Busybody Nora

Riverside Kids #1

by Johanna Hurwitz, Debbie Tilley (Illustrator)

"What is your name?" That's what Nora asks her neighbors as she rides up and down the elevator of her apartment house. She doesn't mean to be a busybody. She just wants to be like doorman Henry and know all the people in her building--all 200 of them! And then one day Nora gets a great idea: they'll have a giant party, for everyone in the building!

Genres: Realistic Fiction, Fiction, Childrens, Middle Grade, Juvenile

96 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1976

About the author

Johanna Hurwitz is an American author of more than sixty children's books. She has sold millions of books in many different languages.

Reviews

[Rod Brown · Rating 2 out of 5]

A five-year-old girl name Nora hangs out in her apartment building, meeting the neighbors and having what might be generously described as adventures.

The first, second, and final chapters sort of complete an arc about community, but the middle chapters are just episodic fluff.

Tepid.

I'm dumbfounded that the author was able to wring fourteen more books out of this generic setting and characters.


FOR REFERENCE:

Contents: Mrs. Mind-Your-Own-Business and Other Neighbors -- Stone Soup for Supper -- Nora the Baby-Sitter -- Daddy's Birthday -- String Beans -- The Giant Party

[Nora · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was okay...mostly because I'm Nora and not a busybody. Most of the time.

[Random Scholar · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a cute short story about Busybody Nora who wants to know the names of everyone who lives in her apartment building. I would read this out loud to young students in Kindergarten, First grade and maybe Second grade. I would just have to omit or change certain sentences that have not withstood the test of time. For example, there is a scene where Nora kisses her mother on the lips to get some of her lipstick. I see this as innocent but after working in schools for over six years I know how some anal retentive people can easily misinterpret this. I would omit that sentence entirely if I was reading it out loud.

Aside from that this is a fun story about meeting new people and getting to know them. Nora has a nasty encounter with a woman in an elevator who introduces herself as Mrs. Mind-your-own-business. Many students will be able to relate to this if they too have tried to talk to unfriendly strangers.

[Lisa Brown · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nora is a sweet and precocious kindergartener, and she lives in an apartment building in New York City with two hundred people living in it. This thought fascinates Nora, and she decides that she wants to meet and get to know all of them, and so she begins with asking people's names as she goes up and down the elevator. Each chapter is another little adventure that Nora has, everything from surprise parties, to stone soup, or accidental babysitting.

I read this to my five year old, and it was such a cute little book. It would be a great beginning reader chapter book for K-2nd.

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great book to read with preschoolers/kindergarteners.

[Kelly Chester · Rating 5 out of 5]

Super cute book

[Barb Middleton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting transitional books can be tough to find. These short books oftentimes lack character development and interesting plots because they are structured for children that are still decoding words. They tend to have characteristics such as short word meanings, simple vocabulary, and declarative sentences. It takes a special writer that can engage adults as well as children readers at under a hundred pages. Of course, young readers are not as picky or get as bored as adults with children's' books. Many a times I might dislike a book that a child loves - such is just the nature of children's literature. Adults read 'em and write 'em, but the kiddos have to love 'em. And lets face it, what an adult likes is going to be different than a child. This book is going to appeal to both the adult and child. It would make a good read aloud that captures the home-life of the good-natured six-year-old Nora living in a New York apartment with her younger three-year-old brother, Teddy. Adults will smile at Nora's naivety, while kids will love the bed-bouncing threesome of Nora, Teddy, and their two-year-old neighbor, Russell. A timeless book that is good for grades 2-3.

Nora decides that she wants to learn everyone's name in their apartment building. When she asks a crabby neighbor the woman responds sarcastically, "Mrs. Mind-Your-Own-Business." Nora is confused by the weird name. While the adult meant it as a putdown thinking Nora being too nosy, Nora fortunately does not get it and continues to ask everyone their name. She is the outgoing kid that wants to be like the doorman and know everyone's name in the building. She has no clue that some people like the crabby neighbor think it is impolite to ask and obviously does not like children.

Nora spends the next chapters in various domestic settings with her family from cooking to babysitting before she brainstorms a building party for a neighbor that she loves. Nora's heart is big and she's not afraid to show how much she likes her neighbors whether it is memorizing their names or having a party. My favorite chapters were when Teddy, Nora, and their mother make Stone Soup based on the book. I used to act out so many books and it was wonderful to see the mom jump into the foray and encourage her children's ideas. Dad gets in on the action too with a chapter where Nora and Teddy are making him a birthday present. Teddy is struggling to come up with an idea and his mom suggests building something for his dad from his blocks. Teddy doesn't like this idea because it is not a permanent gift but the mom explains that "Birthdays are happy memories." When the dad comes home and accidentally knocks over Teddy's creation before he can show him, Teddy goes into hysterics. The dad knowingly sits down with Teddy to rebuild it with him and the end result is a happy Teddy spending time with dad and a building grander than the original. The author puts in many authentic moments like this that makes the reader relate with the family.

Another fun chapter is when grandpa is visiting for dinner and becomes the storyteller telling a classic fairy tale but inserting himself into the story. Teddy is particularly enthralled with the story and Nora is engaged too. Both believe their grandpa and it is a wonderful example of adults encouraging children to use their imaginations and believe in the magical. If you are looking for books for the child that is on the cusp of reading chapter books, then I recommend this one with a pinch of pixie dust.

[elissa · Rating 5 out of 5]

After we finished with the MY FATHER'S DRAGON trilogy, my 3 year old son and I needed more chapter books to read together. I drove him down to my in-laws' house (7 hours away) a couple months before he turned 4, and happened to pick this book on tape as one to try listening to in the car with him. We both loved it, and we went on to read all the other Riverside Kids books (about Russell, Elisa, Nora and Teddy) that we could get our hands on. That kept us busy for a long time, as Hurwitz wrote so many of them! They got to be slightly repetitive for me after awhile, but not so much that it made me want to stop reading them. My older son wanted to read them again when his younger brother was 4 years old, so that we could all share them. Read them again we did, and my younger son loved them, too. They're very simple, humorous stories about a couple of families who live in an apartment building on Riverside Drive (on the Upper West Side of NYC--close to where my older son was born). Each chapter is a self-contained story, but they make up a novel as a whole. I recommend these to parents who are looking for first chapter books to read aloud with their young kids all the time (partly because the kids in the books are so young--by the time kids are reading novels by themselves they often want to read about older kids). Sometimes they're hard to find, but they're WELL worth any time it takes! [And one warning about this series: In one of the later books (Nora and Mrs. Mind-Your-Own-Business) one of the kids finds out that the tooth fairy isn't real, so if that's something you don't want to read with a young child, you could easily skip that chapter in the book that it's a part of--not the first in the series that I've reviewed here...]

[Katie Fitzgerald · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Busybody Nora, Nora is just six years old, and she is one of only three children living in her apartment building. The others are her three-year-old brother, Teddy, and their two-year-old friend Russell. (Remember him, he's important later in the series.) This first book focuses on Nora's desire to meet and personally befriend all 200 of the residents of her apartment building. This gets her in trouble from time-to-time, as not everyone likes being asked personal questions in the elevator, and her parents sometimes find her personal questions embarrassing. Her desire for community, however, leads to a nice party at the end of the book, in appreciation and celebration of an elderly woman whose daughter wants her to move out of New York.

Some observations:

In the chapter entitled Nora the Babysitter, Nora and Teddy are left alone in the apartment to wait for Mrs. Michaels to come and watch them. I can't imagine a parent in New York City doing that in this day and age. I also don't know if a real-life child would handle it as well as Nora did, especially when it became clear that Mrs. Michaels had forgotten to show up!

Nora attends half-day afternoon kindergarten. I went to morning kindergarten myself, but I can remember that there were kids who went in the afternoon, and that this was the main way that I classified my classmates when we got to first grade. These days, though, I don't know of any kindergarten programs that aren't full-day. I realize I'm not even sure when that became the norm.

When Nora's father has a birthday, her mother buys him phonograph records of Schubert music. I don't know if kids have even seen a phonograph these days.

[Brandi · Rating 2 out of 5]

In this quick, short chapter book great for young, transitional readers, Nora is a curious little girl, so curious that she wants to know the name of all 200 people who live in her New York City apartment building. In an effort to achieve this goal, she throws a party for the building, with a little help from her building friends.

I lived in these big apartment buildings in the five years I spent in the City and boy was I the exact opposite of Nora and can totally relate to Mrs. Mind-Your-Own-Business.

[Melissa Namba · Rating 3 out of 5]

as a kid, I loved this book. I thought the characters were so colorful and I could relate to nora. now I feel like it is a cute story, but the characters are not really well developed, it's not written as well as I remember, and it's not as charming as it once was. still, I'm sure kids will like it. I mean, i WAS starved for books then, so that probably made a difference.

[Andrea · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked the references to other books in this story. For example one of the chapters is called, "Stone Soup for Supper." Good for the early elementary grades.

[Baby Girl · Rating 3 out of 5]

what i learned was that there is always adventure in life and have fun with it. also that you should go out for what you believe.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read all the Nora books. I enjoyed them, made me want to live in an apartment complex. (Yes, I was a strange child.) Recommended for beginning readers.

[Kathleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cassettes 1997.

[Cws]

JAR4-Hur