Reading not blogging

In all my spare time not blogging I've been reading JF.  Luckily they are quick to read.  But apparently I found not blogging so liberating I couldn't come up with a good review for a book I enjoyed. Both books were so fun I'm scared to read something else!

The Penderwicks on Gardam Street by Jeanne Birdsall
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I thought this book was cuter than the first.  But then again it had more of a love story and it had no cheese.  This book follows the story of the four Penderwicks sisters after their vacation after the come home and start school again.

The Willoughbys by Lois Lowry

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Amazon referred this book to me after I read The Penderwicks.  I got it because hello Willoughby!  Any Jane Austen/Children's Lit fan could not not get the book. It was my first Lois Lowry book, I'm ashamed to admit, but the time period most people read Lowry wasn't a good reading time for me in my life.  Maybe that's why I read Juvenile Fiction to make up for my dyslexia, maybe in two decades I can upgrade my reading choices. Back to the book, Lowry has a bit of a dark sense of humor in the book, and I wasn't really sure where it was going.  I was unsure about the book for most of it, but then by the end I loved it and I could appreciate the dark humor. Some dark humor I love, other is a little iffy. It all comes down to how talented the author is at dark humor, or if just comes off bitter. Lowry wrote out of talent not bitterness. The book is about four kids who decided they should be orphans based on all the great classic literature written about orphans.  That's another thing I like about this book.  I like when modern books reference classics. The book is very clear in telling you its about an old fashion family. Just to set the record straight this book has nothing to do with Sense and Sensibility, but it was the second children's book in a week I read with a reference.  Not to mention I love the cover.  

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I also love the outlines of the kids playing on the Penderwick books, I just stare at them and feel the cover with the palm of my hand like Meg Ryan does in You've Got Mail, and wonder how do I get a picture like that when my youngest unborn child starts running before J stops being a kid. By the way I think my oldest niece on my husband's side should read the Penderwick books because the oldest daughter sort of reminds me of my niece.  Sure my niece's mother is living, but they both have dark eyes and dark hair, and the oldest girl of a big family and oldest girls just get an unfair share of the burden of raising their younger siblings, so I thought she might relate. I kept picturing my niece with curly hair (it was weird), but if she does read the second someone should tell her she cannot date at 13.