Book Review - Great Books by Kathleen Odean

(Should I admit that I went to two different libraries today? Trevor and I stopped at the "big" one on the way home from karate, specifically looking for Thornton Burgess books for him. Later, Robert and I went to our neighborhood library to pick up books that were on hold for me.)

Kathy mentioned Kathleen Odean's Great Books for Girls a few days ago on our hs list. At the same time I requested it from my library, I noticed another book by the author, Great Books for Boys, and I picked both up today. These aren't book that I so much as read, but scanned through. Each one contains several hundred book selections for children, loosely grouped first by ease of reading (picture books, beginning chapter books, medium chapter books, and older books), and broken down by genre within each reading level category. Each book recommendation includes an age range and a brief description of the story.

I'm familiar with many of the selections and/or authors, and they are good, giving me more confidence with the other books. I wrote down many choices for both Holly and Trevor as I leafed through the descriptions. I winced at the author's obvious feminist slant and her refusal to include books such as Bemelman's Madeline ("...although she is described as fearless, Madeline does not actually do anything in the first book about her. Worse, her fellow students spend an awful lot of time crying") and Anne of Green Gables ("...at the end of the book, she consciously sacrifices her education to help her beloved relative. ...Anne has become dreamier and less given to speaking her mind that when she was young. ...the lesson it ultimately offers girls is a very traditional one.") Well, for pete's sake, let's not offer girls TRADITIONAL lessons!

There are several books out there that offer "great books," and this is one of the better ones. I recommend it.

Now I'm armed with yet another reading list (and I do have several floating around!). I just have to decide where to begin for my kids, lol.