Children's Books discussion

Please join us in reading a mystery read for April, Wig in the Window by Kristen Kitscher. We look forward to hearing your thoughts!
Best,
Jane & Jasmine

I read this four years ago, so my memory of it is sketchy at best. However I wrote the following about it at the time:

A great mystery for girls who want to go beyond Nancy Drew, with some interesting twists and turns; friendship troubles, and school trouble for a couple of 7th-grade girls.

There were other, more scathing reviews of this book, but I really enjoyed it.

It's a nice kid detective story with a good plot and characters, but it would have been vastly improved simply by switching the narrative voice from first to third person. No 12 year old I have ever known would write:
'As we rounded the bend and I saw Luna Vista Middle School perched over the Pacific, its low hallways looked so exposed that I wished I could leap into the ocean and drift away.'
or:
'Mouth parted in surprise, cheeks aglow, Trista cast her brown eyes to the ceiling.'
These are two of many descriptive passages in the story which would be acceptable in the 3rd person, unbelievable in the 1st. The author's grown up voice sneaked in and took over too many times.

Eek.

I have the book ordered from the library.

Steve wrote: "It's a nice kid detective story with a good plot and characters, but it would have been vastly improved simply by switching the narrative voice from first to third person. No 12 year old I have eve..."

Yup, I actually like first person narrative, but it has to suit the person's age and in this book, it so often does not and this is driving me to distraction especially since mysteries (except for historic mysteries) are not really my favourite genre and so I find the strange (for and to me) narration even more noticeable.

This is not a children's book!! May be suitable for teens if parents don't mind graphic descriptions of a neighbors breasts..what on earth!? Wish I'd had a warning.

Elena wrote: "This is not a children's book!! May be suitable for teens if parents don't mind graphic descriptions of a neighbors breasts..what on earth!? Wish I'd had a warning."

I will have to look at the book again; I certainly don't remember that!

Beverly wrote: "Elena wrote: "This is not a children's book!! May be suitable for teens if parents don't mind graphic descriptions of a neighbors breasts..what on earth!? Wish I'd had a warning."

I will have to l..."

I am not finished with the book, but even if, so what? It's just breasts. Why should breasts, nudity etc. not be shown and presented in childrens' literature? Pretty puritanical that, and it really also should not so much matter what pareants want, but rather what children like to read. Also, the girls with their spying and making comments about the neighbour's breasts, that is a perfect vehicle for discussion, not that breasts are inappropriate, but that one should not really be spying on the neighbours and making graphic comments about their physical attributes.

Ha, I remember in high school, when Judy Blume's Forever was a huge issue, and for those classmates whose parents would not let them read the book, well, they just borrowed copies from those of us whose parents were a bit more tolerant and then read the book at school breaks or at friends' houses. So even those classmates whose parents categorically did not want their daughters to read Forever, most of them were still able to read the book by simply borrowing the novel and not reading it at home.

So, I have finally finished Wig in the Window. I'm not quite sure who the audience would be for this book. Most pre-teen girls do not want to read about breasts, and there was just too much talk about them for my liking. Let's remember this is suppose to be a middle grade read. But, boys probably would not want to read because all of the main characters are female. Again, who is the audience?

The best part of the story for me was the realistic portrayal and dialog between the characters. The cafeteria scenes bring me right back to middle school.