Fair Day, and Another Step Begun

by Katie Letcher Lyle

Convinced of the rightness of her love, a pregnant sixteen-year-old follows the father of her child when he runs away from her.

Genres: Young Adult

Paperback

First published April 28, 1974

Reviews

[Victoria Weinstein · Rating 5 out of 5]

This beautiful YA novel made a huge impression on me as a child. It's about a pregnant teenager who goes on a journey to find, and to win, the father of her baby. What a subject matter, right? Things were more liberal in the 1970's, I guess. The protagonist is a gentle, lovely soul and the lyrical storytelling has stayed with me for thirty years. Do find a copy and read this.

[Anna Bowling · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first read this book when I was in junior high, and it's stuck with me for the :cough cough: years since, so I was curious to see how it held up after all this time. The verdict: pretty darned well.

This might be a different sort of read for today's YA aficionados. We first meet sixteen year old Ellen Burd and young twentysomething John Waters at the point where everything changes, and Ellen reveals she is pregnant with his child. John suggests abortion, but Ellen is firm about keeping the baby. John splits, Ellen follows, in disguise and in secret, until they meet again at the hippie commune, Fair Day. Things do not get any easier there, as John has a new girlfriend, another young man has eyes for the visibly pregnant Ellen, and there are horse thieves about.

Written in the early 1970s, this then-contemporary retelling of the Old English ballad, Childe Waters, has a lyrical, hypnotic feel to it. The language is lush, the images poetic and vivid enough to have stuck with me since I was but a wee princess myself. That kind of staying power gets highest marks from me, and makes me wish it were possible to take snapshots of some of the images Ms. Lyle describes, so I could frame them and keep them where I could view them always.

[Debby]

Ellen Burd is 16 when she sees and falls in love with John Waters, a Yale grad who has returned to work for his dad in their small VA community. In Oct. Ellen gets John to take her on a canoe trip which ends up with their making love. In Feb. Ellen goes to see him to tell him she is pregnant - he later leaves town. Ellen is a strange girl - very interested in plants which an old hermit type of friend teaches her to use. He makes a love potion for Ellen before he leaves. She follows him and they end up living in a commune type of situation. The end comes when she has the baby, John claims him, and they manage to solve a horse thieving "mystery".

Strange book - very unusual treatment of teen pregnancy. Based on the old English ballad "Childe Waters". Almost verging on fantasy. Easy reading and spell binding in a strange way.

[Soren · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm re-reading this book in 2007 to see if I still like it's freakiness. I know it's cased on a ballad, written around when I was born, and written in this sort of dreamlike hippie way.

[Geanie · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favorites when I was in high school...