her dark, suave, faintly French boss, Tony.

Extreme amounts of clothing porn. Ferm describes what virtually everyone is wearing in virtually every scene, and makes it clear that this is Ellen’s fascination in life. Which is great.

He was very handsome in a black mohair suit with a woven silk tie. He wore a French-cuffed white shirt with jeweled cuff links that matched his tie stud….

The descriptions are rather flat and overdone. This side is rather dull, for once.

But the motivations, and the tale of a young, rather naïve girl thinking over her instinctive reactions to various situations – those are wonderful. At one point, Ellen giggles at the complicated process of ordering wine, and Bill tells her something she had never considered before – that the fashion world involved more than creative design, that ordering wine and being a social creature was part of the business as well. In another fine moment, Ellen’s assumptions about a fat friend – and about her boring, old maid aunt - are exploded. Just as Ellen is mentally giving both women – one thin and colorless, the other fat and dressed in loud patterns – a makeover, fat Mrs. Boorman stuns her:

“Of course,” Mrs. Boorman remarked, as they sat down at the table, “I could look even slimmer if I wore solid colors.” Ellen almost dropped her tomato juice. It had never occurred to her that Mrs. Boorman understood that. She had assumed the heavy-set woman chose her flamboyant clothes from a lack of judgement.

Mrs. Boorman continues that she kept up with the styles for years, obediently changing with the times to suit each era.

“Then I decided to take a stand. I picked the colorful dresses I liked best and stuck with them. My daughters are horrified, but I’m happy.”

The romances were dull, the 1960’s swinging New York scenes hysterical –

Greenwich Village was alive with activity. Ellen caught glimpses of a dungareed girl with one blond braid down her back, a thin, bearded fellow with a canvas under his arm, a couple swaying jerkily outside a nightclub to a drum beat that echoed savagely from within…

- and Ellen’s career plots were as predictable as the romances. But the underlying characterizations were very good, and the ideas good. The larger teen romance itself was just not good.

Links

Kirkus review

Identify this book!

2015-08-24T20:08:00.003-07:00

A reader emailed a book description, hoping I'd recognize their long-lost teen novel.

Quick question, have you come across or do you remember a book from the 1950s set at a college campus within the fraternity/sorority system? The most significant moment from the book is the "golden couple" driving off down fraternity row and getting in a car accident that kills them both. There's a similar moment in Anne Rivers Siddons "Heartbreak Hotel" but it's not that book.

I couldn't help; it doesn't sound familiar to me. Anyone else?

2015-07-05T20:07:00.001-07:00

The New Lucinda

Grace Gelvin Kisinger,

1958, Thomas Nelson & Sons

Lucinda Taylor is 16, blonde, blue-eyed and tall but as a studious, serious girl, she knows she’s not popular and she feels dull and ignored in her hometown of Exeter. Reading a magazine article, she finds inspiration in a story about a girl who transforms the way she acts and how others think of her. Cindy wishes she could do this too, but in a town where everyone’s known her since birth, how can she?

So it’s lucky her dad is transferred to Woodmont, a town just far enough away to make Cindy’s makeover doable. And she pulls it off. She’s cool, she’s mildly indifferent, she’s unenthusiastic – she’s everything a popular girl should be. Fighting her inclination to be friendly and engaged with a group of friendly girls, Cindy instead cozies up to Rose Walsh, a sleek and predatory girl, and falls wildly in infatuation with Malcolm “Mack” Gordon. But are these people, who Lucinda’s identified as the most popular kids at Woodmont, really all that desirable?

I’m a sucker for a teen novel about trying to remake yourself. Lucinda’s likeable, the pace is good, and the resolution is satisfying. One major flaw – Lucinda’s identification of Rose and Mack as popular kids is never seriously discussed. Rose, in particular, seems less popular than infamous. Is Lucinda’s perception accurate?

Paperback

il. Barbara Fox (cover)

1958, Scholastic Book Services

Author’s other books

The Enchanted Summer (1956)

More Than Glamour (1958)

Bittersweet Autumn (1960)

Too Late Tomorrow (1962)

Links

Kirkus review of The New Lucinda

A blog with a review of More Than Glamour

Kirkus review of The Enchanted Summer

Kirkus review of More Than Glamour

Kirkus review of Bittersweet Autumn

Kirkus review of Too Late Tomorrow

Answer For April (1963)

2015-05-15T21:31:00.004-07:00

Answer For April

Jan Nickerson, il (cover) Lucille Wallace

1963, Funk & Wagnalls Company, Inc.

Although the others had gone back into the house, April Anderson watched the car until it was out of sight. She knew that Margo would insist that Jeff remove the Just Married sign and the paper streamers before they left the country road and started along the thruway. Her older sister had a large share of the Anderson dignity; Jeff, being an advertising man, wouldn’t mind. If the other drivers honked at him, he would give them a big grin, but Margo would be embarrassed. April thought that she would be too, in a similar situation.

Sixteen-year-old April has just watched her older sister Margo leave the family home for the last time. Their mother is dead, their father is an aggressively helpless man, and housekeeper Mrs. Berry isn’t enough to keep the home lights burning. April quickly learns that Margo’s been doing a lot in the past few years, and that it all falls on her now. Younger sisters Amy (14) and Pam (12) are basically hers now. Their 19yo brother Thayer Jr. is in Germany, serving in the military, and doesn’t make an appearance.

Tall. Blonde. Suave. Hollister. April’s been semi-flirting with boy-next-door Spencer, but is immediately intrigued to find a strange blonde boy on her front doorstep. He’s Hollister Jones, come to get tutoring in French from her impatient father (which is never quite explained, given Thayer Armstrong’s obvious dislike of teaching and apparent financial comfort), and triggers a girl-war between April and her long-time best friend Norma.

The war is conducted largely by Norma, who reveals such depths of malice which are all met with familiarity by April, so that you wonder why our heroine was ever friends with her. Then again, April’s response to Norma’s jealousy is to shrug; she’s oddly cold-blooded.

April’s real agonies are reserved for her family. Which is inevitable, given that her father suffers from Fragile Father Syndrome (attacks many fictional papas whose wives have been conveniently removed from this life by a tension-heightening author; generally, FFS daddies are socially conscious, artistic, journalistic or otherwise unimpeachably Better Than Thou. Daughters usually in thrall to them, sons often avoid them.) Thayer, even regarded through April’s fond eyes, is an asshole. An artist who loathes the commercial work he does to pay the bills, he has a long history of vicious arguments with son-in-law Jeff, an ad man, and reacts to modern music (apparently jazz) as if someone had struck him very hard with a club. Which becomes more tempting, the longer he goes on. His crowning moment is when it’s suggested everyone take their own plate to the sink after dinner.

Father looked distressed.

The poor man. He spends his days in his backyard studio with his Dachshund, Snodgrass, slaving over a hot palette, and here these evil women want him to walk his own dirty dish to the kitchen sink.

Modern music enters the plot through family friend and independent career woman “Aunt” Irene, who invites April for a visit to Boston and introduces her to various young friends. One, a brilliant but moody musician named Tom, becomes infatuated with April. You start to see Norma’s point.

“Every boy who comes along. First Hollister, then Neil Burgess, and Tom Barlow, and, of course, always good old Spencer. Why should you have them all?”

Sadly, this is about the extent of the clothing porn.

Saturday evening had come. Temporarily renouncing all her responsibilities, April became a carefree teen-ager preparing for a date. What a wonderful feeling! As she stepped into her black suede pumps, she felt absolutely grown up.

A readable but not particularly lively book.

Random points

Amazing names – Thayer and Hollister and Spencer and Snodgrass and Margo.

Virtually no physical description – clothes, house, etc. Nada. You fill in all the blanks.

That Cover

The two younger Anderson girls throw a Halloween party, true, but the cover is baffling. The party covers a chapter and isn’t that big a plot, and the book itself goes from the start of autumn through mid-winter.

Other books

Date With A Career (1958)

Destination: Success! (1959)

New Boy in Town (1960)

When The Heart is Ready (1961)

Circle of Love (1962)

Bright Promise (1965) historical

Double Rainbow (1966)

Peter Pembroke, Apprentice

Links

Kirkus review

A review of Nickerson's book New Girl In Town at Forever Young Adult blog

Hold Fast The Dream (1955)

2015-01-24T22:07:00.001-08:00

Hold Fast The Dream
Elizabeth Low,
Harcourt, Brace, 1955

It was noontime in Paris. The medley of sound from bell-tower and boulevard fell faintly on Blithe Moreland's ears, but her hands did not stop work. She continued to press little pellets of clay onto the yard-high figure of a striding man on the stand before her, entirely absorbed in the construction of the human shoulder.

Blithe Moreland is in Paris for the summer, working in the highly sought-after sculpting class of Monsieur Pierre, hoping to impress the master and convince her family back home that art, not college, is her future. A weekend trip to Salzburg derails her plans, introduces her to the kind Lang family and gives her the artistic inspiration she's been seeking.

Quiet fell upon the crowd and, at the flourish of a trumpet, the famous Lippizan horses with their handsome riders filed through the gate in a slow line, eight white horses stepping proudly in unison like lovely, perfect creatures from another world. This was the world-famous Spanische Reitschule of Vienna, the Spanish Riding School; Blithe had often heard of it.

Moving to Salzburg to study the horses, Blithe is crushed to discover they've now gone on tour. She contents herself studying other horses, throwing herself into sketching and investigating the anatomy of the horse in preparation for someday creating a sculpture.

Apart from Blithe's artistic ambitions, two sub-plots involve a romance (of course) and the slow-developing relationship between the young American and the Austrians she comes to know. It's a relationship marked by humiliating mistakes and mutual confusion, but with goodwill on both sides.

Both the romance and the international harmony plots take a back seat to Blithe as an artist, a choice that pleases me. The slow pace of her progress is also likeable, and the resolution is believable. My only real quibble is with the "where'd that come from?" nature of the romance - it pops up at the end of the book as an accomplished feature of her life, but until about 5 pages before, she wasn't even aware she liked the guy.

Links
Kirkus review
(atypically inaccurate)

First Love (1963) short stories

2015-01-17T23:55:00.000-08:00

First Love

Gay Head, editor; John Fernie, il (cover)

1963, Scholastic Magazines, Inc.

14 warm and glowing stories selected by Gay Head.

Stardust by Virginia Laughlin (originally Boys Don’t Understand)

16-year-old Wendy Warren dreams about the older brother of the boy next door. 23-year-old Brian complimented her and she fell head over heels, much to the annoyance of his younger brother Tod.

A Girl Called Charlie by William Kehoe

Quiet, thoughtful Charlotte Hollister finds a meeting of the minds with Ridge Evans when he protests the “going steady” fad in their high school.

Blue Valentine by Mary Gibbons (orig in Woman's Day, Feb. 1954, shown to left)

16-year-old Angelo Colucci, oldest and only son in a family of girls, chooses what he thinks is the ultimate feminine gift for his adored girlfriend, Ethel-Irene Simons, daughter of a local professor. His instincts are perfect – except he doesn’t realize how her parents will react.

The Walnut Trees by Virginia Akin (originally in Woman's Day Magazine)

Jenny Lee’s crush on a handsome teacher is resolved in an unexpectedly gracious way when his engagement is announced.

Once Upon A Pullman by Florence Jane Soman

He raised on eyebrow. “Just fasten your seat belt and let me take care of the landing.”

19-year-old William Fowler tries to impress a girl he meets on a train by cribbing from a novel about a smooth seducer.

Epicac by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. (originally in Collier's)

A machine helps a man woo his coworker, and falls in love with her itself.

Sixteen by Maureen Daly

The narrator tells of a night out of time, when she goes ice skating and meets a boy and waits for him to call and realizes he never will. A strange, dreamy story.

Eighteen by Charlie Brodie

The boy from Daly’s Sixteen tells his side of the skating night.

Prelude by Lucille Vaughan Payne (originally in Seventeen)

Nancy is popular, pretty and comfortably middle-class; her only “quirk” is an unusual affinity for classical music. Stephen in invisible, awkward and poor, but he also loves music and plays the piano. They fall in love, but Nancy has to decide if she can accept the change their dating will bring to her life of popularity.

Tomboy by Gertrude Schweitzer

Frances is uninterested in the social/romantic life at school, and resists growing up. Forced to attend a 16^th birthday party for a cousin, she quickly plans with old friend Skeeter to slip out. To catch frogs in a nearby marsh. Then she meets a college boy…

Bittersweet by Arlene Hale (originally title "First Love")

Leslie and Claude were high school sweethearts. Then he went to college, and suddenly, stopped writing. When he comes home for winter break, they’re forced to confront the truth.

Who is Sylvia? By Laura Nelson Baker (originally in Seventeen, September 1959 issue, shown left)

Adam falls in love with quirky, aloof Sylvia, who recently moved to town and lives with her grandparents. When parental decisions suddenly end their relationship, Adam faces the ephemeral nature of love.

Theme Song by Dave Grubb

Edith, a dreamy girl working in her father’s small restaurant, finds romance in the love life of a young man, a soldier posted at the local base, who comes in and talks about the girl he left behind.

Tough Guy by Peter Brackett

Surly, angry Byron is always ready to fight but secretly is in love with Nina and even writes a poem about her. The verse falls into the wrong hands, and destroys his bad boy rep. But it also gets Nina’s attention.

The authors

Several of the authors were difficult to find online. This has to be one of the most unlikely places to encounter Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. His short, EPICAC, was first published in 1950, in Collier's Weekly, and the central figure (a computer) was based on the real-life ENIAC.

Gay Head

Hi There, High School! (1960)

Etiquette For Young Moderns (1954)

Dear Gay Head (1962)

Boy Dates Girl (1961)

Party Perfect (1963)

Florence Jane Soman

Love Is A Lonely Thing (1953)

A Break In The Weather (1959)

Picture Of Success (1966)

Maureen Daly

Seventeenth Summer (1942)

Sixteen and Other Stories (1961)

Acts of Love

First A Dream

Arlene Hale

a prolific writer of nurse romances.

Laura Nelson Baker

Somebody, Somewhere

The Special Year

Links

ENIAC

Maureen Daly papers

Arlene Hale obituary

A Heart For Business (1958)

2014-02-05T15:06:00.004-08:00

A Heart for Business
Adele De Leeuw
1958, The Macmillan Company

She sighed. He had always ordered her around, and for the most part she hadn't minded. But Greg's opinion of her capabilities didn't jibe with her own. That was because he had known her too long, she thought. Just the way he had read down that list of questions... well, it was true she couldn't operate power tools or keep books or do art work. But that didn't mean she couldn't do anything.

Mary-Ellen Lathrop has a boy next door with a long memory for every single time she failed to show any hard economic sense. Greg, pleasant but unrelenting, thinks she's being ridiculous to sign up for Junior Achievement, the high school program that guides students through the rigors of setting up and running a small business.

"Get wise to yourself. You've got lots of things but a head for business - no."

Greg, frankly, is a dick. Although he has a point. Despite her genuine desire to show her talent for business, Mary-Ellen (known as Mel) has a tendency to look more at the promised social benefits of the enterprise. Such as the girl/boy ratio. Mel befriends the group's Mr. Darcy, a brooding and cynical anti-capitalist and music-loving pianist named Alex Gunther.

Alex seemed disinclined to go on. He stood, aloof and composed, while the silence built up. Mel noticed for the first time that his plaid jacket was worn thin at the elbows, and his trousers had the shine of much wear.

She's besotted, even more so when she discovers his only reason for joining J.A. is to find out how the capitalist machine works from inside. Son of a skilled machinist who'd been crippled on the job, Alex lived through his family losing everything when his father's employer refused to pay the benefits they owed him. Now he's uncontrollably bitter, lashing out even at the pretty girl who invites him to use her family's piano (because of course they have one, just as her parents of course love classical music):

He said, in a hard voice, "People like you - " he flung his long arm around the room, encompassing the deep chairs, the lamps, the Oriental rug, the silk draperies, the pictures - "what do you know about people like us? Or care? You're the kind who own the factories that do us out of our rights."

So Mel has an uphill battle with that one. Meanwhile, her dependable if slightly abusive Greg is being reeled in by a predatory newcomer. Diane, a redhead with a dramatic streak of her own, hits the J.A. group hard, and Greg forgets Mel exists.

The romances weren't particularly interesting, and the Junior Achivement aspect was dull (see below for why this may be my own little issue) but there is a Mr. Darcy, and he is furious at Big Business, so that's nice. Mel's dad may possibly help him see that all owners aren't bad guys, and he may completely come around and probably ends up being a manager somewhere, but we had a moment, Alex.

Full disclosure: at one point as a child, I did Junior Achievement. Where Mel's was run by 2 adults, local businessmen, mine was run by 2 nitwit college kids and correspondingly poorly executed.

Paperback
Acorn Books, 1963

Links
Junior Achivement

Trish (1951)

2013-11-24T18:58:00.001-08:00

Trish

Margaret Maze Craig,

1951, Thomas Y. Crowell

“I wonder,” Pat said suddenly, and the tone of her voice was an odd combination of resentment and wistfulness, “how it would feel to be Connie Hyde.”

High school seniors Patricia Ingram and her best friend Mary Jo Tucker are not popular. They’re not unpopular – Pat has a lovelorn male neighbor she doesn’t want, and neither girl is an outcast - but they want more. At least, Pat does. She’s spent her high school career existing on the fringe of the effortless cool clique run by sleek, poised girls like the famous Connie, and she wants that world. Mary Jo, slightly wiser, suggests there might be aspects to that world Pat hasn’t considered, but Pat has a big reason to ignore this advice – she’s in love with a boy from that group.

Dick Keating – tall, rugged senior. Stubby, biscuit-brown hair and short, thick eyelashes of the same incredible color. Hazel eyes. Lips a trifle full perhaps, but lips that turned up engagingly at the corners when he smiled. Very white teeth, just a little crooked. A casual way of wearing clothes, an easy nonchalance of manner. Dick Keating – the central figure in all her daydreams, and Connie Hyde’s exclusive property!

A chance meeting draws Dick’s attention to the slightly innocent Pat, and the novelty of a girl who isn’t smooth and jaded keeps his interest. Astonished, Pat is thrilled to begin dating him. From the start, though, she’s never sure where she stands with Dick, or how he’s going to fall between his interest in her unsophisticated charms and the allure of the familiar Connie. Later, she begins to see that his interest in her has awakened something else in him, a possibility that he might not just love her but that he might be able to change into the person she thought he was – a boy with values like her own, rather than a boy from a social group that to Pat seems racy and vulgar.

And then the book whips around, introduces a college boy with a bad reputation who falls instantly in love with Pat and destroys her relationship with Dick by creating (unwittingly) a situation where it seems they’ve had sex.

The last quarter of the book is jarring, and while the resolution between Pat and her flawed prince was believable, the way the book arrives at that resolution is baffling. Introducing a major character that late, making their relationship that powerful, and writing out Pat’s friends so quickly were all odd choices. Otherwise, a nicely written teen romance.

About the Author

Margaret Maze Craig (1911-1964)

Craig was born and lived in Pennsylvania. She was married and had 2 children, and worked as a home economics teacher.

Etc.

The dedication reads "For my mother, La Belle Sutton Maze."

Other Books by Author

Julie (1952)

Marsha (1955)

Three Who Met (1958)

Now That I'm Sixteen (1959)

It Could Happen To Anyone (1961)

Other Editions

Still More Of The Best Stories For Girls (1972)

2013-10-07T19:25:00.000-07:00

Still More Of The Best Stories For Girls (aka Like It Is)

Ed. N. Gretchen Greiner, il. Jim Conahan; il. Tom Nachreiner (cover)

1972, Golden Press

A fairly low-quality anthology of stories which are clearly intended to be very relevant.

Stories:

Good-Bye, Miss Kitty by Jane L. Sears

High-school freshman Karen sets out to rehome her beloved cat when her parents’ impending divorce means moving to an apartment that doesn’t allow pets. By far the best-written and most poignant of the stories in this anthology, this one still has the same odd, unreal quality of most of the others.

Dog-Sitter by Carl Henry Rathjen

Tena nervously faces down her first pet-sitting appointment as she chews on the bitter argument she’d had with her boyfriend’s father about girls applying to vet school. The outdated – and somewhat dangerous – advice on dog handling is almost enough to distract from the typical denouement in which the heroine realizes – surprise! – that her crisis is all in her own silly little head.

Fly Free by Carol S. Adler

Clare has retreated into herself after an accident amputated two fingers. Sent on an extended visit to a friend’s family, she’s drawn into the tense dynamic between the engineer father and his level-headed son who has no aptitude for math. Well-written and involving.

A Person, After All by Constance Kwolek

Anne reads the obituary of a dull, frumpy teacher , and realizes that the woman’s life contained parallels to her own.

Two Nice Girls by Frances Gray Patton

Two college girls, one black and one white, have a self-consciously self-congratulatory friendship until one gossipy chat exposes more of each’s background than she’d have liked.

They Don't Make Glass Slippers Anymore by Lael J. Littke

A teenager uses her little brother to get the attention of a handsome boy at the local amusement park.

The Year of the Baby by Carol Madden Adorjan

Only child Lorna is furious and unsettled when her parents announce that her mother is pregnant.

The Summer of Charlie Crip by Suzanne Roberts

Six months after her brother’s death in Vietnam, Karry is listlessly hanging around at the family’s summer cottage. A rescued baby bird and a cautious new boy bring her back to life.

Debbies Faces Herself by Pauline Smith

No Boy. I'm A Girl! by M.J. Amft

Authors

N. Gretchen Greiner

A Batch Of The Best (1979)

My Little Book of Cats

Jane L. Sears (1929-2012)

Wrote nurse romances; her mother Ruth McCarthy Sears wrote gothic romances.

Carl Henry Rathjen (1909-1984)

A prolific writer who contributed to the Trixie Belden series but concentrated on science fiction.

Carol S. Adler (1932-)

Better known as C.S. Adler. Has written many children's books.

Constance Kwolek (1933-2009)

Published one novel, Loner, and wrote articles and short stories.

Frances Gray Patton (1906-2000)
A short story writer best known for her novel Good Morning, Miss Dove.

Lael J. Littke

Author of over 40 books, including many young adult novels and books aimed at the Mormon market.

Carol Madden Adorjan

A teacher who wrote several books.

Suzanne Roberts
Difficult to determine

Pauline Smith

M.J. Amft

A short story writer.

Links

A cranky boy review of this book (with original cover) and Greiner’s followup A Batch Of The Best.

Note

This seems to have been one of a series of young adult anthologies. The others were:

The Best Stories For Girls

More Of The Best Stories For Girls

A Batch Of The Best

The Skating Rink (1969)

2013-10-02T20:30:00.001-07:00

The Skating Rink

Mildred Lee, il. Ilse Koehn (cover)

1969, The Seabury Press

One thing stood out, raw and bitter, in his mind: he was his father’s son and doomed to failure, no matter what he undertook.

Tuck Faraday, 15, is a poor country kid in rural southern Georgia. Alienated by a stammer that’s evoked constant ridicule from family and classmates since he was little, he’s ready to quit school the moment he turns 16. Then he meets Pete Degley.

“Degley’s the name,” he said. “Pete Degley.” His handshake made Tuck feel older than his fifteen years and he liked the feeling. Pete Degley told Tuck he was going to put a roller-skating rink here beside the highway, confiding in him so naturally that it wasn’t till afterwards, when he thought the whole thing over, that Tuck saw anything unusual about it.

The rink is going up close to Tuck’s bedraggled house, where his bitter father Myron is struggling to keep a chicken farm going and his exhausted stepmother, Ida, labors every winter over a foully smelly and recalcitrant oil stove. Tuck, staring at this despairing failure every day, is drawn to Pete’s optimism and the sense that his dream, his skating rink, could actually succeed.

Pete has reasons of his own for talking to Tuck. His young wife, Lily, is a wonderful skater and Pete, with a bum knee and a couple decades on him, wants a young male skater to pair her with, as an exhibition to draw crowds and to give skating lessons. So he trains the two in secret.

Curiously, as Tuck gains skill and confidence, he also gains insight. He finds compassion for his teasing little sister Karen, loutish brothers Clete and Tom, and even his parents.

About the Author

1908-2003

Mildred Lee Scudder was born a Baptist minister’s daughter in Alabama and spent her childhood travelling around the rural south, a region that appears in most of her books. She worked as a librarian at the University of Alabama, and married James Scudder in 1947. It also appears that she had married Edward Schimpff in 1929, and had 2 children.

Other Books

The Invisible Sun (1946)

The Rock and The Willow (1963)

Honor Sands (1966)

Fog (1972)

Sycamore Year (1974)

The People Therein (1980)

The Bride Of the Lamb

Links

Papers at University of Minnesota Libraries – Children’sLiterature Research Collections

UA list of Alabama authors

Other Editions:

Interesting, the metamorphasis from the first edition to the paperbacks. Tuck seems to go from being a kid to being a big teen to being John Travolta.

Surfboard Summer (1965)

2012-12-05T04:27:00.000-08:00

Surfboard Summer
Jean L. Sears
1965, Western Publishing Company
edition shown: 1969 Golden Press, A Golden Griffon Romance, il. Luciana Roselli

Suddenly Cindy's throat thickened, for in Mr. Marshall's eyes she caught the same flash of pity she had seen so often in Diane's. They knew what was wron. They understood her dread of going home to face her parents - and to look at that empty chair.

It's been five months since 16-year-old Cindy's older brother died in a car crash, and her mother is just going through the motions. Struggling with her own grief and trying to take care of her mother, Cindy has been looking forward to their annual summer at her grandmother's San Francisco home and is devastated when it's cancelled. Lonely now that her best friend has gone away for the summer, she wanders down to the beach of her California town and discovers surfing. And the local surf god, Bix, who swoops in to rescue her when - well, when he nearly runs her over. She doesn't mind, considering their ah, romantic ride back to the beach.

Crouching low while balancing with his feet tensed on the board's slippery surface, he did an about-face. Cindy took a deep breath, then hooked her legs around his muscular waist. A minute later, he lifted her knees up so that she was astride his broad shoulders.

Bix is a poster boy for the California coast -

His blond hair gleamed in the sun, and there were little white squint lines around the tanned skin on his temples, as if he had looked at a lot of oceans and smiled at a lot of pretty girls.

- and Cindy makes an impression by snapping a photo of him that gets picked up by a local newspaper, boosting his already high image and ego. Then she learns to surf well and, with her fearlessness, wins him completely. Or as completely as you can win over a guy like Bix.

Other plot points involve Heather, a rich girl whose bout of polio has left her with a crippled leg, and the tension between Bix's quintessentially middle-class surfing club and the beach bums.

Bix's usually affable face hardened before he answered. "Beach bums!" He shook his head disgustedly. "They do anything for show, and they give the rest of us a bad name with their peroxided hair and wild parties."

Cindy's a likeable heroine, kind enough that her first instinct is to protect her heartbroken mother but sensible enough to rebel when her mother's initial foray out of grieving selfishness is to question her daughter's new hobby. The California surfing scene feels like something out of the world of Gidget, and it's oddly impossible to imagine those nice, healthy, clean-cut early 1960's kids as surfers looking darkly at wild beach bums. Didn't the beach bums win that war?

About the Author
1929-2012
Born in Kansas, Sears had a mother (Ruth McCarthy Sears) who wrote gothic mysteries and young adult romances. Sears was a freelance writer who also wrote nurse romances and for Catholic publications.

Other Editions
The original book, which is so less attractive I've swapped it out for the paperback above:

Other books
Ski Resort Nurse
Television Nurse
Las Vegas Nurse

Links
Obituary

Vintage Nurse Romance Novels - blog with reviews of Sears's nurse novels

2012-11-24T18:51:00.001-08:00

Mystery Of The Long House

Lucile McDonald and Zola H. Ross

1956, Thomas Nelson & Sons

Edition shown: Pyramid Willow Books, 1964

Archaeology! Barbara’s dark eyes clouded and she tossed her short brown curls crossly. Of all the dull affairs! Who cared about embalming life, either past or present. She wanted to live it – now!

18-year-old Barbara Stratton is used to dealing with new environments; her father’s job in international banking has had the family moving around constantly all her life. But her latest setting, an island off the coast of Washington State, is a disappointment. She’d planned a summer of sailing parties, riding trips with the Tack Room Club and dances at the Boat Club. Instead, she’s dispatched to a remote archaeology dig run by her new brother-in-law, Paul. The soul of feminine arts, she bakes some brownies as a welcome treat and trips down to the site to introduce herself – and falls into a trench. Most of the men forgive her quickly, but harried Paul and two of his students remain distant. They have more pressing concerns than a bored teenager; their dig is of an Indian long house, and part of it appears to be on private land whose owner refuses to let them dig. With only a partial dig possible, their funding is in jeopardy. Barbara, meanwhile, is making friends with the locals and poking around in the mystery of the unfriendly neighbor, Mrs. Covey.

As the summer passes, Barbara finds herself becoming more interested in archaeology, and in one particular young archaeologist. But she disagrees with the group’s aloofness from the locals. When one man says, bitterly:

“None of these people understand. They’re stupid and stubborn.”

Barbara counters with:

…. “He doesn’t understand,” she said slowly. “And none of you try to make him understand. Maybe if you did, you’d have better luck.”

Somewhat unusually, the heroine spends much of her time alone. The love interest angle isn’t developed until late, and Barbara basically rubs Paul the wrong way so that the rest of the team feels awkward befriending her. Her loneliness and boredom keep her worrying away at the mystery, and finally give her the answer.

Slow, atmospheric and somehow boring. I liked the other McDonald/Ross collaboration I’ve read, Winter’s Answer, which was similarly slow and atmospheric, but had a liveliness to it that this book lacks.

Lucile Saunders McDonald (1898-1992)

Born in Oregon, Lucile Saunders became a journalist and worked at various newspapers in the Pacific Northwest. She married Harold D. McDonald in 1922 and had two children. She collaborated with Ross on several young adult novels in the 1950s and 1960s.

Zola H. Ross, aka Helen Girdey Ross

1912-1989
Associate Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Washington 1948-1955
Teacher in Kirkland, Washington. Pseudonyms included Z.H. Ross, Helen Arre, and Bert Lle

Books by both

The Mystery Of Castesby Island

Stormy Year

Friday’s Child

Pigtail Pioneer

Wing Harbor

The Courting Of Ana Maria

Assignment In Ankara

Winter’s Answer

The Stolen Letters

The Sunken Forest

For Glory And The King

Links

Wikipedia for Ross

The Unchosen (1963)

2012-06-17T18:50:00.000-07:00

The Unchosen

Nan Gilbert
1963, Harper & Row
Edition shown: 1965 Scholastic, il. Bob Cassell (cover)

We three were the have-nots, leagued against the haves. The left-out pretending not to envy the soughtafters. Three high-school seniors who had never had a single date, not one - can you imagine it?

Ellen Frazer, awkward and pudgy, looks dispassionately at herself and her two friends - Debbie Fuller (chubby and desperately boy-crazy) and Kay Nicholson (self-consciously tall and painfully skinny) - and concludes privately that they are The Unchosen. She also concludes that their families are no help. Her hearty German-American mother solves every problem with food and needs reassurance that her daughter is happy; Debbie's lack of popularity is made worse by having a younger sister who is extremely popular; and Kay's ongoing war with her feminine, fussy mother has embittered her against human relationships - an animal lover, she finds happiness in fussing over her beloved Fox Terrier, Midge.

But Ellen has an advantage. She has been a collector of pen pals for years, living vicariously through their initial letters about alien lives in faraway places, but finding only disappointment with the subsequent flat updates on daily life. With Norris Adair, she finds romance. Norris sends long, interesting letters that thrill her, and they flirt through the mail. The long-distance romance also gives her more respect among her friends - at least she has a sort of boyfriend. Maybe.

Over the course of their final year in high school, all three girls find their own ways out of anonymity. Ellen's a typical protagonist; she's ambitious and self-aware, and too proud for her own ambitions. She's quick to see the practical work that goes into making Ann Allison the most popular girl in the class, but can't quite figure out how to pull it off - and is not entirely aware that she lacks the commitment to fame, has a crippling amount of pride. It takes Kay's ruthlessly practical streak to mobilize the group - she calculates the number of unattached boys, and the percentage they'll have to approach to be assured of a reasonable rate of success. And Debbie, once introduced to the male side of the school, goes on a tear.

"Oh, good grief, it's as simple as two plus two," Kay said impatiently. "It you want to end up with five boys and you're only netting ten percent, you'd have to start out with fifty - see?"

"Gee," murmured Debbie, the blissful thought of five boys erasing her doubts as to how Kay proposed to snare them.

I have an affection for the teen novels that focus on the more average teen problems. One of the worst things about being a teenager is how you're starting to realize that prosaic, clichéd situations can be extraordinarily painful, which means you suffer without getting any respect. Here you are, at the height of your energy and passion, and your emotions are all inflamed by wanting a date to a stinking prom, or arguing with your mother. Where's the drama, where's the grand scale?

This book pulls it off. The writing is solid, and the characters are strong. From brooding Ellen to defensively indifferent Kay to frantic Debbie, all three girls are convincing as nice outsiders who have to find their own ways to social happiness. The pace is steady, but the pen pal plot is jerky, vanishing for much of the book and then resurfacing to tie everything up. There is little feeling of place - the book is set in Oregon, but it's a stock, generic American suburb. But best part may be the admission that you have to work to drag yourself out of the popularity gutter. This is is refreshing; it's a lot more common to find books where the heroine's either rescued by a Ken doll or (more typically) realizes the popular kids are dull and her life's work lies with the cool outcasts.

Covers

1963, Harper & Row at Amazon
1973, Harpercollins Childrens Books

About the Author

Mildred P. Geiger Gilbertson
From Eugene, Oregon
Graduated from the University of Texas, Austin in 1933

Websites

Loganberry Books *notice the comments from Gilbert's daughter and granddaughter on that site

Nonfiction

See Yourself In Print (for children) (1968)

Children

365 Bedtime Stories (1955)
A Dog For Joey (1967)

Young Adult
The Strange New World Across The Street
Champions Don’t Cry (1960)
Academy Summer (1961)
Then Came November
A Knight Came Running (1965)

Picture

Hanna Barbera's Yogi Bear Takes A Vacation
Hanna Barbera's Fred Flintstone: Bewildered Babysitter
Nan Hanna Barbera's Fred Flintstone's Bewildered Baby-Sitter with Pebbles
The Three Fuzzy Bears
Sir Gruff (dog) (1947)
Young Macdonald On The Farm (1949) il. Theresa Kalb

Anthologies

Story Parade - "The Burglar Trap"
Fields And Fences
On My Honor (editor Marjorie Meyn Vetter, 1951)
Told Under Spacious Skies
Told Under The Stars And Stripes
From Many Lands

That Archer Girl (1959)

2010-09-28T19:58:00.000-07:00

Anne Emery, il. Charles Geer (cover)
1959, The Westminster Press

Anne Archer was a Girl Who Had Everything.

A slim blonde from the oldest family in town, Anne Archer is a senior at the exclusive Auburn Academy, a private day school in a wealthy Chicago suburb. The holiday season, and the approaching end of her high school career, plus the spectacular debut her mother's planning for the spring, are making Anne restless.

...the debut always brought with it the gnawing question of what she would do afterward.

Part of her solution to the anxious boredom is to crash the local public high school's dance with another girl's boyfriend. Her problems seem to recede when she falls hard for Ron, and he for her. But she's aware that he's fallen in love with only one side of her, and she's even slightly conscious that if he sees who she can be, it would be a disaster.

Anne has a reputation, and not just as the local golden girl. Although her family connections and personal looks ensure a certain level of acceptability, she also has an unsavory history of going too far with too many boys. Anne dismisses the latter; that's who she was last year. This year - and the New Year - will be different. But when her best friend, brainy Christie, finds a male soulmate, it drives Anne over the edge. Despite her love for Ron, Anne's driven to make brainy, distant Kent respond to her. To be rebuffed torments her, and as Kent retreats further from her advances, she becomes frantic to gain his interest.

Anne's nastiness is made clear early:

"I hate people that make me feel sorry for them," Anne said. "It makes me kick them around. They ought to know better."

There are hints of why Anne's so cold and controlling - childhood cruelty at school, her parents' distance - but while they're offered as a way to understand her, she's never excused by either the author or the other characters. Anne herself takes pains to conceal any weakness, attacking it in others and impatient with criticism.

On the other hand, Ron's a little overly obsessed with Anne as his personal property. Her behavior is wrong, but his anger at her flirting seem a little creepy coming from an unmarried high school boy regarding his girlfriend.

Links
Image Cascade

Other Books by Author

Dinny Gordon Series:

Dinny Gordon, Freshman
Dinny Gordon, Sophomore
Dinny Gordon, Junior
Dinny Gordon, Senior

Senior Year
Going Steady
Sorority Girl
High Note Low Note
Campus Melody

County Fair
Hickory Hill

Sweet Sixteen
First Love True Love
First Orchid for Pat
First Love Farewell
The Popular Crowd
The Losing Game

Scarlet Royal
Vagabond Summer
That Archer Girl
Married on Wednesday
A Dream to Touch
Tradition
Bright Horizons
Mountain Laurel
Jennie Lee, Patriot

American Friend: Herbert Hoover
Mystery of the Opal Ring
Danger in a Smiling Mask
Carey's Fortune
The Sky Is Falling
Free Not to Love
Stepfamily

A Spy in Old Philadelphia
A Spy in Old Detroit
A Spy in Old New Orleans
A Spy in Old West Point

Beth Hilton: Model (1961)

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Lee Wyndham
1961, Julian Messner

"Honestly, Beth, the way you stumble along, I expect you to fall over the flowers in the rug!" Mother said after an exasperating half-hour of walking and pivoting instruction in the living room.

New Jersey girl Beth is 17 when the painful comparisons to her cousin Lissa, a model since childhood, and an unfortunate experience in a school fashion show prompt her to enroll in charm school. Initially, all she wants is to learn some grace and poise, but a chance meeting with an arrogant young photographer spurs her to a long-derided ambition - modeling. She scrapes her way into the Queen's Agency and, upon graduation from high school, enters the world of modeling in New York City.

During the fifty-three minutes she had spent before Alex Turner's camera, she had eaten a bite out of seventeen generously spread peanut-butter sandwiches - and after the first nine or ten, it wasn't easy to "glow" over The Product.

Meanwhile, jaded child model Lissa is growing dissatisfied with her own lot, yearning toward Hollywood and jealous of her heretofore meek cousin's new confidence and ambition. Matters come to a head during an ice storm on a mountain, surprisingly enough. Matters between Beth and the treacherous photographer Amos resolve somewhat earlier; it will be no surprise that the two have chemistry.

Wyndham's books are always clear and well-written, and make the most of the careers highlighted. With such a glamorous career, though, she seems to have been overly cautious. There are nice bits about the realities of modeling, but not as much atmosphere as you might hope. There is one very funny scene when Beth, at a shoot to model a wedding gown, finds herself locked out of the church as a sympathetic crowd gathers around her, thinking she's been jilted.

Clothing porn, of course:

Her number was a swash-buckled black broadtail, supple as finest fabric and cut like a smart cloth coat, with a large notched collar and a saucy black beret to top it off.

But not as much as you'd expect. There is a sense of serious purpose about the career of modeling; history is given, techniques discussed, and it's made clear that Beth's half-hearted jump into the field has to become something more if she hopes to be a success.

Beth was impressed. John Robert Powers had founded the very first model agency. She had read about him and his famous "long-stemmed American Beauties" - Powers Girls who went on from modeling to earn fame and fortune in other fields as well: as actresses, motion-picture stars, fashion directors, designers, stylists, fashion-show producers.

At the end of the book is a short piece titled "If You Want To Be A Model." In italics is the advice "Don't let anyone "sell" you on the idea of doing anything which you suspect is not right or proper."

Other Editions
1964 Tempo paperback

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Author Bio

Jane Andrews Lee Hyndman aka Lee Wyndham was born in Russia in 1912. She came to the U.S. in 1923, and married in 1933. She worked in book publishing as an editor, for the Philadelphia Inquirer in the 1950s, and was a lecturer and columnist through the 1960s. This book draws on her own modeling experience. As a teacher at an NYU writing class, she taugh a young Judy Blume.

Links

Northwest Digital Archive

Bibliography

Young Adult Fiction

Candy Stripers, New York, Messner, 1958

Bonnie

Lady Architect, New York, Messner, 1957

Buttons and Beaux, with Louise Gallagher, New York, Dodd, Mead, 1953

Golden Slippers, Vera Bock, illustrator, New York, Longmans, Green, 1953

Dance to My Measure, New York, Messner, 1958

Slipper Under Glass, Vera Bock, illustrator, New York, Longmans, Green, 1952

Camel Bird Ranch, Bob Riger, illustrator, New York, Dodd, Mead, 1955

Children's Fiction

A Dance for Susie, Jane Miller, illustrator, New York, Dodd, Mead, 1953

On Your Toes, Susie!

Susie and the Ballet Family, Jane Miller, illustrator, New York, Dodd, Mead, 1955

Susie at Dance Camp

Family at Seven Chimney House

Sizzling Pan Ranch, Robert D. Logan, illustrator New York, T.Y., Crowell, 1951

Nonfiction

First Book of Opera

Writing for Children and Teen-agers, New York, Writer's Digest, 1968

Florence Nightengale

Holidays In Scandinavia

Ballet For You

Thanksgiving, Hazel Hoecker, illustrator, New York, Garrard, 1963

Fairy Tales

The Mermaid and the Three Magic Rings

Russian Tales of Fabulous Beasts and marvels, retold by Lee Wyndham

Tales of Ancient Araby, New York, Watts, 1960

Tales from the Arabian Nights, Robert J. Lee, il, Racine, Whitman Publishing Co., 1965

Chinese Mother Goose Rhymes

The winter child; an old Russian folktale retold by Lee Wyndham

Ever After (1948)

2010-07-19T20:04:00.000-07:00

Ever After

Phyllis Whitney, il. Elinor Darby (cover)

1948, Houghton Mifflin Company

The blue eyes that took in everything and gave out nothing examined Marel critically, coveted her hat and came wearily to rest when they reached her portfolio.

"Oh," she said. "One of those. Just out of art school, I suppose?"

Margaret Elizabeth "Marel" Pope comes to New York City from Chicago determined to make her way as an illstrator of children's books. When her initial interview at Embree Studios ends in the gentle observation that her drawings lack life, Marel goes off freshly determined to improve her work and win a place there. She luckily has a wealthy aunt, Peggy, whose fame as a hatmaker has resulted in a penthouse apartment she's opened to her struggling niece.

Marel won't stay long with Peggy. She quickly befriends a young writer, Chris Mallory, and they fall in love. But with postwar housing at a premium, the young couple can only find a tiny studio, which blows the problems of their early months of marriage all out of proportion. Does Marel believe that a woman can't have a career and a husband, as so many of her friends claim?

Whitney had a talent for summing people up. Marel's cynical coworker Gail:

...a tall, rather brassy-looking girl came to the door of the waiting room. No hair could ever have grown that color, but it was beautiful, sleekly combed and certainly eye-taking. She'd have been quite pretty except for the hard lines about her mouth and the suspicious way her blue eyes regarded the world.

The romance is quite nice, and Chris is a model young husband, willingly sharing the chores in a very modern way. Everything, in fact, is very 21st century until Marel realizes, as have so many heroines in so many romances, that their problems are all her fault.

About the author

1903-2008

Phyllis Ayame Whitney worked in libraries and bookstores in Chicago before marrying George A. Garner in 1925. They had a daughter, Georgia, in 1934. She worked for the Chicago Sun and the Philadelphia Inquirer during the 1940s. Her first book, A Place For Ann, was published in 1941. In 1950 she re-married; according to her NYT obituary, she divorced Garner in 1945 partly because he was not supportive of her writing. Two of her mysteries for children won the Edgar Allen Poe Award, and she was awarded the Grand Master Award from the Mystery Writers of America in 1988.

Books

Books for teens

Nobody Likes Trina (friendship)

The Fire And The Gold (early San Francisco)

A Long Time Coming (migrant workers)

Step To The Music (Civil War)
Linda's Homecoming

Willow Hill (race)

A Place For Ann

Career-type

Creole Holiday (acting)

The Highest Dream (working at the UN)

Love Me, Love Me Not

The Silver Inkwell (writer)

A Window For Julie (window dresser)

A Star For Ginny (illustrator)

Links

Author website

The New York Times obituary

Other editions