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Amy and Laura #1
Amy Moves In
The first in a series of highly praised books about a poor, Jewish family living in the Bronx in the 1940s. Amy moves into a new neighborhood, and learns to choose the right kind of friends, and the consequences of lying.
212 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1965
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
February 21, 2017
This review of all three Amy and Laura books also appears on my blog, Read-at-Home Mom.
When Marilyn Sachs passed away at the beginning of January, I was reminded immediately of how much I enjoyed her 1968 children's novel, Veronica Ganz. Back in 2015, when I reviewed the book, I wrote that it was "refreshingly unburdened by the contemporary notion that every book is poised to make or break the reader’s entire childhood by its portrayal of unpleasant happenings." I appreciated the book so much because it told the truth about how kids sometimes behave, and it treated the negative aspects of life as ordinary, run-of-the-mill occurrences that happen to everyone, and not as terrible tragedies that ruin kids' lives forever, or that must be overcome with the help of Very Special Adults. As I read through the three books in Sachs's Amy and Laura series, I felt that same sense that Sachs wished to present the truth to her audience, without exaggerations that make life seem better or worse than it is.
In Amy Moves In, Amy Stern struggles to fit in after her family moves to a new neighborhood. She tries to befriend an interesting girl in her class at school, and though this girl turns out to be a bully, Amy is afraid of what her classmates would do if she pursued a friendship with someone more worthy, but much less popular. When her mother is involved in a serious accident and must stay in the hospital for a prolonged period of time, things get more difficult for Amy, as the family adjusts to life with Aunt Minnie, who runs a household much differently than Mama.
In Laura's Luck, both Amy and Laura are sent to summer camp so their aunt can have a vacation from caring for them before their mother is released from the hospital in September. Laura, who is bookish and unskilled at sports, is not happy about going to camp, and her first few nights are absolutely miserable. After a stint in the infirmary with a sprained ankle and a friendly nurse for companionship, Laura comes out with a better attitude and a new cabin assignment to help ease her adjustment. As she works to become a valued member of her cabin, Laura also begins to see the value in camp.
Finally, Amy and Laura sees the Stern family piecing their lives back together after Mama finally returns home. The girls are sad to see their mother confined to a wheelchair, and their father has insisted they do nothing to cause their mother any displeasure at all, including arguing in the house or participating in activities at school of which she would not approve.
What stands out to me in all three of these books is Sachs's honesty and sincerity about the triumphs and tribulations of Amy's and Laura's lives. Her stories do not feel manufactured, and they do not manipulate the reader toward having any particular emotion or learning any particular lesson. Rather, Sachs present the events of everyday life the way they really happen - randomly, unpredictably, inconveniently - and her characters react reasonably and realistically. Because the characters are so believable, the reader is completely invested in the fate of both girls from the moment they are first introduced, and after a while, the plot almost doesn't matter, because the appeal of the stories is simply spending time with the characters. Though Amy and Laura are frequently at odds with one another, the reader is always sympathetic to both sisters, because Sachs allows full access to their thoughts and motivations and gives each character a balance of good and bad qualities.
I was surprised when I read Veronica Ganz to learn that it is set in the 1940s, and that fact was even less obvious in these books. Veronica actually appears in Amy and Laura (as a cause of trouble for Laura in her new post as hall monitor), so it's clearly meant to be the same time period, but there are very few details dating the books to the 40s specifically. In fact, so many aspects of the stories feel timeless, or at the very least more modern than the 1940s. Some of this is probably because of the writing style, which matches other books for kids from the 1960s and 1970s, but I think some of it is also because the characters' emotions are so real and therefore so relatable for kids from every generation.
This is a great vintage series for realistic fiction lovers, and a wonderful portrait of the complicated relationships between sisters. It is one I will recommend without hesitation to my own girls in a few years!
When Marilyn Sachs passed away at the beginning of January, I was reminded immediately of how much I enjoyed her 1968 children's novel, Veronica Ganz. Back in 2015, when I reviewed the book, I wrote that it was "refreshingly unburdened by the contemporary notion that every book is poised to make or break the reader’s entire childhood by its portrayal of unpleasant happenings." I appreciated the book so much because it told the truth about how kids sometimes behave, and it treated the negative aspects of life as ordinary, run-of-the-mill occurrences that happen to everyone, and not as terrible tragedies that ruin kids' lives forever, or that must be overcome with the help of Very Special Adults. As I read through the three books in Sachs's Amy and Laura series, I felt that same sense that Sachs wished to present the truth to her audience, without exaggerations that make life seem better or worse than it is.
In Amy Moves In, Amy Stern struggles to fit in after her family moves to a new neighborhood. She tries to befriend an interesting girl in her class at school, and though this girl turns out to be a bully, Amy is afraid of what her classmates would do if she pursued a friendship with someone more worthy, but much less popular. When her mother is involved in a serious accident and must stay in the hospital for a prolonged period of time, things get more difficult for Amy, as the family adjusts to life with Aunt Minnie, who runs a household much differently than Mama.
In Laura's Luck, both Amy and Laura are sent to summer camp so their aunt can have a vacation from caring for them before their mother is released from the hospital in September. Laura, who is bookish and unskilled at sports, is not happy about going to camp, and her first few nights are absolutely miserable. After a stint in the infirmary with a sprained ankle and a friendly nurse for companionship, Laura comes out with a better attitude and a new cabin assignment to help ease her adjustment. As she works to become a valued member of her cabin, Laura also begins to see the value in camp.
Finally, Amy and Laura sees the Stern family piecing their lives back together after Mama finally returns home. The girls are sad to see their mother confined to a wheelchair, and their father has insisted they do nothing to cause their mother any displeasure at all, including arguing in the house or participating in activities at school of which she would not approve.
What stands out to me in all three of these books is Sachs's honesty and sincerity about the triumphs and tribulations of Amy's and Laura's lives. Her stories do not feel manufactured, and they do not manipulate the reader toward having any particular emotion or learning any particular lesson. Rather, Sachs present the events of everyday life the way they really happen - randomly, unpredictably, inconveniently - and her characters react reasonably and realistically. Because the characters are so believable, the reader is completely invested in the fate of both girls from the moment they are first introduced, and after a while, the plot almost doesn't matter, because the appeal of the stories is simply spending time with the characters. Though Amy and Laura are frequently at odds with one another, the reader is always sympathetic to both sisters, because Sachs allows full access to their thoughts and motivations and gives each character a balance of good and bad qualities.
I was surprised when I read Veronica Ganz to learn that it is set in the 1940s, and that fact was even less obvious in these books. Veronica actually appears in Amy and Laura (as a cause of trouble for Laura in her new post as hall monitor), so it's clearly meant to be the same time period, but there are very few details dating the books to the 40s specifically. In fact, so many aspects of the stories feel timeless, or at the very least more modern than the 1940s. Some of this is probably because of the writing style, which matches other books for kids from the 1960s and 1970s, but I think some of it is also because the characters' emotions are so real and therefore so relatable for kids from every generation.
This is a great vintage series for realistic fiction lovers, and a wonderful portrait of the complicated relationships between sisters. It is one I will recommend without hesitation to my own girls in a few years!
April 29, 2009
I was always very fond of this one. Picked up at a school fete when I was seven or so. I liked how a time period was never specifically mentioned in the books, so it just had that general 'a little old-fashioned' feel. An interesting slice of life to read about, although the adults were, on the whole, not very likeable.
June 28, 2011
I read this as a kid and I enjoyed it, it is by far one of my favorite books by one of my favorite authors. The story supposedly takes place in the 1940's but things such as kids haven't changed all that much! It really focuses in on the lives of young kids; It talks about an ordinary closeknit family; Mama, Daddy, and their two girls Laura (oldest) and Amy (youngest). The fact that they are poor, Jewish and living in a different time period and a different area from where I grew up (them in the inner city outside NYC, me in the suburbs clear across the nation outside Seattle) from mine didn't really strike me initially. I grew up in a comfortable family in the upper middle class in the 1980s, but the story still could have been my own. It is timeless and could have happened anywhere at any time. They just moved to a new neighborhood and Amy has mixed feelings and gets into all kinds of adventures.
Things that bothered me were that I thought that Amy was a wimp and cried too much and her sister and mother should have had her fight her own battles since Laura can't always be there to do it for her. Also, I think Amy gives in too easily to friends and she initially has a bad choice in friendships; her standards are too low, however that evens out in the end. Also, I could not believe how rude the storekeepers were in the story; talk about bad customer service. How can they stay in business if they yell at people??? I guess they were very low class, so that was life in the Bronx back then! I found a few of the grown-ups in this book downright obnoxious! I was also hacked off about the way one chapter it made girls seem inferior to boys and seemed to let boys get away with hurting girls, and there seemed to be no closure to it. However I guess in a latter chapter they vaguely mention a settlement about the boy-girl dispute in the girls' favor but it isn't quite clear.
Anyway, their ordinary family life is disrupted when Mama has a terrible accident and winds up in the hospital. Daddy's sister Aunt Minnie comes to live with them (she's a screamer and she's a neat freak!) and Mama's one night stay in the hospital turns into months. I did not always care for Aunt Minnie, how she hated animals. She was a cruel, heartless witch! I cried about the Kitten Herkey. He was just a helpless kitten, for Heaven's sake and Aunt Minnie was so irrational about him, and animals in general. It was not his fault he was a helpless kitty. She could have at least given him to someone else who would care for him. You don't take a pet away from children; that is a cardinal rule! AUNT MINNIE, HAVE A HEART, for crying out loud!!! Money was clearly not the issue, or Daddy would not have brought the kitten home in the first place. It's HIS house. Aunt Minnie was just plain MEAN!
The end of the book was disappointing in that it left a lot of questions unanswered, however it's a series and if you read the two following books you get more answers. This is an interesting book and you kind of have to read it more than once in order to understand it better and to enjoy it more.
Things that bothered me were that I thought that Amy was a wimp and cried too much and her sister and mother should have had her fight her own battles since Laura can't always be there to do it for her. Also, I think Amy gives in too easily to friends and she initially has a bad choice in friendships; her standards are too low, however that evens out in the end. Also, I could not believe how rude the storekeepers were in the story; talk about bad customer service. How can they stay in business if they yell at people??? I guess they were very low class, so that was life in the Bronx back then! I found a few of the grown-ups in this book downright obnoxious! I was also hacked off about the way one chapter it made girls seem inferior to boys and seemed to let boys get away with hurting girls, and there seemed to be no closure to it. However I guess in a latter chapter they vaguely mention a settlement about the boy-girl dispute in the girls' favor but it isn't quite clear.
Anyway, their ordinary family life is disrupted when Mama has a terrible accident and winds up in the hospital. Daddy's sister Aunt Minnie comes to live with them (she's a screamer and she's a neat freak!) and Mama's one night stay in the hospital turns into months. I did not always care for Aunt Minnie, how she hated animals. She was a cruel, heartless witch! I cried about the Kitten Herkey. He was just a helpless kitten, for Heaven's sake and Aunt Minnie was so irrational about him, and animals in general. It was not his fault he was a helpless kitty. She could have at least given him to someone else who would care for him. You don't take a pet away from children; that is a cardinal rule! AUNT MINNIE, HAVE A HEART, for crying out loud!!! Money was clearly not the issue, or Daddy would not have brought the kitten home in the first place. It's HIS house. Aunt Minnie was just plain MEAN!
The end of the book was disappointing in that it left a lot of questions unanswered, however it's a series and if you read the two following books you get more answers. This is an interesting book and you kind of have to read it more than once in order to understand it better and to enjoy it more.
April 11, 2019
I've begun revisiting some books from my childhood. Marilyn Sachs was an author I liked as a kid in elementary school- I still like her now! This is part of her Amy & Laura series; I hope to move on to the next book soon. Great story about a 10 yr old girl Amy and her sister Laura, who move into a new neighborhood and all the subsequent ups and downs that come with starting a new school, making new friends and acclimating to a new environment. Fun read.
November 29, 2017
This is another of those books that I always intended to read and then hadn't even though I'd carried around that particular book for years and years.
Amy and Laura have just moved into a new neighborhood. The first in a trilogy about the sisters, this book focuses on Amy, on the friends she makes (not always the best kind) and the way she likes to tell tall tales. Her penchant for lying gets her into trouble. Her lack of ability to think for herself puts her into uncomfortable positions.
I found myself not liking Amy a whole lot. I'll have to read the other books (and I know I read Laura's Luck as a child, though I don't remember it well now outside of something about Amy being always in the thick of things while Laura feels like she's always on the outside? If I could find it, I'd read it...) to see if Amy ever develops an admirable character or not. By the end of this book we see a glimmering of who she could be, and given what her family is going through, my main thought was more of the "it's about time" sort of thinking. Overall I was somewhat disappointed at the end of this book. I'm kind of sorry I've been dragging it around for so long.
Amy and Laura have just moved into a new neighborhood. The first in a trilogy about the sisters, this book focuses on Amy, on the friends she makes (not always the best kind) and the way she likes to tell tall tales. Her penchant for lying gets her into trouble. Her lack of ability to think for herself puts her into uncomfortable positions.
I found myself not liking Amy a whole lot. I'll have to read the other books (and I know I read Laura's Luck as a child, though I don't remember it well now outside of something about Amy being always in the thick of things while Laura feels like she's always on the outside? If I could find it, I'd read it...) to see if Amy ever develops an admirable character or not. By the end of this book we see a glimmering of who she could be, and given what her family is going through, my main thought was more of the "it's about time" sort of thinking. Overall I was somewhat disappointed at the end of this book. I'm kind of sorry I've been dragging it around for so long.
September 8, 2015
Originally read this series of 3 books as a kid (maybe 6th grade). I decided to read the series again now and understood a lot more of what was going on, especially with the adults. Some of the plot lines and characters annoyed me, but some of them were quite relatable. My ratings are as I rate them upon reading them now. My ratings as a kid probably would've been a star higher for each book.
August 21, 2016
Good if you grew up enjoying Sachs works about NYC in the 50's and 60's. Amy is a smart mouthed 10 year old growing up and going through trials and good times with her family. What it is like to be living hand to mouth, family problems, and how easy it is to become a bully are themes explored herein
November 24, 2008
This was an absolutely adorable book that showed what it was like to be a city girl in the early '60's. It describes the childhood we all wished we had and gives a glimpse of what life was like when this was still America. Cute!
September 5, 2020
Really cute. I haven’t read this since I was a kid, so it was a fun trip down memory lane. I remember liking book 2 better, about when the sisters go to summer camp, but I figured I should start at the beginning and read the whole trilogy again.
March 25, 2008
This was one of my favorite series when I was growing up. I still treasure these books today.
March 14, 2010
Very little plot and a heroine that I just didn't care for. I'm all about "day in the life of a child" stories, but this one just didn't do it for me. At all.
August 23, 2016
in this book it was strange that amy made friends with someone that was mean to her. My favorite part was when amy and her friends all were playing by the big rock thing in the parks
February 11, 2017
This book is about a girl named Amy who is seven years old and trying to fit in her new neighborhood.
This was a cute book, but I would definitely recommend it to younger children.
This was a cute book, but I would definitely recommend it to younger children.
March 21, 2023
Loved this trilogy as a kid, and decided to re-read it before I weed it from my personal collection... and I still hate to do it. Great stories.
June 8, 2023
Nostalgia reread.
September 9, 2024
Revisited this book that I had read when I was younger. It’s part of a great series about two sisters growing up in the 60’s. I love the peek into that time in history. Times have definitely changed!
September 1, 2008
Apparently this is part of a fairly popular series that I've never heard of before. The book was good, perhaps it hasn't aged well.
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews