Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm

Rating:
Summary: Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm wasn't a bad book...
Review: But it wasn't exactly a great read, either. My mother bought this book for me when I was about seven years old. Back then, I thought it was rather boring and hard to get into. Fifteen years later, I picked it up again, and my first impression remains the same. The author spends a great deal of time telling you how unusual, engaging, and unique her heroine is, but throughout the book, Rebecca's actions never back up the author's assessment. I felt this book was dry and flat. Who wants to read a book in which the climax revolves around children selling soap?
I found it all too similar to L.M. Montgomery's "Anne of Green Gables," in story and characters, except the "Anne" books are so much better!! Anne is the heroine who is unusual, engaging, and truly unique.

Rating:
Summary: Rebecca is the Girl's Complement to Tom Sawyer
Review: I tried to read this book to my 5 year old daughters, (they loved Anne of Green Gables), but the language was too advanced for them. However I couldn't put it down. Ms. Wiggin's use of turn of phrase and metaphor remind me so much of Mark Twain. I'm in awe of their common talent for making it possible to see a concept in a new light by merely a precise juxtaposition of words. Much of this might be lost on younger readers, but my daughters were nevertheless facinated by Rebecca's spirit; so much so, that they asked me to tell them the whole story when I had finished.

Rating:
Summary: Rose of Joy
Review: No review could do this marvelous book justice, but I will attempt it. My mother bought the book for me some years ago because she thought it would be good for me to read classics. Thinking that it would be boring, I didn't read it for a long time. But a couple of days ago I was bored and picked it up. Soon, I fell under the same spell Rebecca cast over nearly every person she met. Around the age of 10 or 11, she was forced to leave her home, Sunnybrook Farm, to live in a brick house with her spinster aunts in Riverboro. Her aunts Jane and Miranda weren't used to young people, but they let Rebecca stay with them in order to help out her poor widowed mother who had 6 other children to care for. Rebecca charmed nearly all the citizens of Riverboro, Aunt Jane, and, in time, her strict, austere Aunt Miranda.

There were many things to love about the story. In fact, it has become one of my favorite books of all time. (and I am a voracious reader) The characters were all realistically and richly delineated. Rebecca especially came alive for me. She was such a talented, imaginative, caring girl. She was the kind of person that anyone would love to have as a friend. Actually, I would want to be her. I didn't want to stop reading about her adventures. The events played before my mind's eye like a movie. I traveled back in time, to 100 years ago. This is considered a children's book, but it has truths and insights that people of all ages can learn from. Several of the passages, the literary allusions, and Rebecca's poems were so beautiful that I had to reread them. The language was eloquent. As another reviewer said, the vocabulary wasn't "dumbed down" like the vocabularies of modern children's books, and there was a protagonist one could love.

The only part about the novel that I didn't like was that there isn't a sequel. I would love to find out what Rebecca's career turns out to be. I believe that she marries Mr. Ladd (a.k.a. "Mr. Aladdin"), but I wish we could know for sure.

Overall, I highly reccomend this book to readers of all ages. If you like books with wonderful supporting characters and an unusual, loveable heroine, treat yourself to "Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm".