Roller Skates

Lucinda Wyman #1

by Ruth Sawyer

A Newbery Medal Winner!

Growing up in a well-to-do family with strict rules and routines can be tough for a ten-year-old girl who only wants to roller skate. But when Lucinda Wyman's parents go overseas on a trip to Italy and leave her behind in the care of Miss Peters and Miss Nettie in New York City, she suddenly gets all the freedom she wants! Lucinda zips around New York on her roller skates, meeting tons of new friends and having new adventures every day. But Lucinda has no idea what new experiences the city will show her.... Some of which will change her life forever.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Childrens, Fiction, Middle Grade, Classics, Historical, New York

186 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1936

About the author

Ruth Sawyer was an American storyteller and a writer of fiction and non-fiction for children and adults. She may be best known as the author of Roller Skates, which won the 1937 Newbery Medal.

Reviews

[Carrie · Rating 5 out of 5]

To explain why I recently re-read Roller Skates, it is necessary to delve into my sometime strange reading habits. I have already mentioned the young adult books from my parents’ house that got burnt up in the fire. Prior to the blaze, I had been in the middle of carrying out one of my strange reading projects. To put it simply, one day I came home from law school, and decided to: 1) alphabetize all the young adult books in the guest room (at least 300 hundred books) and then 2) read them all, in alphabetical-by-author order. Since most of the books in the room were either ones that, as a child, I had determined were too boring to read, or books that my younger siblings had added to the pile, it meant that I ended up reading many books for the first time – and finding lots of great books I had overlooked because they had boring covers, or bad blurbs on the back. I got pretty far, too, until they all burnt up (or, more precisely were totally destroyed by smoke damage).

Which leads me to Roller Skates. This was definitely one of the books that I had disdained as a child because of the dull cover/title. I was not a particularly athletic child, and had no interest in Roller Skating. The cover showed a drawing of a girl on, you guessed it – Roller Skates. No thanks, I said.

What a fool I was! As I saw, when I read it for the first time (at the ripe old age of about 23) and as I saw on my recent re-read, this is an absolutely charming book. Set in 1890’s New York, it tells the story of Lucinda, a society child who has a year-long adventure when her parents go abroad for her mother’s health, and she is allowed to stay with her teachers at their boarding house (rather than her snobby Aunt Emily and her “four docile ladylike daughters”). Lucinda, who is absolutely lovely and charming and Anne-like, takes this opportunity to explore her world and meet people from all social stratas, including a cab-driver, a policeman and a fruit vendor’s son. She makes friends of all sorts, she learns about life outside of the Social Register, and we benefit from her experiences through their charming re-tellings. Totally deserving of the Newbury Medal – which it won in 1937, and as fresh today as it was then. I am so glad that I ran across a copy in Green Apple books – and even more pleased that it was the same copy, “boring” cover* and all, that I owned before.

[Darka · Rating 5 out of 5]

я б поставила цій книжці всі зірки світу, так сильно я її люблю. "Роликові ковзани" - одна з найкращих історій мого дитинства, дуже прикро, що немає українського перекладу і я-маленька читала її російською. зараз я більш-менш відновила справедливість, прочитавши в оригіналі, але ж наскільки багато в мене вкрали тоді, це обурливо.

книга охоплює рік життя десятирічної Люсінди, яка абсолютно щаслива лишитися тимчасовою сиротою. її батьки відбувають в Італію поправити мамине здоров'я, а вона лишається в НЙ під опікою сестер Пітерс. Люсінда - пізня дитина, несподівана і не надто бажана, в родини вже немає сил і запалу розбиратися з дівчинкою. їй затісно у суворих рамках світського товариства, вона вважається надто холодною, нечемною, схильною до істерик, але насправді у Люсінди золоте серце.

роликові ковзани і відсутність гувернантки дають Люсінді свободу, дарують їй цей мегаполіс. з великою цікавістю дівчинка ставиться до всього навколо, шукає нових знайомств серед людей, здавалося б, невідповідного соціяльного становища, серед її друзів юний італійський продавець фруктів, поліціянт, ірландський кебмен, нічний репортер, власники готелю, східна леді, лахмітник, онука акторів, священник тощо. улюблена подружка Люсінди - маленька Трінкет, донька дуже талановитого і дуже бідного скрипаля.

я дуже люблю лінію з ляльковим театром у цій книжці. Люсінда, дізнавшись про існування п'єс Шекспіра, бере собі за мету відтворити "Бурю" (The Tempest), за цим дуже захопливо спостерігати.

ця книга хоче поговорити з читачами не лише про прекрасні миттєвості, а й про смерті, з якими доведеться стикнутися Люсінді. авторка дає нам можливість прочитати деякі записи зі щоденника героїні, я хочу навести одну з них:

"Death is something grown up peoply try to keep children from knowing about. I think it's silly. What is hard to understand is how death divides you in two. Something goes and something stays. Perhaps I shall undestand it better when I grow older, but Uncle E. says nobody understands it very well"

книга закінчується за день до повернення батьків Люсінди. дівчинка розуміє, що життя вже не буде таким вільним як зараз, і мріє лишитися у моменті, де вона назавжди десятирічна несеться доріжками на роликових ковзанах, але ми вже знаємо, що дорослішання неуникне. у пролозі бо (який в російському перекладі тупо викинули, мені бракує зла) читачі вже бачили дорослу Люсінду, якій треба нагадування про ту дівчинку, якою вона колись була.

[Julie G · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think I finally understand the TRUE value of winning a book award, like the Newbery or the Pulitzer: your book stays in print.

Your book stays in print, if only for libraries to offer access to it.

Believe me, after “spending” the past year in the 1930s, I can tell you that it isn’t that easy for a book to stay in print, particularly after 100 years. (It was challenging enough to find many of my selections from my 1970s reading project).

This particular middle grades read, ROLLER SKATES, is a book that would have easily gone out-of-print, but its Newbery Medal win in 1937 secured its future.

It’s a weird little novel, one that was written in the 1930s, but depicting an earlier time (1890s).



For anyone who loves New York and enjoys juvenile fiction, you might appreciate the truly unique setting of a NYC, 100+ years ago, that no longer exists, but is well preserved here. Following our main protagonist, Lucinda, as she skates the nearly empty streets of a young city, is not the worst way to spend an afternoon.

Oh, and here’s a bonus: this novel, unlike so many others to come out of this decade, doesn’t read as “racist” at all! Quite the opposite. It is a refreshing take on racial and cultural acceptance.

Unfortunately, the book itself is a bit of a mess. It starts with an Introduction that makes no sense (and is never resolved) and it rambles and wanders and needed some tighter editing for sure.

But, now, let’s get to my little rant.

Okay, so I was reading this alone because my youngest daughter bailed on me, early on, and reported that she “could no longer listen to this book without falling asleep.” And I’m reading about how young Lucinda, our little roller skater, who is TEN, has all of these “dynamic” relationships with the men in her community.

These men always want to come visit Lucinda, whose parents are in Europe for the year and who is in the loose care of two “spinsters,” and they like to put Lucinda in their laps. As she sits in their laps, they often turn her face so she is looking at them, and sometimes they hold her cheeks with both hands and sometimes they kiss her on the mouth.

“Uncle Earle” is particularly troublesome. He is married to Lucinda’s tiresome Aunt Emily, but, even though he has several daughters of his own, he prefers to hang out with Lucinda, and he asks her to keep it a secret from her aunt.

I want to make something clear: this isn’t part of the plot, as in: “Uncle Earle is molesting Lucinda,” this is just a random sidebar, like, it’s all perfectly normal. Uncle Earle likes to pick up Lucinda in his carriage and whisk her off to restaurants and plays, and it is their little “secret” that she loves keeping. There’s no actual “molesting,” just secretive monkeybusiness.

I have found similar themes to this type of inappropriate adult attention to prepubescent kids in Louisa May Alcott’s Eight Cousins, Jean Craighead George’s My Side of the Mountain and Katherine Patterson’s Jacob Have I Loved. Most of these stories were award winners, as well.

I find it interesting that all of these juvenile novels were written by female authors, but it is obvious that either (a) my modern life has completely distorted my own reality and people were once far more wholesome than I think they were or (b) women were so entrapped by the societal and cultural norms of the time, they perpetrated these ideals.

Either way, I can tell you that I’m pretty sure that Uncle Earle could have benefited from a good "lady of the night" (as they were called back then).

Wrapping this up: it was lovely to visit NYC, circa 1890, on roller skates! I was surprised by some of the mature themes (two unexpected deaths), and I think that anyone studying the progression of juvenile literature ought to consider this book an interesting early offering of the genre.

[Eileen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I saw this on the dollar rack at the Strand, remembered reading it something in the vicinity of 20 years ago, and picked it up. Hey, it won the Newbery Medal in 1937; it must be of at least reasonable quality. Fine. Then I reread it.

In the broadest sense, the story goes: "10-year-old Lucinda makes friends everywhere, often while roller skating, in the NYC of 189-." This seems fine on the surface--but then you get past the surface and find the endemic racism. I say "endemic" purposefully; this is not at all the racism of the current US. For example, there are approximately zero black people depicted in the book; the only instance I could find was a backhanded line in blackface from an undescribed doorman. I don't know about you, but I don't for one second believe there were zero black people living and working in NYC at the end of the 19th century. That's offensive enough as it is, but as the book progresses, and Lucinda makes friends among those people clearly "not of her class," we start going back to previous instances of American racism. Key immigrant populations from the second half of the 19th century--Irish, Italians, and inspecific Slavs who I suspect are supposed to be Jews, although maybe they're supposed to be Russian, or both! who can say?--are brought in, depicted as "friendly but uneducated and low-class". While Lucinda makes friends with them, there's definitely this strange jolly-faced Other quality to all the so-called characterization.

Then. Lucinda meets a woman--Chinese? Japanese? who knows?--who is depicted in this completely bizarre and not at all okay Asian-exoticism sort of way. She's married to someone who is clearly depicted as Jewish, very jealous/possessive, and remarkably fetishistic. As an adult, I suspect this to be a mail-order bride situation, although it's never clearly stated. So. Lucinda of course makes friends with her. Then one day she talks back in school and is sent home. You'd expect this sort of thing in this type of book, right? Yes. So she decides to go see her wonderful Asian friend--spoiler alert--and suddenly finds her murdered. Seriously. With a ceremonial dagger that was previously hanging on the wall. WHAT. She of course finds her Other friends in the building--the super and his wife--and they say, "Lucinda, you can't be caught up in this. Did anyone see you? I'll take you home. You were never here. The maid will find her soon enough." Again: WHAT. WHAT.

Then the plot never, ever comes back around to this at all. It's over. While death can have a place in a book like this--for instance, a different friend of hers dies of Victorian novel disease, i.e. diphtheria plus poverty, later in the book--the whole exoticist murder depiction really cannot. I don't even know what else to say. I mean, there are other problems: the first chapter frame is unnecessary; the story grinds to a very awkward halt at the end of Lucinda's year. But these issues are nothing compared to the completely out of place, racist, and anti-semitic murder situation.

There is no way I would give this book to any kid at this point in time. I don't know if I can even thoroughly parse it myself. Here's what I think: it's probably horribly accurate to the attitude of the time. It did get the Newbery Medal in 1937. This is not exactly the high point for tolerance in American (or any other western) society. The attitudes may be exaggerated; I'd think that by 1937, a full 74 year lifetime after the NY draft riots of 1863, issues of anti-European racism were at least tapering off. Nowadays, certainly, I can't imagine people tolerating anti-Irish or anti-Italian sentiment; the most you see is St. Patrick's day green beer, the interior decor of Bennigan's, and episodes of the Jersey Shore. But a book written in the mid-30s, depicting attitudes in the 1890s--I think it's accurate. This book is a throwback to a different time, with a different set of tolerated prejudices, and while (as with an awful lot of the books I've been reading lately) it's of use as a historical document, it's not at all a healthy mindset to propagate now.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

I quite enjoyed this story set in the 1890s of a well-to-do New York girl who gets a year untrammeled by parental authority and French governesses, which she spends mostly skating freely through the city and making friends of all sorts in high and low places. I haven't read most of the early Newbery winners, but I'm quite ready to believe that it's among the better ones. The opening is a little twee, and perhaps Lucinda is a bit over the top in her joyousness, but there are sobering notes -- we only gradually learn that Lucinda's parents have been indifferent to her most of her life. There are certainly elements that have not aged well (for example, the servant of the two elderly sister Lucinda boards with being referred to always as "Black Susan"), and like many other reviewers, I think the book would have been better with one bizarre plot element excised (the murder). However, it was an entertaining story, and I particularly loved the staging of "The Tempest" Lucinda produces with her toy theater. I'm eager to read the sequel.

[Lady Clementina ffinch-ffarowmore · Rating 3 out of 5]

When ten-year-old Lucinda Wyman becomes a ‘temporary orphan’ (her parents have had to travel to Italy for a year for her mother’s health), she finds a new sense of freedom. Now able to skate around New York as she likes, she goes about meeting and making friends with an interesting bunch of people, all from a very different social station ( a rag-and-bone-man, a fruit vendor, a musician, actors, and a journalist among them), people who she may not have possibly even met had she been living with her family. She is ever willing to help them and bring them happiness in whatever little way she can (as are they) and soon finds herself loved and appreciated much more than she is by her family (other than her parents, I mean). What one likes about Lucinda is that while she is a good-hearted and helpful girl, she is also mischievous and not the kind who does what she’s told all the time. She also has a rather sharp tongue and is not much afraid of saying what she feels (ending up in trouble quite often as a result). While the book is essentially Lucinda’s little adventures with her new friends, it also showcases how the less privileged lived in the latter half of the 19th century—struggling to make ends meet, losing out on life’s little pleasures, and trying to escape death which rears its ugly head every so often in many forms, a battle which they don’t always win (thus making it not entirely a light-hearted children’s book).

[Wendy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'd been looking forward to this, since I remembered it being a childhood favorite of Kathleen's. It was an enjoyable read, but I think it's one of the few Newberys that I feel like I would have enjoyed more if I'd read it first as a child. As an adult... some of it seems weird. I kept wondering if there was another book that came before, or something, because I felt like I was missing some information that the author thought I would have (like stuff about Lucinda's family). And the weird disjointedness of some of it made me wonder if it was memoir--Wikipedia seems to confirm that--since in real life, everything doesn't make sense... I mean, that whole thing with the murder was just sort of bizarre. (I thought the other sad episode was handled really well.)

The book also seemed really old-fashioned to me--if I hadn't known, I would have thought it was written earlier in the 20th century, like Understood Betsy or Patty Fairfield.

Good, yes, but not a favorite.

[Bethany · Rating 2 out of 5]

Hmmm. I spent most of this book regretting I couldn’t give this to my younger self because she would’ve appreciated it more. But then in the last 50 pages a character gets murdered??? Another character is sick and dies in the following chapter, which at that point was less jarring and more of the tragedy I’d expect to find in a children’s book. The murder really threw me off, I’m not gonna lie. The fact that it happened, the way it was addressed, and the characters involved.

[Luisa Knight · Rating 1 out of 5]

Reading Grade: 4th - 6th

Cleanliness:

Children's Bad Words
Mild Obscenities & Substitutions - 10 Incidents: dickens, Jumping Jupiter, dang'em, Be-elzebub!, d*mn, darn it, h*ll, Jumping Jehoshaphat, dang it all,
Name Calling - 4 Incidents: black Susan, colored, heathen Chinee
Religious Profanity - 12 Incidents: Heaven forbid, Glory be to God, golly, honest-to-God, Faith, Goodness Gracious

Religious & Supernatural - 6 Incidents: Fairies, fairy raths, goblins, and banshees are mentioned during make-believe times. Mentions the good Maria and the Holy Madonna. "I guess you're on the lap of the gods this year." Regarding a statue of Diana in Madison Square: "She's the goddess, defending the city." When a little girl dies, a doctor talks about the Esquimo's belief that when a person dies their soul becomes a white gull. This is discussed and perhaps believed by the little girl when later she sees a white gull. '"I didn't know heaven was so sure,"Lucinda smiled impishly.'

Attitudes/Disobedience - 10 Incident: Lucinda "mutinied" against her parent's wishes for her to stay with her Aunt Emily. She said she wouldn't go and would run away if they sent her there. (Her parents send her to stay with her teacher instead). Lucinda writes: "I think Aunt Emily's bound to stir up Heaven when she gets there. Maybe she won't ever get there. That will be a joke on Aunt Emily." Lucinda writes: "Aunt Emily had to stir things up because I wasn't in her Sunday School. She'll keep it up until mama comes home but I'm not going to weaken. I was very polite about it, outside; but inside I boiled." There is an entire scene where Aunt Emily and Lucinda fight - it lasts several pages. Lucinda is disrespectful, rude, stubborn and disobedient. " I know I don't sew nicely - I'll never, never sew nicely. I wish I was in heaven and you and your everlasting sewing in hell, Aunt Emily!" In the end, her uncle steps in and takes her out of the room to read Shakespeare with her instead. She is not remorseful and "Being Lucinda, could not manage so much humility" to apologize. Later, she makes a laughing remark about the situation. "Then temper would get her. ... she would say those things forbidden a young Wyman; such as Darn it, and H*ll, and Jumping Jehoshaphat!" Lucinda is very happy when she doesn't have to tithe but works a deal with the Sexton. Lucinda sings a vulgar song about a drunk butler. Her uncle asks her to never sing it again. She protests, saying it's elegant. Lucinda goes to watch a play at a theater that isn't respectable. She does not tell her aunt and thoroughly enjoyed herself. When a little friend is sick, Lucinda does not want to leave her side though her teacher asks that she go get some sleep. "She almost had a tantrum." She refuses, saying she won't go. The doctors says she can stay. '"I didn't know heaven was so sure,"Lucinda smiled impishly.'

Romance Related - 5 Incidents: Mentions petticoats, drawers or undergarments a few times. The word "breast" is used a few times meaning "chest" or "heart". A baby's plump, bare bottom is mentioned. A harem is mentioned in relation to Kipling's Just So Stories. Lucinda goes to a ball.

Violence - 2 Incidents: Lucinda visits and makes friends with a foreign lady. It is not made clear whether she is a whore or having an affair but something is going on. Her husband barges into the apartment one day, about to start a fight when he notices Lucinda (you get the impression he's drunk). Later, Lucinda walks into her friend's apartment only to find the woman stabbed to death in the back. She runs for the landlord and he spares her having to be involved in any police investigations, telling her she must never tell a soul what she saw or where she was that day. "Reading As You Like It ... she brought to him two speeches that rolled deliciously on her tongue: 'A pox o' your throat, you bawling, blasphemous, incharitable dog.' What does a pox o' your throat mean, Uncle Earle? And following that - 'If thou more murmur'st, I will rend an oak, And peg thee in his knotty entrails, till Though hast howl'd away twelve winters.' It sounds simply elegant but I'm afraid I don't understand it."

Conversation Topics - 5 Incidents: Mentions a tobacco shop and Lucinda is shocked at seeing a woman smoking. Mentions wine. Lucinda visits and makes friends with a foreign lady. It is not made clear whether she is a whore or having an affair but something is going on. Her husband barges into the apartment one day, about to start a fight when he notices Lucinda (you get the impression he's drunk). Later, Lucinda walks into her friend's apartment only to find the woman stabbed to death in the back. She runs for the landlord and he spares her having to be involved in any police investigations, telling her she must never tell a soul what she saw or where she was that day. Mentions St. Nicholas. When a little girl dies, a doctor talks about the Esquimo's belief that when a person dies their soul becomes a white gull. This is discussed and perhaps believed by the little girl when later she sees a white gull.

Parent Takeaway
For having been written in 1936, this was a shocking book. The main character is persistently rebellious, always gets her own way and is never remorseful. She does everything that a girl of her time wouldn't and shouldn't do - which comes across as a very strong message from the author. There is language and even a murder scene.

**Like my reviews? Then you should follow me! Because I have hundreds more just like this one. With each review, I provide a Cleanliness Report, mentioning any objectionable content I come across so that parents and/or conscientious readers (like me) can determine beforehand whether they want to read a book or not. Content surprises are super annoying, especially when you’re 100+ pages in, so here’s my attempt to help you avoid that!

So Follow or Friend me here on GoodReads! You’ll see my updates as I’m reading and know which books I’m liking and what I’m not finishing and why. You’ll also be able to utilize my library for looking up titles to see whether the book you’re thinking about reading next has any objectionable content or not. From swear words, to romance, to bad attitudes (in children’s books), I cover it all!

[Rachel Aranda · Rating 2 out of 5]

The plot revolves around ten-year-old rich kid Lucinda Wyman who becomes a 'temporary orphan' (her parents have had to travel to Italy for a year for her mother's health). During that year of 'being an orphan' she finds a new sense of freedom as she is now able to skate around New York as she likes. During her skating time, she goes about meeting and making friends with an interesting bunch of people, all from a very different social station (a rag-and-bone-man, a landlady, rich Asian lady (who could be a mail-order bride but we don't know for sure), a fruit vendor and his family, a struggling musician and his family, a family of traveling actors, a journalist, police officers, and a carriage driver). Essentially working class people who she may not have possibly even met had she been living with her family. She is ever willing to help them and bring them happiness in whatever little way she can (as are they for her) and soon finds herself loved and appreciated much more than she is by her family (possibly more than her parents as they find her cold). While the book is essentially Lucinda's little adventures with her new friends, it also showcases how the less privileged lived in the latter half of the 19th century-struggling to make ends meet, losing out on life's little pleasures, and trying to escape death which rears its ugly head every so often in many forms, a battle which they don't always win (thus making it not entirely a light-hearted children's book).

I have mixed feelings about the main character. What I like about Lucinda is that while she is a good-hearted and helpful girl, she is also mischievous and not the kind who does what she's told all the time. She also has a rather sharp tongue and is not much afraid of saying what she feels (ending up in trouble quite often as a result). However, she is a rather naïve girl who doesn't quite understand that not all problems are easy to solve, and that life can be hard for people even though hers is not. She gets into all kinds of situations where she could learn valuable life lessons.

Now to move into what I didn't like about this book. As a reader, I was left with a sense that whatever lesson that she could have learned were pushed to the side and didn't really sink in for her. It's honestly a little odd since there was death of people she knew occurring more than once in the end but it truly felt like she didn't let it fully sink in even later on in the year. I liked how she was a bit naïve though since it led to here being willing to throw herself into whatever tickled her fancy. She may come off a bit self-absorbed but she's a rich 10-year old girl whose parents aren't around… It's kind of expected to happen.

Other issues I have with this book have to be the beginning and ending. Truth be told, I have no idea what the purpose of the first chapter is. At first, I thought we were supposed to be a friend or relative of Lucinda as we see her years later from when most of the book takes place. She wants to talk about the past but we don't seem to remember it and are embarrassed. She makes us feel guilty until we remember that we have a journal during that time period. After Lucinda prompts us to read it, we start the story. This scene is confusing because the only person who keeps a journal during the stories is Lucinda and she isn't sharing it for anyone but herself and maybe her mother. So how would we know all of her inner thoughts? Why do we see snippets of Lucinda's journal but not the other person's journal? It is how the story started after all. Also, who is this person in the first chapter? We're never told so it's still an unsolved mystery. This was incredibly confusing to me. The ending was a little better than the beginning, in my opinion, but not by much as the author seemed to be in a hurry to wrap up the story. One example of this hurriedness is the sudden dissolving of Tony and her friendship. It suddenly ended because he wanted to be alone with her instead of having to have a chaperone. The last moment of their friendship is that he scowls at her and she tells him she's leaving after they mind his fruit stand. What kind of an ending is that?! I know they're of different social classes, but there was a chance for the subject to be talked about by kids who didn't fully understand the situation. Sure it might have been clumsy since it's a tough subject to talk about for kids but any attempt would have been appreciated. Their friendship ending could have been so much more meaningful and sadder but it was just an awkward mess.

Needless to say, I had issues with this book, but it was a pretty good carefree story. If you don't think too much into the story then it's pretty okay. This is where my problem lies. I have read a lot of children's books from different time periods that have been done really well and really badly. This is kind of somewhere in between a 2.5 and 3 star rating for me. I could forgive a lot of issues with this book but what galls me is that this book could have been better than it was. It could have dealt with a lot of issues that affected girls during the 1890s to late 1930s like sexism, social standing, obligations that girls are supposed to have, etc. It was one of the first Newberry Award winners to have a main character who was a girl so it was needed, but it made girls seem kind of airheaded and not all sensible. It also touched on other issues like racism by representing people of color and foreigners in positive, although slightly cliché situations as they were all servants or poor working folk, but nothing too big happened with Lucinda knowing them. She didn't get to say goodbye to them like she did Tony so we don't know if she just forgot about them, like she did previous lessons and events, or if they all kept in touch. I just don't feel satisfied with this book so I have to give it a 2.5 rating.

[Antof9 · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good book is a good book. Doesn't matter who the intended audience is!

I read this as part of our "Read the Newberys Project" (up to 1937 now!), and wasn't disappointed at all. In fact, it was a great book to follow "The Story of Edgar Sawtelle", which I was thoroughly annoyed with. It's just fascinating to me how a good book draws me in, and the "target" age is totally meaningless.

It's interesting to me that in the Newbery lexicon, this follows "Caddie Woodlawn" and "Invincible Louisa" so closely. It's as if the Newbury committee knew they needed to get some "girl" books out there. Not that this one is girlie at all, but Lucinda as the primary character is well, obviously a girl :)

It's a charming book about a 10-year old girl whose parents go to Europe for a year (for the mom's health). She's the youngest in the family with 3 much older brothers, and we really don't know much about the family until the very end. The family is superfluous though - they're only in the story to be absent, because this is the year of her freedom. She considers herself in an orphanage, and spends the whole year doing things her mom, and certainly Great Aunt Emily, wouldn't have approved of. She makes friends with the family who runs a fruitstand, a homeless person (or 2), the Central Park policeman (and later bribes him w/ candy!), a hansom cab driver (and his wife!), theatre people, and more. It's fab.

One of the reasons I like Lucinda so much is she and I are kindred spirits. Bonus? I never heard anyone describe it this way before, but it's me! When Lucinda first meets Tony at the fruitstand, some thugs have just stolen some fruit from him. In helping to pick it up:

"I call that mean. Two against one and stealing, I call that mean! Jumping Jupiter, I wish Patrolman M'Gonegal had this beat! He'd lick 'em good."

Lucinda was using her best street vernacular. Like Nature in Thanatopsis she spoke a various language and used it unfailingly.

You can't read this book and miss how roller skates get out wild energy, allow Lucinda freedom, and more. I loved her roller skate theology: Isn't it elegant not to have tantrums any more! I guess half of it is because you don't expect them; and the other half is roller skates. They use up a lot of energy and iron out a lot of feelings. ... they ought to be called 'the mother's friend.'

I like that there are some subtle things in this book that would speak to a young girl's heart when reading this. When Lucinda is asked to be a bridesmaid in a wedding, she asks the bride why she'd pick her because she's "homely as two toads, and the other girls are so pretty". The bride says, "You'll look perfectly elegant too, Lucinda. You're so alive and interesting - don't you think that's better than just being pretty?"

I like that :)

There's more I could say about this charming book -- it really did enchant me, and there are also some heavy parts in it. But I'll leave it at a very high 4 stars (wish there were halves to give), and recommend it to pretty much anyone.

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a nice, fairly uneventful story about a girl, Lucinda, who is left in the city with a teacher while her parents go out of the country for her mother's health. She experiences a bit more freedom during this time and is allowed to skate pretty much anywhere she wants to. She makes friends with people she probably would never have run into before.

There is a strange framing device in the beginning that I didn't really get. And a murder that was handled in a pretty weird way.

Casual racism in the form of using the word "colored" to describe an African-American, and referring to a maid as "Black Sarah". Published in 1936 and awarded the Newbery for that year.

[Mariangel · Rating 4 out of 5]

A delightful book, loosely based on the author's childhood: As it happens to Lucinda, the main character in the book, Sawyer's parents traveled to Europe leaving her in New York when she was 10. While her parents are away, Lucinda lives with one of her school teachers and gets to know all her neighbours: the Italian grocers, the Irish cabby, the Polish musicians... Some scenes reminded me of Shirley Temple's "Poor Little Rich Girl".

One of the nicest things in the book is how Lucinda cherishes her favorite books (which are also my favorites): Nathaniel Hawthorn's Greek myths "Tanglewood Tales", George MacDonald "The Princess and the Goblin" and "At the back of North Wind", all of which I have been reading to my son this past year; "Sans famille", which she translates during French lessons; and the joy she experiences when her uncle introduces her to Shakespeare's comedies, both in reading and at the theater. A highlight of the book is her performance of "As you like it" to all of her friends and neighbors using a huge puppet theater.

I have read comments of readers who find the deaths in the book not appropriate for children, and wonder why it got the Newbery medal. Didn't they read "Little women" when they were young? In fact, Lucinda ends the story by realizing how many things about life and death she has learnt that year, precisely because she was not sheltered by her parents.

[Lisa · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was the 1937 Newbery Medal winner and it must have been a slow year for children's books being published. The book had potential but was boring. The main character is your typical precocious tomboy but she had no endearing qualities to make me really like her.

[Helen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a charming YA book - that a grownup reader can also enjoy - about the protagonist (Lucinda) respite from her rather dull family, when her parents depart for a year to Italy so that her mom can rest/recover from an illness. The spirited ten-year-old tomboy takes the opportunity of minimal adult supervision to explore NYC on roller skates, makes many friends from all levels of society - and on the eve of her parents' return, it's evident that as the year of freedom is drawing to a close, she regrets having to return to being a regular, well-behaved daughter in rigid late 19th C Victorian society. The book is easy to read, and poignant - as Lucinda experiences the tragic loss of friends, and the seeming disintegration of a friendship with an immigrant boy she befriended. The magical world she had built up of her wide circle of friends, that she had cultivated with uncanny wisdom for someone so young, was about to vanish, with her parents' return. The book also gives a glimpse into life in NY in an earlier era, prior to automobiles and many of the other conveniences we take for granted. At the time, Grant's Tomb was being constructed "in the country" - the Upper West Side. I enjoyed this book, and recommend it to anyone - especially those interested in life in NY in the 1890s.

[Manuel Alfonseca · Rating 3 out of 5]

ENGLISH: A nice book about a year in the life of a ten-year-old girl, Lucinda. When her parents must travel to Italy so that her mother recovers her health, she is left (as she says) as a temporary orphan, under the loose watch of Miss Peters and her sister, although in the background lurks the awful vigilance of Aunt Emily and her four gazelles.

Lucinda makes lots of friends in the most unexpected runs of life: a boy of her age, the son of an Italian fruit seller; a couple of policemen; Mr. Night-Owl, a reporter; Trinket, an undersized, underfed doll-like little girl; a hansom cab driver; Rags-and-Bottles, a rubbish man; and, of course, Uncle Earle, who more than compensates the awful vigilance by his wife.

ESPAÑOL: Un bonito libro sobre un año en la vida de una niña de diez años, Lucinda. Cuando sus padres han de viajar a Italia para que su madre recupere la salud, ella se queda (así lo dice ella) como una huérfana temporal, bajo la laxa vigilancia de la señorita Peters y su hermana, aunque en segundo plano acecha la espantosa vigilancia de la tía Emily y sus cuatro gacelas.

Lucinda hace muchos amigos en los ambientes más inesperados de la vida: un chico de su edad, hijo de un vendedor de frutas italiano; un par de policías; Mr. Night-Owl, un reportero; Trinket, una niña pequeñita y desnutrida que parece una muñeca; el conductor de un coche de caballos; Rags-and-Bottles, el basurero; y, por supuesto, el tío Earle, que compensa con creces la espantosa vigilancia de su esposa.

[Kim Novak (The Reading Rx) · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book surprised me! The cover looks like a boring old children’s book no one would want to read. But, the main character really was ahead of her time. She was a budding bleeding heart liberal feminist who had a mind of her own! Sure there were some cringy moments as one might expect for a book written in the 1930s about a girl in the 1890s. But the themes tackled in this story were very progressive. It challenges the concept of social class. There is depression, murder, poverty, homelessness, and death from now preventable childhood disease (hello 2025, coming again soon because of the anti-vax near you)… not the content you would think of as being in a children’s book. But there is also pervasive observation and kindness.

There is a profound section near the end that particularly spoke to me: “Today the skates sang a sorry rhythm. She’d never belong to herself again— not until she married and got herself a husband, and then she’d belong to him.” Here is a fictional 10 year old girl growing up, opening her eyes, and saying F the patriarchy. Published in 1936 and winner of the 1937 Newbery Medal.

[mitchell dwyer · Rating 2 out of 5]

I've read others' reviews and I'm so conflicted about this novel that I agree with the favorable reviews and the unfavorable reviews both. There is something to love here, in this story of a ten-year-old girl who refuses to let social boundaries interfere with her making friends with anyone she chooses. While largely annoying, her personality is also somewhat winning; despite myself, I couldn't help caring about her and her friends.

Yet so much of this story is a laborious read. Readers old enough to remember the first Benji movie will find similarities between it and the first three chapters of this book, in which we are led around New York and introduced to the many friends Lucinda has made: A police officer, a fruitcart merchant, a confectioner, a hansom cab driver. A little of that goes a long way, and if I weren't committed to finishing this novel, I don't know that I would have.

But then the flowery story takes a couple of bizarre and unexpected turns. I will not spoil it here for future readers, but there is a murder and a mortal illness, and while one is dealt with admirably by the storyteller, the other sticks out in a disturbing way I can't articulate. I hesitate to call it gratuitous, but I also struggle to understand what it contributes to the rest of the novel.

As if all that weren't enough to negate the positives I find here (and the positives are genuine, so I'm not looking to cancel them out), the author takes it upon herself a few times to explain to us what it is about Lucinda that brings people together, as if she doesn't trust the strength of her own writing and characterization. There is an I in this story who pops up a few times, including in the introduction, but who the narrator is is never explained and the infrequent intrusion of an I is distracting and sometimes maddening.

I see some good read-aloud value here, so readers sharing this novel with children might take a look at it. The author, for the most part, puts together some good sentences, and the episodic structure of the book lends itself well to bedtime or read-aloud time. I will repeat what other reviewers have cautioned, however: Read it yourself first before sharing with young children.

I cannot decide whether I like or dislike this book; I suppose that means I like AND dislike it.

[Lauren Smith · Rating 2 out of 5]

I picked this book up from my stack with full expectancy to be bored out of my mind. (I know – you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover but it was pink…) I thought this would blow my tomboyish personality to madness. After reading it, though I wasn’t wowed by it, I did like it for what it was. There are many characters, some so colorful you wonder how realistic they actually are but anything can happen in New York. Lucinda is left to stay in the states while her stuck-up parents travel Italy and Europe. Lucinda defies the very aristocratic nature of her name by preferring to ride her roller skates and chat with strangers. I didn’t immediately relate with her, mostly since I have never had her out in the open outlook – despite my love of people I’ve always been one to keep plans to myself. My interest increased as the novel progressed but not to the extent of gripping me. It’s always good to read something a little different but as far as I’m concerned this is just another book crossed off my list

[Tricia Douglas · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful story about a little girl living in New York City around 1890. Her parents travel to Italy and Lucinda is left to live with Miss Peters and Miss Nettie, not horrible Aunt Emily. Lucinda more or less has the run of the neighborhood, meeting anyone and everyone she finds on the street. Her freedom is what allows the book to seemingly take us back to our own childhood. If only we could be free and creative like Lucinda. A very well-written Newbery from 1936.

[Cheryl · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reread yet again for Children's Books group discussion April 2025. I'm still enchanted. Lucinda did a lot of growing up in this year. And she changed a lot of lives for the better.

I still don't know a lot of the words, but I'll only bother to look up pongee and Dhondaram.

[Joe · Rating 3 out of 5]

What a weird little book.

Part of the early Newbery canon, Roller Skates continues the trend of pre-1940s-winning what-the-fuckery.

With no plot whatsoever, the book merely follows the whims of impish Lucinda, who skates all around 1890s Manhattan, making friends and generally being a busybody. Where are her parents during all this? In Italy. They’ve left their child with a woman named Miss Peters, whose relationship with the family is ill-defined at best. Lucinda insists that she’s now an orphan. Even though her parents are alive and well. Sorry, real orphans.

A product of its era, there are some characterizations that are uncomfortable for modern readers. However, there are so many insane comings and goings and doings that it’s impossible to even care about that kind of stuff.

Lucinda befriends the son of an Italian grocer, but spends more time obsessing over the growing number of “bambinos” (yup - multiplying Italians, folks) than she does with her new buddy. She ingratiates herself to a policeman whom she eventually bends to her will. She shmoozes with an Asian “princess” who is STRAIGHT-UP MURDERED - a plot point that is literally dropped two pages later, despite the fact that it’s Lucinda who discovers the body. Lucinda “borrows” (author’s words, not mine) a toddler from the apartment above hers, whom she trots around town in the dead of winter. It’s no surprise when the child gets violently ill and dies - something that everyone, including the parents, get over with alarming speed.

Unlike other early Newbery winners, Roller Skates is a lightning fast read. This is partially because much of the book is totally gonzo.

1. The book is peppered with ludicrous non-sequiturs, particularly in the dialogue. Conversations often come across as two people talking about two completely different things.

2. Transitions within paragraphs make you wonder if editors even existed in the 1930s:“Each took home a box of wedding cake with gold initials on it. Lucinda slept on hers and had a lovely dream.” [p. 182]

3. The book's sequences are flabbergasting: at any moment, Lucinda is concocting another bizarre adventure or convoluted activity. She spends a solid three chapters obsessing over Shakespeare's The Tempest and performing it with dolls. When the performance occurs, it's just that: a performance. Nothing remotely unexpected happens.

4. Each chapter is appended with a totally nonsense diary entry that recaps events in the chapter and glosses over non-events that happen between chapters. Remember The Dead Toddler? Lucinda reflects on that for a mere sentence and then it's on to her next batshit musing.

You'd think that an amalgamation of these threads would be messy and unreadable. You'd be right about the messy, but the book is compulsively readable. It isn't a painful read at all. It's just weird. Like a fever dream. Like a 10 year old skatingskatingskating a thousand miles an hour through Manhattan and yapping about everything that pops into her head.

I'd really give this book 2.5 stars, not 3. But whatever. I’ll award the extra half star to this crazy-assed shitshow. If this were a series, I'd read every last book in it just to see what kind of nutso plot point was thought of and immediately discarded next.

[Subashini · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked it for the most part; there was that dry, ironic tone to the prose, and Lucinda's adventures especially in the field of enchantment—her treasured books, Aunty Emily's suppers, puppet theatre, circuses, Diana of the Tower, Shakespeare with uncle Earle, picnics, reading aloud to Trinket—were all quite delightful. But there were the casual bits of racism and Orientalism (fun!) and a point where Orientalism and misogyny meet and the "Asiatic" lady whom Lucinda refers to as Princess is found murdered in what I'm meant to interpret as a result of domestic abuse and then things move on as normal right after that and I was like ???

[Michelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Newberry winner that really was a winner! This was very Anne of Green Gables in an earlier time and different setting. Some odd moments, like when she stumbled upon a murdered heiress and then it was never really spoken of again. But the ending was gorgeous, how she wished to be irresponsible, creative, allowed to be herself- 10 years old forever.

[Shauna Ludlow Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Why didn’t I read this book decades ago? It was a bit dated and I had to look up several words, but it was charming. And heartbreaking. And so very interesting. It made me excited to explore New York City and become friends with strangers like Lucinda.

[Sue · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's always hard to judge some of these older Newbery books, because of the writing style. But this was an engaging story of one girl's year in NYC, living with two sisters while her parents spend the year in Italy. She has always been seen as troublesome, when in reality she is curious, imaginative, & doesn't want to fit into her society box. This year of relative freedom allows her to explore on her skates, meet many different people & learn more about life & herself. The many self-aware understandings she comes to during the year make this interesting. It also involves some rather deeper themes than you would expect in a child's book, but are handled in a way that a child can learn & grow.

[Beth Bonini · Rating 5 out of 5]

I used to spend a lot of time at my grandmother's house in the summer. She lived on a lake in Texas, and the afternoons were so darn hot that I spent most afternoons lying on a bed reading. Some of my mother's childhood books were in the bedroom: Little Women, several copies of the Bobbsey Twins' mysteries and this lovely, lovely book. There's an inscription inside: To Rebecca, from the McGills, Heidelberg, Dec 29, 1949 . . . my mother's 8th birthday. I don't know how many times I read this book, but it most have been at least a dozen. It was one of my summer rituals.

I've been organising my many bookshelves, and in the process have unearthed many treasures -- including this book. It's grubby and worn, but so precious to me. I just meant to have a little skim through it, but I ended up reading the entire thing in one of those almost hypnotic reading states that can occasionally happen to an avid reader (who happens to find herself alone in a quiet house). I still found the book as enchanting as ever. It was SO familiar to me, and yet I couldn't wait to see what happened next. I experienced that special enchantment that so often fell upon me when I was a young reader, but is rarer now. Perhaps I just have an old-fashioned sensibility, but to be a 10 year old in New York City in the 1890s -- to be free to roller skate through the streets all by yourself, and to meet all sorts of interesting people -- still seems to me a romantic ideal.

If you don't know the book, the premise is that 10 year old Lucinda is being sent to live with the Misses Peters (one of them is a teacher at Lucinda's private school) for a year while her parents go to Italy. This observation, by a local policeman, gives such a good sense of Lucinda's life, before and after: Patrolman M'Gonegal's beat was Bryant Park and that stretch of Fifth Avenue that bound it. He had marked Lucinda long before, and without interest, as a child of society, going down the avenue, pulling at the hand of a rigid Frenchwoman like a puppy on a leash. But the leash had been slipped; the puppy was free, and he watched for her every morning with a sense of deep satisfaction. So many children's books pose a scenario in which a child becomes free of parental constraint (often through death), but this book is special because the period of 'freedom' is just one unique year. There is just so much boundless joy in this book; for the first time, Lucinda is allowed to really explore the world and be herself; for the first time, she is truly valued for her own special qualities. Like Anne Shirley, she has the gift of huge enthusiasm and a relish for new experiences. She has a wise Uncle Earle who sees her special qualities and describes Lucinda's year of being 'orphaned' as a vaccination against "snobbishness -- priggishness -- the Social Register." Lucinda, this poor little rich girl, is suddenly thrown into the huge melting pot of New York City. Her new friends are from all social strata: Irish hansom cab drivers and policeman, impoverished Polish musicians, women who have to scrape a living and take rooms in boarding houses, an Italian fruit seller and his family. I was so charmed by that openness and heterogeneity as a child, and I still love that aspect of the novel. It is not really a coming-of-age novel in the traditional sense, as it really only covers one year of Lucinda's life, and she is still very much a child, but it is definitely a story in which the main character comes entirely into herself -- and one can sense, even as a young reader, that she will retain the best part of what she has learned.

There is so much joy in this book, but some proper sadness, too. I sobbed at several points, just as I did when I was younger than Lucinda and reading this book for the first time.

[Deb Omnivorous Reader · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an old favourite from when I was a kid. I was fascinated by Lucinda's year of being a temporary 'orphan' while her parents went to Europe and she boarded with a teacher. Actually, New York in the late 1800's (I guess that is when it was set, it was awarded a prize in 1937) was as remote a place from me, in the 1970's - 1980's Middle East, as the moon. I read Lucinda's adventures, roller skating around the city and making friends with all and sundry with the same suspension of disbelief that I applied to Podkayne of Mars.

It is a lot of fun, this book, though I frequently puzzled over things some of which I now understand; like the obsession with Irish and why did Lucinda's aunt disapprove? or; What on earth was the pinafore thing? Other questions I find that as an adult I am still a bit hazy on; Bath bun...? what? Then there are concepts, words and phrases that I have simpley no idea what they mean and because Lucinda is a child and has erratic speech patterns I often can't even figure them out from context.

It is a very rich little story and it scores well ahead of many modern children's fiction through lack of sugar coating. Bad things happen to people, friends of Lucinda's die and while she does all she can, it is not enough. The carefree friendly attitude of our main protagonist wins her many friends all over the city and this results in many strange friendships and small adventures. This is a child's book, with childlike (though rarely childish) experiences and perspectives but because it is set so long ago I think it takes a modern adult to really get their head around it. Along with many other children's books I can think of, I rather doubt this is remotely suitable for a ten year old today. Not only would they have a hard time relating to it, but it reflects the rigid class systems, the racism and bigotry of it's time. Of course, a lot of the charm is that Lucinda, despite being a 'society child' makes friends with people of all walks of life, but I am pretty sure it would take a modern adult to correctly interpret the social issues of the society it is based within.

Great book! I am so glad to get my hands on a copy again, the old children's books are slowly vanishing off the shelves and I often think more highly of these old stories than of the more recently written ones.

[LobsterQuadrille · Rating 2 out of 5]

I liked the idyllic atmosphere of the book, but at times I found my interest in it fading. The protagonist, 10 year old Lucinda, is staying with some relatives(or family friends; I forget which)in New York, where she makes many friends, young and old alike. As nice as this storyline sounds, it tends to become repetitious, and I think the character development suffered because there were so many characters that it was hard to fully develop most of them. Another thing that bothered me about this book was something that I never expected to happen.
One day, Lucinda goes to visit a friend of hers, a Chinese lady married to a rich American. But she finds the lady lying dead on the couch, with a dagger in her back.

My thoughts as I read about this grim event:

"Wait, what!? She was murdered?! People just DON'T get murdered in these kinds of books! Who did it? Why? Come on, I want to know! I bet Lucinda's going to be really sad for the next chapter or so..."

Well, most of these questions and predictions didn't seem to be resolved in the book. It was never mentioned who killed the lady and why, and the murder had absolutely no effect whatsoever on the rest of the story. Seriously, I think the murder was referenced ONCE over the course of the following chapters, and Lucinda didn't seem to spend much time feeling terribly sad, which didn't seem realistic to me. So anyhow, there was a completely unnecessary, unsolved, and pointless murder. And also, Lucinda's sweet friend Trinket gets sick and dies in the end. (sigh) So much potential ruined by an overly large cast of characters and unnecessary deaths.

[Orinoco Womble (tidy bag and all) · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first read this in middle school in about 1974 and really enjoyed it. It was a glimpse into a totally unknown life for me: New York City in the 1890s, when little girls could safely walk (or skate) to school alone or spend the day in the park with another child friend, make adult friends and visit them, etc.
Lucinda lives a rather privileged existence, but she doesn't realise it, and it doesn't make her afraid to make friends with anyone from the policeman on the beat to the fruit-seller's son. We read of her adventures and misadventures, from mounting a puppet-theatre production of The Tempest to learning about the bigger issues of life and death.
This is a book that improves with reading. I re-read it not long ago, and adults will find things in it to enjoy the second time that went unpercieved at the child's level. I would recommend this for 11-12 year olds.