31 Days of Blogging: Your Favorite Childhood Book
Oh, god. THERE WERE SO MANY. The Basil of Baker Street series, everything Tamora Pierce ever put into this world, But Not The Hippopotamus by Sandra Boynton, the Berenstein Bears, Officer Buckle and Gloria, Misty of Chincoteague and everything Marguerite Henry wrote after that especially King of the Wind, any and all fairy tale adaptations--
But my therapist always tells me to go with my gut, and the first book that leapt to mind was The Ordinary Princess.
I first read The Ordinary Princess when I was about six or seven; I don't recall how I found it, but I think I literally just picked it up off my mom's bookcase. As you do. It's about a young princess called Amy (or, well, technically, the Princess Amethyst Alexandra Augusta Araminta Adelaide Aurelia Anne, and how sad is it that I only needed to check two of those? They say her full name like twice) who is distressingly ordinary. Her sisters are all the perfect ideal of fairy tale princesshood, with golden hair and crystal blue eyes and a proper fainting, wilting manner, while Amy is brown-haired, brown-eyed, freckled and dumpy and intelligent, with a sense of humor and a work ethic, and the funny thing is that none of Amy's sisters are demonized. Amy doesn't think there's anything wrong with being how they are, she just wants permission to be different. And that is so rare.
It's such a bright and lovely fairy tale, and it makes me so happy.
This entry is crossposted at http://bookblather.dreamwidth.org/201614.html. Please comment over there if possible.
But my therapist always tells me to go with my gut, and the first book that leapt to mind was The Ordinary Princess.
I first read The Ordinary Princess when I was about six or seven; I don't recall how I found it, but I think I literally just picked it up off my mom's bookcase. As you do. It's about a young princess called Amy (or, well, technically, the Princess Amethyst Alexandra Augusta Araminta Adelaide Aurelia Anne, and how sad is it that I only needed to check two of those? They say her full name like twice) who is distressingly ordinary. Her sisters are all the perfect ideal of fairy tale princesshood, with golden hair and crystal blue eyes and a proper fainting, wilting manner, while Amy is brown-haired, brown-eyed, freckled and dumpy and intelligent, with a sense of humor and a work ethic, and the funny thing is that none of Amy's sisters are demonized. Amy doesn't think there's anything wrong with being how they are, she just wants permission to be different. And that is so rare.
It's such a bright and lovely fairy tale, and it makes me so happy.
This entry is crossposted at http://bookblather.dreamwidth.org/201614.html. Please comment over there if possible.