Stacks Book Challenge

I finished Linnets and Valerians by Elizabeth Goudge. Mama Squirrel thought I might be disappointed with it, and Tim read it one day when I set it aside and said it had voodoo in it, so I decided not to read it aloud to the younger boys as I had planned.

The book was very enjoyable, you're plunged right into the story from the first page. The kids aren't perfect, but they're interesting and likeable. Tim commented that at the beginning, it seems like a Saturdays book by Elizabeth Enright, but it evolves into a Nesbit book along the way. He was right, it seems pretty straightforward at first, but subtly becomes fantastic (as in fanciful and unbelievable). But I still liked it. It reminded me of The Little White Horse in the sense that good overcame evil and all the loose ends were tied up into one blissful happy ending and everyone lives happily ever after forever and ever. I like that.

I also read More All-of-a-Kind Family and Ella of All-of-a-Kind Family. More AOAKF was a lot like the first book, light and enjoyable and ending with a wedding. Ella was disappointing. The writing seemed choppy, as if it was written in short little sentences for second graders (were the first two like that? I don't remember them being like that) but the subject matter - a girl on the verge of womanhood choosing between a glamorous career and a mundane family life with the man she loves - is suited for readers old enough for real sentences. And it lacked the charm of the first two, maybe because it wasn't about little children and their antics, but about an older girl making a big decision.

I've read my five books and then some, but I still plan to read The Iliad for Boys and Girls before my challenge is done. It was one of the books I originally listed (I listed six instead of five).