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Bright Island
Born and raised on Bright Island off the Maine coast, Thankful Curtis is more like her sea captain grandfather than any of her older brothers are. Nothing suits her better than sailing and helping her father with the farm. But when her dreaded sisters-in-law suggest that Thankful get some proper schooling on the mainland, the wind is knocked from her sails.
Thankful finds t...more
Thankful finds t...more
Hardcover, 288 pages
Published
October 23rd 2012
by Random House Books for Young Readers
(first published 1937)
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I wish I'd known this book when I belonged to the target age group. It feels like an unexpected amalgam of a Heidi, Anne of the Island, and Swallows and Amazons, with a little Railway Children thrown in for good measure - the isolated girl who is just fine with staying that way, who has to carve out a place for herself among townsfolk; the extraordinary girl going away from her beloved home to school, a completely foreign environment where she is seen as a hick but proves herself and wins good f...more
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Oct 23, 2012
Julie Barrett
added it
Bright Island by Mabel L. Robinson
ISBN: 9780394809861
First thing that attracted me to this book was that it's about an island. Love islands as I spent many a year in my teens growing up on one local one.
Next thing is the state of Maine. We have traveled around the state and have spent many a week there just discovering new things.
Mary Curtis has 6, 4 living boys who were now all married and living on the mainland and the last child she had a daughter which she named, Thankful.
They were all co...more
ISBN: 9780394809861
First thing that attracted me to this book was that it's about an island. Love islands as I spent many a year in my teens growing up on one local one.
Next thing is the state of Maine. We have traveled around the state and have spent many a week there just discovering new things.
Mary Curtis has 6, 4 living boys who were now all married and living on the mainland and the last child she had a daughter which she named, Thankful.
They were all co...more
Okay, listen up, hipsters of the Newberys/Cybils/Whatever.
This is a cautionary tale.
Back in 1938 the NY Times raved "One would be hard put to it to find a better contemporary novel than this" and perhaps it was. And perhaps it was worthy of a Newbery Honor.
But in 2013 I can't see a kid happily reading this.
Or perhaps, before I get a slough of 12 year olds/homeschooling moms/childless librarians and teachers telling me otherwise--I can't see the average kid of 2013 reading this one
Plenty of fict...more
This is a cautionary tale.
Back in 1938 the NY Times raved "One would be hard put to it to find a better contemporary novel than this" and perhaps it was. And perhaps it was worthy of a Newbery Honor.
But in 2013 I can't see a kid happily reading this.
Or perhaps, before I get a slough of 12 year olds/homeschooling moms/childless librarians and teachers telling me otherwise--I can't see the average kid of 2013 reading this one
Plenty of fict...more
Bright Island by Mabel L. Robinson
ISBN: 9780394809861
First thing that attracted me to this book was that it's about an island. Love islands as I spent many a year in my teens growing up on one local one.
Next thing is the state of Maine. We have traveled around the state and have spent many a week there just discovering new things.
Mary Curtis has 6, 4 living boys who were now all married and living on the mainland and the last child she had a daughter which she named, Thankful.
They were all co...more
ISBN: 9780394809861
First thing that attracted me to this book was that it's about an island. Love islands as I spent many a year in my teens growing up on one local one.
Next thing is the state of Maine. We have traveled around the state and have spent many a week there just discovering new things.
Mary Curtis has 6, 4 living boys who were now all married and living on the mainland and the last child she had a daughter which she named, Thankful.
They were all co...more
This is a magnificent book that is engaging and rewarding. While the situations are perhaps not commonplace today, the emotions are no less apropos. The story is somewhat typical, but is nevertheless interesting. It does not resolve in the expected way and yet is entirely satisfying. What I noticed, however, was that the book is written in a style that is strikingly different from that found in children's fiction of recent vintage. Too many of today's books seem dumbed down through the influence...more
I read the paperback reissue of this 1938 Newbery honor book. Sixteen-year-old Thankful Curtis has been raised on an island off the Maine coast. Schooled by her Scottish mother and taught to sail by her sea captain grandfather, she loves her life there. Now she must face the prospect of attending a boarding school on the mainland and learning "what a woman does." It is a gentle coming-of-age story written in a more innocent time for more innocent teens. Still, there are situations and characters...more
I read this one weekend morning in bed under a feather quilt with a coffee cup at my side all in one go and I think that it might just be the ideal way to read it. I think this book would have been magic when I was young because it was still pretty magical now, reading it for the first time. Girl grows up on remote Maine Island, goes to boarding school, encounters love and friendship etc etc. - like Anne of Green Gables crossed with Linda Greenlaw. So cozy. And I suggest the new reedition with t...more
This is just the kind of old-fashioned book I love, very reminiscent of A Girl of the Limberlost. Thankful's understanding but no-nonsense mother also reminds me of Velvet's mother in National Velvet. And there are some boarding-school elements as well, another of my favorite themes. I can't believe I'd never heard of it before, but now it's been re-issued for its 75th anniversary.
Serious Love for this book! I remember reading this at my grandmothers home in the summer of 1977. I love the innocence of the times, I love the language flow and I remember wishing I had a Bright Island to call my own. Thankful Curtis and her family whisk you away to another time. Timeless fun!
If you like Anne of Green Gables or Laura Ingalls Wilder, this is for you (or your daughter), a story of a girl in the 1930s who lives on a remote Maine island and goes to boarding school on the mainland. The first 3rd is a bit slow, but then it gets interesting and hard to put down.
Definitely for fans of old-fashioned fiction, this one! It's a pleasant read, but I think many children will find it dull/slow. I really like the setting (island) and the main character (Thankful). They're a nice change of pace from many books of the era. Thanks to Netgalley for the read!
This book felt comforting in some ways, and I really liked Thankful's growth into young womanhood. Writing for children is SO different today, not to mention the way we look at the world (Mr. Fletcher's interest in Thankful creeped me out!)
My goodness. Books for young people were so much better in the 1930s than they are now!
I really probably ought to start a Newbery shelf ...
Really delightful.
Really delightful.
E
Nice coming-of-age story, without the main character losing her sense of where she comes from. Place is a character in the story.
Reviewed on my blog: http://sharingsoda.blogspot.com/2012/...
Apr 04, 2013
Kierstin
rated it
2 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
newbery-honors,
read-in-2013
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