The Higher Power of Lucky by Susan Patron

Ever since the controversy over the use of the word scrotum in this book, I have wanted to read it. And you know what, scrotum is in there, but there is so much more to the book that the word is really irrelevant to the story, or so I thought until I got to the end, where it comes back in the wrap-up. Still, I was not offended in the least, and if I had kids, I would not hesitate to read this to them.

This is the story of Lucky, who is anything but lucky. Her mother died, her father doesn't want her, and her guardian seems bent on getting back to France, leaving Lucky all alone again. What to do? Like any ten year old, the idea of running away makes perfect sense.

The Higher Power of the title comes from Lucky's penchant for listening in on _____ Anonymous meetings. She wants to find her higher power to help her come through her problems--namely that no one seems to want her.

Lucky has a best friend named Lincoln who is preoccupied with tying knots. In one of my favorite scenes in the book, the two of them go out on the highway where there is a sign: Slow Children at Play. He adds a colon to make it mean what it is supposed to mean.

There is not a single person in this book who is perfect. I think that is its charm. That and the setting in a tiny desert town in California where the people are given license to be a little eccentric, all 43 of them.

Kids will relate to Lucky I think and she is a plucky little girl well worth emulating.

Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH by Robert C. O'Brien

This is my first book in the Newbery challenge. To start, I had a real forehead slapping moment when I looked up the author of this book. He also wrote one of my favorite YA books of all time, Z for Zachariah. Considering that, I am surprised I never read the Rats of NIMH book before. And I was also surprised to find out that O'Brien died young and it was his wife and daughter who finished Z from his notes. And his daughter went on to write a few other NIMH books. But enough history.

It is no wonder this book won a Newbery. It is a wonderful adventure about intelligent rats and mice. Mrs. Frisby is a mouse whose soul concern is saving her children from the farmers plow. Normally they would have just moved from the garden where they were living to their summer quarters, but this year is different because one of her children is sick and can't risk the journey too soon. Luckily, on advice from the wise owl, she goes to the rats to ask for help in moving her home to the lee side of a rock in the garden where it will be safe from the plow. In so doing she finds out that her dead husband had a connection to the rats. He and they had escaped from NIMH. A scientific lab where they were all getting shots to make them smarter and longer living. And it worked.

The rats have their own thing going on. They are planning a move to a new location where they will become self-sufficient and able to quit stealing from humans to live.

I loved this book. O'Brien writes in a style that I like to read. His sentence structure goes right into my brain and I fall right into the story. All around, a fine read and I am sure this would make a wonderful read-aloud for kids.