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Anastasia Krupnik #4
Anastasia Tiene Problemas
Readers will identify with Anastasia as she handles the pre-teen and teenage years. Dealing with everything from crushes and new siblings to moving and trying to choose a career, her challenges are as humorous as they are realistic...a perfect combination to captivate readers.
Library Binding
First published January 1, 1984
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About the author
Lois Lowry
143 books22.8k followersTaken from Lowry's website:
"I’ve always felt that I was fortunate to have been born the middle child of three. My older sister, Helen, was very much like our mother: gentle, family-oriented, eager to please. Little brother Jon was the only boy and had interests that he shared with Dad; together they were always working on electric trains and erector sets; and later, when Jon was older, they always seemed to have their heads under the raised hood of a car. That left me in-between, and exactly where I wanted most to be: on my own. I was a solitary child who lived in the world of books and my own vivid imagination.
Because my father was a career military officer - an Army dentist - I lived all over the world. I was born in Hawaii, moved from there to New York, spent the years of World War II in my mother’s hometown: Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and from there went to Tokyo when I was eleven. High school was back in New York City, but by the time I went to college (Brown University in Rhode Island), my family was living in Washington, D.C.
I married young. I had just turned nineteen - just finished my sophomore year in college - when I married a Naval officer and continued the odyssey that military life requires. California. Connecticut (a daughter born there). Florida (a son). South Carolina. Finally Cambridge, Massachusetts, when my husband left the service and entered Harvard Law School (another daughter; another son) and then to Maine - by now with four children under the age of five in tow. My children grew up in Maine. So did I. I returned to college at the University of Southern Maine, got my degree, went to graduate school, and finally began to write professionally, the thing I had dreamed of doing since those childhood years when I had endlessly scribbled stories and poems in notebooks.
After my marriage ended in 1977, when I was forty, I settled into the life I have lived ever since. Today I am back in Cambridge, Massachusetts, living and writing in a house dominated by a very shaggy Tibetan Terrier named Bandit. For a change of scenery Martin and I spend time in Maine, where we have an old (it was built in 1768!) farmhouse on top of a hill. In Maine I garden, feed birds, entertain friends, and read...
My books have varied in content and style. Yet it seems that all of them deal, essentially, with the same general theme: the importance of human connections. A Summer to Die, my first book, was a highly fictionalized retelling of the early death of my sister, and of the effect of such a loss on a family. Number the Stars, set in a different culture and era, tells the same story: that of the role that we humans play in the lives of our fellow beings.
The Giver - and Gathering Blue, and the newest in the trilogy: Messenger - take place against the background of very different cultures and times. Though all three are broader in scope than my earlier books, they nonetheless speak to the same concern: the vital need of people to be aware of their interdependence, not only with each other, but with the world and its environment.
My older son was a fighter pilot in the United States Air Force. His death in the cockpit of a warplane tore away a piece of my world. But it left me, too, with a wish to honor him by joining the many others trying to find a way to end conflict on this very fragile earth.
I am a grandmother now. For my own grandchildren - and for all those of their generation - I try, through writing, to convey my passionate awareness that we live intertwined on this planet and that our future depends upon our caring more, and doing more, for one another."
"I’ve always felt that I was fortunate to have been born the middle child of three. My older sister, Helen, was very much like our mother: gentle, family-oriented, eager to please. Little brother Jon was the only boy and had interests that he shared with Dad; together they were always working on electric trains and erector sets; and later, when Jon was older, they always seemed to have their heads under the raised hood of a car. That left me in-between, and exactly where I wanted most to be: on my own. I was a solitary child who lived in the world of books and my own vivid imagination.
Because my father was a career military officer - an Army dentist - I lived all over the world. I was born in Hawaii, moved from there to New York, spent the years of World War II in my mother’s hometown: Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and from there went to Tokyo when I was eleven. High school was back in New York City, but by the time I went to college (Brown University in Rhode Island), my family was living in Washington, D.C.
I married young. I had just turned nineteen - just finished my sophomore year in college - when I married a Naval officer and continued the odyssey that military life requires. California. Connecticut (a daughter born there). Florida (a son). South Carolina. Finally Cambridge, Massachusetts, when my husband left the service and entered Harvard Law School (another daughter; another son) and then to Maine - by now with four children under the age of five in tow. My children grew up in Maine. So did I. I returned to college at the University of Southern Maine, got my degree, went to graduate school, and finally began to write professionally, the thing I had dreamed of doing since those childhood years when I had endlessly scribbled stories and poems in notebooks.
After my marriage ended in 1977, when I was forty, I settled into the life I have lived ever since. Today I am back in Cambridge, Massachusetts, living and writing in a house dominated by a very shaggy Tibetan Terrier named Bandit. For a change of scenery Martin and I spend time in Maine, where we have an old (it was built in 1768!) farmhouse on top of a hill. In Maine I garden, feed birds, entertain friends, and read...
My books have varied in content and style. Yet it seems that all of them deal, essentially, with the same general theme: the importance of human connections. A Summer to Die, my first book, was a highly fictionalized retelling of the early death of my sister, and of the effect of such a loss on a family. Number the Stars, set in a different culture and era, tells the same story: that of the role that we humans play in the lives of our fellow beings.
The Giver - and Gathering Blue, and the newest in the trilogy: Messenger - take place against the background of very different cultures and times. Though all three are broader in scope than my earlier books, they nonetheless speak to the same concern: the vital need of people to be aware of their interdependence, not only with each other, but with the world and its environment.
My older son was a fighter pilot in the United States Air Force. His death in the cockpit of a warplane tore away a piece of my world. But it left me, too, with a wish to honor him by joining the many others trying to find a way to end conflict on this very fragile earth.
I am a grandmother now. For my own grandchildren - and for all those of their generation - I try, through writing, to convey my passionate awareness that we live intertwined on this planet and that our future depends upon our caring more, and doing more, for one another."
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 78 reviews
November 15, 2007
Okay, this cover is horrible but THESE ARE THE BEST BOOKS EVER.
Anastasia is hilarious. These books are great. Anastasia's parents are these messy, absent-minded, vaguely bohemian intellectual types, and everything that happens in these books is completely hysterical. This is the one in which Anastasia becomes obsessed with Sigmund Freud, and irritates the hell out of her wonderful family. I can relate to these situations! Also good is the one where Anastasia goes to modeling school. Actually, they're all good. These books are ingenious. I love how she is always trying to figure out how to be a woman by reading Cosmopolitan magazine, and how she's in love with this cool kid who keeps a pick in his afro, and how her younger brother Sam is also extremely hilarious. They have the most wonderful, loving family in children's literature but it isn't annoying somehow, maybe because they're so disorganized. Anastasia is the perfect kid heroine because she is so smart but so ridiculously out-of-it at the same time. Oh man. I want to read them all again. Right now. God, I loved these books.
Anastasia is hilarious. These books are great. Anastasia's parents are these messy, absent-minded, vaguely bohemian intellectual types, and everything that happens in these books is completely hysterical. This is the one in which Anastasia becomes obsessed with Sigmund Freud, and irritates the hell out of her wonderful family. I can relate to these situations! Also good is the one where Anastasia goes to modeling school. Actually, they're all good. These books are ingenious. I love how she is always trying to figure out how to be a woman by reading Cosmopolitan magazine, and how she's in love with this cool kid who keeps a pick in his afro, and how her younger brother Sam is also extremely hilarious. They have the most wonderful, loving family in children's literature but it isn't annoying somehow, maybe because they're so disorganized. Anastasia is the perfect kid heroine because she is so smart but so ridiculously out-of-it at the same time. Oh man. I want to read them all again. Right now. God, I loved these books.
September 6, 2015
This is the fourth Anastasia Krupnik book, and, like the third one, I'm pretty sure it's one that I read as a kid, though there was a lot I didn't remember very well. Anastasia is now thirteen and in seventh grade: the book starts in October, so we don't actually see any back-to-school/making friends stuff, which I like: it means that words and effort that would have been spent on that kind of scene-setting/establishing characters/etc. can be spent differently, and I think it works.
Like the other books I've read in this series, this one is often quite funny. There are three main plot strands (Anastasia gets herself in over her head with a science project idea; Anastasia deals with adolescence; Anastasia's younger brother, Sam, deals with a bully at preschool) and all of them have moments of hilarity. Near the start of the book, Anastasia comes home with a pair of gerbils, to the horror of her rodent-phobic mother; there is also a fairly hilarious conversation about how Anastasia thinks her mother must be going through menopause, because all of a sudden she's acting really weird in ways that Anastasia finds really embarrassing. The problem, of course, is actually that Anastasia is thirteen and hormonal, which her parents assure her is normal but which horrifies Anastasia. She says she wants to see a psychiatrist; her parents say she doesn't need one. But then, by chance, she ends up acquiring a bust of Sigmund Freud at a garage sale, and embarks on solo talk therapy with him in her bedroom.
This was a cute and fun read, but this book and the previous one felt like they had less emotional impact than the first two books in the series. I'll still probably check out the next one, though.
Like the other books I've read in this series, this one is often quite funny. There are three main plot strands (Anastasia gets herself in over her head with a science project idea; Anastasia deals with adolescence; Anastasia's younger brother, Sam, deals with a bully at preschool) and all of them have moments of hilarity. Near the start of the book, Anastasia comes home with a pair of gerbils, to the horror of her rodent-phobic mother; there is also a fairly hilarious conversation about how Anastasia thinks her mother must be going through menopause, because all of a sudden she's acting really weird in ways that Anastasia finds really embarrassing. The problem, of course, is actually that Anastasia is thirteen and hormonal, which her parents assure her is normal but which horrifies Anastasia. She says she wants to see a psychiatrist; her parents say she doesn't need one. But then, by chance, she ends up acquiring a bust of Sigmund Freud at a garage sale, and embarks on solo talk therapy with him in her bedroom.
This was a cute and fun read, but this book and the previous one felt like they had less emotional impact than the first two books in the series. I'll still probably check out the next one, though.
October 1, 2019
Not my favorite of the series, but I still love me some Anastasia. This one felt not as funny and not as quirky as the awkward Anastasia I have grown to love. However, The Freud references and the bust of him she uses as her therapist - that is some damn fine humor.
June 9, 2020
Still fun and funny, but the first one was the best.
November 9, 2017
I hadn't read any Lois Lowry in a long time. Found this book in an op shop while on holiday and thought it would be easy reading.
As always with the Anastasia series it's entertaining, often witty, and the characters have real personality. The story-line is fairly thin, but that's not unusual in these stories. And even the 'issues' (hating your parents because you've now become a teenager, for instance) are dealt with a light touch.
The only irritation with this edition, which was put out as part of Collins' Lions series, is that some editor decided it was necessary to anglicize it. For the most part this isn't a problem, except when the girls go to a garage sale and talk about spending 'pounds' instead of dollars. Even though Anastasia's father mentions within a few pages that they live in Massachusetts.
As always with the Anastasia series it's entertaining, often witty, and the characters have real personality. The story-line is fairly thin, but that's not unusual in these stories. And even the 'issues' (hating your parents because you've now become a teenager, for instance) are dealt with a light touch.
The only irritation with this edition, which was put out as part of Collins' Lions series, is that some editor decided it was necessary to anglicize it. For the most part this isn't a problem, except when the girls go to a garage sale and talk about spending 'pounds' instead of dollars. Even though Anastasia's father mentions within a few pages that they live in Massachusetts.
December 28, 2020
3.5 stars. The ever-increasing number of gerbils, the suspected hormonal challenges of Anastasia’s mom and the very real STAGE ONE hormonal challenges of Anastasia’s teenage years, combined with Sam’s school bully situation result in much of the same realistic, everyday humor that’s in the rest of the series.
At thirteen, Anastasia’s full and frank embrace of a way to maintain mental health is admirable. Of course, she’s having conversations with a secondhand bust of Freud, but it’s something. She’s taking initiative. The gerbil plot line is ridiculous, but hilarious. And Sam just continues being a lovable prodigy.
At thirteen, Anastasia’s full and frank embrace of a way to maintain mental health is admirable. Of course, she’s having conversations with a secondhand bust of Freud, but it’s something. She’s taking initiative. The gerbil plot line is ridiculous, but hilarious. And Sam just continues being a lovable prodigy.
June 3, 2017
I needed a fast, good read to help me catch back up in my year's reading goals, and this one did it. It was nice to revisit some of the stories I loved when I was younger and had fewer concerns of the world. Lois Lowry wrote these books in such a way that they are timeless to me - I dont' get tired of Nikky Coletti's teeth-marks, and the gerbils gerbils gerbils everywhere, and Anastasia talking to a bust of Freud. Ms. Lowry made a very nice home with the Krupniks and I love to visit it, yes I do.
May 7, 2020
I definitely remember this one from childhood. Reads as much more dated than the previous volumes, and I noticed that the title is changed in later editions to take out the term "analyst." Sam's typewritten note at the end remains hilarious.
June 8, 2021
As much as I like Anastasia’s family, I like seeing more of her friends. The science experiment aspect of this book was interesting - I liked the notes at the end of each chapter.
March 4, 2022
I'm still laughing from all the antics in this wonderful book! This series is just the most fun!
May 9, 2022
3.5 per Anastasia e il dottor Freud
Recensione completa su Scheggia tra le pagine
È tornata Anastasia con le sue pazze idee e avventure.
Questa volta è alle prese con l’adolescenza, con il cambiamento e gli ormoni e pensa di aver bisogno di uno psichiatra.
Si ritrova da un giorno all’altro a voler nascondere i suoi genitori agli amici, vergognandosi del padre poeta e della madre artista, credendo che gli altri genitori siano migliori dei suoi.
In questo flusso di cambiamenti, Anastasia decide di affidare i suoi pensieri e dubbi a una testa di gesso raffigurante Freud, cercando nella sua presenza una figura rassicurante.
In questo grande caos, si aggiunge un progetto di scienze con roditori che si riproducono e Sam che si ritrova a dover fronteggiare un bullo alla scuola materna.
Le storie di Anastasia mi piacciono sempre e adoro la sua fantasia e i suoi modi eccentrici, però stavolta avrei voluto un maggiore approfondimento.
Recensione completa su Scheggia tra le pagine
È tornata Anastasia con le sue pazze idee e avventure.
Questa volta è alle prese con l’adolescenza, con il cambiamento e gli ormoni e pensa di aver bisogno di uno psichiatra.
Si ritrova da un giorno all’altro a voler nascondere i suoi genitori agli amici, vergognandosi del padre poeta e della madre artista, credendo che gli altri genitori siano migliori dei suoi.
In questo flusso di cambiamenti, Anastasia decide di affidare i suoi pensieri e dubbi a una testa di gesso raffigurante Freud, cercando nella sua presenza una figura rassicurante.
In questo grande caos, si aggiunge un progetto di scienze con roditori che si riproducono e Sam che si ritrova a dover fronteggiare un bullo alla scuola materna.
Le storie di Anastasia mi piacciono sempre e adoro la sua fantasia e i suoi modi eccentrici, però stavolta avrei voluto un maggiore approfondimento.
June 2, 2017
Cute story with an easy read. Definitely more adult than I expected (I wouldn't let kids under 12 read this...), with a fair amount of talk about things like sex.
December 27, 2016
This review also appears on my blog, Read-at-Home Mom.
Anastasia is now thirteen years old, and between her annoying family and the unpredictability of the gerbils she brought home for her science project, she really feels like she could benefit from some time in therapy. Her parents recognize her dramatics as part and parcel of puberty, and they refuse to pay for any counseling, so Anastasia takes matters into her own hands. She buys a bust of Sigmund Freud in whom she confides all of her problems big and small, and whose assistance seems helpful despite his silence.
This book, like the others in the series so far, is essentially a literary family sit-com. It focuses on Anastasia’s day-to-day interactions with her academic parents, precocious little brother and various classmates, putting a humorous spin on everything from homework to early teen angst. Though Anastasia ages from book to book, she always remains uniquely herself, and I am impressed by how well Lowry must know her character in order to write so effectively about the changes she undergoes from year to year. I particularly love that Anastasia is so articulate and self-aware. I laughed out loud when she confessed to her mother that she hated her and then asked for a cure. It’s so refreshing to see a fictional character whose relationship with her mother is that honest, and whose conversations with her parents are so frank.
The highlight of this book is Anastasia’s struggle to contain her gerbils, which begin as a pair and quickly grow to a family of eleven. Though class pets getting loose in family homes is a common occurrence in many children’s books, few authors handle the situation with such clever writing or with such amusing collaboration between teen and toddler siblings. Some of the best parts of this book involve Sam and Anastasia secretly working together to keep their mother from learning there are rodents loose in her home. Also interesting are Anastasia’s notes on her science project, which follow a similar format to her likes and dislikes list back in the first book, Anastasia Krupnik.
Though this book has one of the worst covers of the series so far, it is one of the more memorable stories. Girls who enter puberty in the middle grade years will especially enjoy Anastasia’s candid descriptions of the experience, and they will laugh along as she confides in “Sigmund,” chases down gerbils and struggles to pin down what it means to be normal.
Anastasia is now thirteen years old, and between her annoying family and the unpredictability of the gerbils she brought home for her science project, she really feels like she could benefit from some time in therapy. Her parents recognize her dramatics as part and parcel of puberty, and they refuse to pay for any counseling, so Anastasia takes matters into her own hands. She buys a bust of Sigmund Freud in whom she confides all of her problems big and small, and whose assistance seems helpful despite his silence.
This book, like the others in the series so far, is essentially a literary family sit-com. It focuses on Anastasia’s day-to-day interactions with her academic parents, precocious little brother and various classmates, putting a humorous spin on everything from homework to early teen angst. Though Anastasia ages from book to book, she always remains uniquely herself, and I am impressed by how well Lowry must know her character in order to write so effectively about the changes she undergoes from year to year. I particularly love that Anastasia is so articulate and self-aware. I laughed out loud when she confessed to her mother that she hated her and then asked for a cure. It’s so refreshing to see a fictional character whose relationship with her mother is that honest, and whose conversations with her parents are so frank.
The highlight of this book is Anastasia’s struggle to contain her gerbils, which begin as a pair and quickly grow to a family of eleven. Though class pets getting loose in family homes is a common occurrence in many children’s books, few authors handle the situation with such clever writing or with such amusing collaboration between teen and toddler siblings. Some of the best parts of this book involve Sam and Anastasia secretly working together to keep their mother from learning there are rodents loose in her home. Also interesting are Anastasia’s notes on her science project, which follow a similar format to her likes and dislikes list back in the first book, Anastasia Krupnik.
Though this book has one of the worst covers of the series so far, it is one of the more memorable stories. Girls who enter puberty in the middle grade years will especially enjoy Anastasia’s candid descriptions of the experience, and they will laugh along as she confides in “Sigmund,” chases down gerbils and struggles to pin down what it means to be normal.
June 20, 2021
Whew... This book aged poorly. Anastasia does have her charm. I loved the scenes with her and the bust of Freud. However, it’s mostly a miss for me .
The idea that a Harvard professor doesn’t have the money to afford therapy for Anastasia? Hmm Kay. Like, the Krupniks are good parents, but therapy would help a teenager. But sure, Myron Krupnik, give your 13-year-old a Freud book and see if that doesn’t scar her for life. (I read his book on dreams when I was in high school. Still scarred.)
Then poor Sam is being bullied at school and no one does anything! It’s played for laughs. Ha ha. He got bit today! So funny. That crazy bully. Myron also bombs this one.
But the final straw for me is that the family sends eleven gerbils to Sam’s bully as a joke. Some of them babies! Ha ha. You know that little girl is going to kill those animals. Hilarious.
Sheesh.
Also, no Mrs. Stein! And Daphne is boy crazy and not nearly as much fun. Hopefully the next one is better.
The idea that a Harvard professor doesn’t have the money to afford therapy for Anastasia? Hmm Kay. Like, the Krupniks are good parents, but therapy would help a teenager. But sure, Myron Krupnik, give your 13-year-old a Freud book and see if that doesn’t scar her for life. (I read his book on dreams when I was in high school. Still scarred.)
Then poor Sam is being bullied at school and no one does anything! It’s played for laughs. Ha ha. He got bit today! So funny. That crazy bully. Myron also bombs this one.
But the final straw for me is that the family sends eleven gerbils to Sam’s bully as a joke. Some of them babies! Ha ha. You know that little girl is going to kill those animals. Hilarious.
Sheesh.
Also, no Mrs. Stein! And Daphne is boy crazy and not nearly as much fun. Hopefully the next one is better.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
weeding
March 18, 2021I get that this is a younger book, but there is so much caps lock that it's just cringey.
And then we have this gem, "For pete's sake, Mum, that's something you do in Class Four. Everybody in the world has already done the life cycle of the frog in Class Four. This is Class Eight."
I can't.
Bye.
And then we have this gem, "For pete's sake, Mum, that's something you do in Class Four. Everybody in the world has already done the life cycle of the frog in Class Four. This is Class Eight."
I can't.
Bye.
September 24, 2011
My childhood's book~
I liked it a lot but I don't really much remember how the story goes but I truly like the character: Anastasia.
I liked it a lot but I don't really much remember how the story goes but I truly like the character: Anastasia.
January 15, 2023
3.5
Anastasia is 13 and obnoxious, but lucky to have the kind of wonderful parents who can hold space for her feelings without getting offended. Despite this, she decides she's having emotional issues and that she needs space from her family, so buys a bust of Freud at a garage sale to use as her therapist. This means that she can be her own therapist, sounding out her problems out loud in her room.
This is a shorter Anastasia book, especially as a lot of space is taken up by the repeated pages of Anastasia's science project on gerbils. I did spend some time worrying about the gerbils' safety, too. But still an enjoyable read as always and I laughed out loud a couple of times.
Anastasia is 13 and obnoxious, but lucky to have the kind of wonderful parents who can hold space for her feelings without getting offended. Despite this, she decides she's having emotional issues and that she needs space from her family, so buys a bust of Freud at a garage sale to use as her therapist. This means that she can be her own therapist, sounding out her problems out loud in her room.
This is a shorter Anastasia book, especially as a lot of space is taken up by the repeated pages of Anastasia's science project on gerbils. I did spend some time worrying about the gerbils' safety, too. But still an enjoyable read as always and I laughed out loud a couple of times.
November 3, 2024
Each of the books have had one or two lines that catch you thinking “that didn’t age well”, this one being no exception. But this one had quite a few more instances that didn’t age well compared to the others (I.e. mental health, brushing off bullying, fatphobia), which brought me “out of it” a bit. Especially because many/most of those instances weren’t necessary to the story to begin with and the book would have been better without them. Overall tho another fun one: I love Anastasia and her family, and had to even read some parts out loud because they made me laugh.
November 12, 2021
I never read this one as a kid, but reading it now, it's probably my least favourite by far of the series. However, this isn't representative of my feelings about the other books in the series, all of which I would rate an average of 4 stars.
July 27, 2022
This book in the series felt a lot more like the characters were caricatures than the ones previous. That frustrated me. Still trying to decide whether or not I will continue reading the rest of the series. I did enjoy reminiscing over what it was like to have gerbils as a kid.
January 29, 2018
I honestly love all of the Anastasia books. They are funny, and relatable, and real and great.
This one is one of my least favourites but it s still a great read.
This one is one of my least favourites but it s still a great read.
dnf
September 22, 2019didn't hold up
July 21, 2020
When you think of Anastasia Krupnik, you are not gonna think about this book in the series... its that one you remember... but only if its mentioned specifically.
July 24, 2020
Fabulous! One of my favorites definitely!!
July 20, 2021
I love Lois Lowry. It is well written but a bit senseless ie unresolved. Maybe read as a series it would make more sense?
October 3, 2021
Awesome book. I have liked all Anastasia books but this was even more hilarious and funfilled. Anastasia has gerbils, is suffering from adolsecence and Sam is being bullied. All these factors combine to create a perfect escape to smiley, comfortland.
October 16, 2021
Loved as a kid! Anastasia telling her troubles to a bust of Sigmund Freud is awesome.
November 16, 2021
Loved the Gerbil plotline, but there were a few comments about mental health and a few fatphobic comments that were "big off this didn't age well" moments of the reading experience.
February 25, 2023
I really enjoyed this one!! It was really funny and I think my favourite of the series so far!
Displaying 1 - 30 of 78 reviews