Emily of Deep Valley by Mitali Perkins

Hi Everyone! 


While this is the last review for the year for our CFBA group, I intend to post a few more reviews of other books as I read through December.  


Maud Hart Lovelace, I heard that name and said what? That name alone is very interesting! So I had to read this book. I am so glad that I have! I had not heard of this series or author before. Emily is more of a typical girl. She is horribly horribly shy! Emily winds up with a boy, Don, who is abusive. He is always putting her down, belittling her, making her feel unworthy and unlovable. She is coping with life after graduation from high school in 1912 and not being at all as she expected.


Emily has to rally herself and figure out how and what to do about her life and how to proceed. Emily of Deep Valley reminds me in a way, of Anne of Green Gables and I really enjoyed it. I wouldn't mind reading all the rest of the books in this series, or by this author. 


Carol 

This week, the Christian Fiction Blog Alliance is introducing Emily of Deep Valley Harper Perennial Modern Classics; Reprint edition (October 12, 2010) by Mitali Perkins
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

A word from Mitali: Who In The World Is Mitali Perkins?

That's a good question. I've been trying to figure it out myself, spending most of my life crossing borders.

I was born Mitali Bose in Kolkata (Calcutta), India, and always tried to live up to my name—which means “friendly” in the Bangla language. I had to! Because my family moved so much, it was the only way I could make new friends.

By the time I was 11, I'd lived in Ghana, Cameroon, London, New York and Mexico before settling in California just in time for middle school. Yep, I was the new kid again, in seventh grade, the year everybody barely makes it through.

My biggest lifeline during those early years was story. Books were my rock, my stability, my safe place as I navigated the border between California suburbia and the Bengali culture of my traditional home.

After studying political science at Stanford and public policy at U.C. Berkeley, I taught in middle school, high school and college. When I began to write fiction, my protagonists were often—not surprisingly—strong female characters trying to bridge different cultures.

Mitali Perkins is the author of several books for young people, including SECRET KEEPER (Random House), MONSOON SUMMER (Random House), RICKSHAW GIRL (Charlesbridge), and the FIRST DAUGHTER books (Dutton).

ABOUT THE BOOK

Often cited as Maud Hart Lovelace’s (of Betsy-Tacy fame) best novel, Emily of Deep Valley is now back in print, with a new foreword by acclaimed young adult author Mitali Perkins and new archival material about the characters’ real lives.

Emily Webster, an orphan living with her grandfather, is not like the other girls her age in Deep Valley, Minnesota. The gulf between Emily and her classmates widens even more when they graduate from Deep Valley High School in 1912. Emily longs to go off to college with everyone else, but she can’t leave her grandfather. Emily resigns herself to facing a “lost winter,” but soon decides to stop feeling sorry for herself. And with a new program of study, a growing interest in the Syrian community, and a handsome new teacher at the high school to fill her days, Emily gains more than she ever dreamed...

In addition to her beloved Betsy-Tacy books, Maud Hart Lovelace wrote three more stories set in the fictional town of Deep Valley: Winona’s Pony Cart, Carney’s House Party and Emily of Deep Valley. Longtime fans and new readers alike will be delighted to find the Deep Valley books available again for the first time in many years.

If you would like to browse inside Emily of Deep Valley, go HERE.

The book link is: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0062003305