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Nicole Hadley (380 KP) rated Laura Ingalls Is Ruining My Life in Books

Jun 18, 2018

Laura Ingalls Is Ruining My Life by Shelley Tougas is a middle grade novel where we meet Charlotte Lake. Charlotte and her family are constantly moving to new cities for her mother’s passion of wanting to be a published author. Charlotte’s mom wants to write a book about Laura Ingalls, who was inspirational to her as a child. Charlotte is embarrassed by her mother’s obsession and frustrated with constantly having to start a new school and new life. She never feels like she fits in anywhere. She has a twin brother who has chosen to not talk since he feels his voice is not being heard in the moves, and a younger sister who is perfect. Charlotte struggles to make friends and find her niche among so many moves.

The family recently relocated to Walnut Grove, one of the places Laura Ingalls grew up. It houses a Laura Ingalls museum that hosts an essay contest each year. In a spark of brilliance, Charlotte decides to enter the contests and win the grand prize of $500. She knows this money will change her family’s life and maybe help her mother put down some roots. As the contest deadline nears, Charlotte becomes very ill with the flu and misses over a week of school, and time to create her essay. At the last moment, she furiously scribbles out the line, “Laura Ingalls is ruining my life,” and turns that in as her essay. Her clever teacher reads this and probes Charlotte to write more and dig deeper.

The family rents out the basement of a house owned by Mia and Miguel, who live upstairs with their granddaughter, Julia. Charlotte has moved so many times that she is reluctant to learn the names of her fellow classmates or draw any attention to herself. After she is out sick at the very beginning of school, she starts to notice that her brother has made a lot of friends in her absence. Charlotte, however, is still uncomfortable and even fails a reading test so that she has to spend her lunch time doing remedial work. She hopes to win an essay contest about Wilder because the $500 would be helpful to her family, but Julia wins instead. The two girls start to volunteer at the Wilder museum, and start to become friends. Charlotte’s mother is writing very little, and as the year progresses, starts to slip into a significant depression. Rose’s father remarries, and Rose is devastated that he no longer schedules any of their visits together. When there is vandalism at the museum, Charlotte is blamed, but the real perpetrator is not any of the people who are suspected.

I recommend this book for any fans of pioneer life, Laura Ingalls Wilder, and middle grade readers. I received this book as an ARC from NetGalley via Macmillan Children’s Publishing Group and Roaring Brook Press.

Kudos

Shifters Gone Wild Box Set

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Fall in love with this paw-some collection of 12 shifter romances. From spell-binding romances to...

Shifters Paranormal Romance Box Set Full Length Books

Freeman's Arrival: The Best New Writing on Arrival

Haruki Murakami, John Freeman, Dave Eggers and David Mitchell

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We live today in constant motion, travelling distances rapidly, small ones daily, arriving in new...

Nicole Hadley (380 KP) rated Fight to Learn: The Struggle to Go to School in Books

Jun 18, 2018

Fight to Learn by Laura Scandiffio brings interest and excitement to going to school. While most people have heard of Malala, they may not have heard of all of the great people in Scandiffio's book: people helping to change education for poverty-stricken Indians and Roma, Pakistanis denied an education because of their gender, children ripped away from schools becoming soldiers, and separate, but not equal, schools on First Nation land.

Liked that the book was divided into different challenges children face rather than by geography. It even included an example in the U.S. I also liked that the book highlighted the people, many of whom are children, who are finding solutions to this issue.

A fantastic resource for older students.

I received an ARC copy from Annick Press via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review