Friends Everywhere

Aladdin Angelwings #1

by Donna Jo Napoli, Doron Ben-Ami (Illustrator), Lauren Klementz-Harte (Illustrator)

Every time a bell rings, an angel gets his wings.
The Little Angel of Friendship is the most popular angel around. He's pretty sure it won't take much for him to earn a few more feathers and get his flying wings. But there's a tough task ahead of him. He has to help a girl named Patricia make new friends.
There's nothing wrong with Patricia. It's just that she has a different way of talking than most children. Plus, she's just moved to a new town. The girl down the hall wants nothing to do with her -- she thinks Patricia is a baby. If Patricia doesn't speak up soon, there'll be one unhappy Little Angel of Friendship -- he needs those wings to fly!
Have you made a friend today?

96 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 1999

About the author

Donna Jo Napoli is both a linguist and a writer of children's and YA fiction. She loves to garden and bake bread, and even dreams of moving to the woods and becoming a naturalist.

At various times her house and yard have been filled with dogs, cats, birds, and rabbits. For thirteen years she had a cat named Taxi, and liked to go outside and call, "Taxi!" to make the neighbors wonder. But dear dear Taxi died in 2009.

She has five children, seven grandchildren, and currently lives outside Philadelphia. She received her BA in mathematics in 1970 and her Ph.D. in Romance Languages and Literatures in 1973, both from Harvard University, then did a postdoctoral year in Linguistics at MIT. She has since taught linguistics at Smith College, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Georgetown University, the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, and Swarthmore College. It was at UM that she earned tenure (in 1981) and became a full professor (in 1984). She has held visiting positions at the University of Queensland (Australia), the University of Geneva (Switzerland), Capital Normal University of Beijing (China), the University of Newcastle (UK), the University of Venice at Ca' Foscari (Italy), and the Siena School for the Liberal Arts (Italy) as well as lectured at the University of Sydney (Australia), Macquarie University (Australia), the University of the Witwatersrand (South Africa), and the University of Stellenbosch (South Africa) and held a fellowship at Trinity College Dublin. In the area of linguistics she has authored, coauthored, edited, or coedited 17 books, ranging from theoretical linguistics to practical matters in language structure and use, including matters of interest to d/Deaf people. She has held grants and fellowships from numerous sources, including the National Science Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Mellon Foundation, the Sloan Foundation.

Reviews

[Evie Childs · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book as a child and it was so fun and impactful that it stayed with me well into adulthood. After the chance to read it again, the themes are even more impactful than last time. I like how the trauma of the parents trickled down to impact their daughter - ableism is so heavily ingrained in society that it has affected generations of disabled people and their loved ones.

Denying their daughter the chance to go to try to learn to speak due their own experiences of repression, denial and mistreatment in being taught the supposed 'correct way' of communicating shows the horrors they had to face and how it scarred them. Whilst I wish they had given her a chance, it's understandable that they didn't want to impose that on her and instead wanted her to be spared their fate.

I love how the other children were open to learning a different way of communicating so as to talk to her, even if it took a while for the sister to warm up. All in all, I greatly appreciate this book for being one of teh first to tackle the reality of ableism long before I even knew that ableism was what I was expriencing - albeit in a different way.

I adore this series and will definitely be continuing on with it.

[Leeanne G · Rating 5 out of 5]

A lovely little book about a deaf girl named Patricia moving to the city and learning to make friends. The only kids in her apartment building are hearing so they have to learn to communicate differently, through American Sign Language.

I loved learning a bit about the deaf community and about the changes in deaf education. Patricia's parents (who are also deaf) were forced to spend their entire education years learning to speak. They had no time to learn anything else and it was so difficult that only her dad could learn to do it passably. Patricia does not have to do this; she actually gets to go to school and learn what all the other hearing kids are learning. Patricia comes to realize what a privilege that is.

[Susan · Rating 5 out of 5]

In this book we meet Parricia, a deaf girl, right before she has to move because of her dad's new job. Will Patricia be able to make new friends when she cannot hear or use her voice? Will the new children in her new apartment like her? Will the little Angel of Friendship earn his wings? Find out in this book!

[Laura · Rating 1 out of 5]

If you can't say anything nice...

[Kayla · Rating 5 out of 5]

I used to love this series when I was a kid.

[Deborah Harris]

AR Quiz No. 32134 EN Fiction
Accelerated Reader Quiz Information IL: MG - BL: 3.6 - AR Pts: 1.0
Accelerated Reader Quiz Type Information AR Quiz Types: RP

[Helen Viorel · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm sorry, I just can't stand this goody-goody girlie-girlie friendly stuff. LOL