Newbery Medal: The Dark Frigate (Charles Boardman Hawes)

[justice_turtle]

Pfffff, Dark Frigate. Charles Boardman Hawes. Don't I have homework due tomorrow? I'm sure I need to do the laundry. Pity I don't have a cat; I could vacuum it! ;D

( It's a frigate. Of darkness. )

Blaaaaaaaaaah. Done. THAT WAS A LOT OF BOOK.

Newbery Medal: Tales from Silver Lands (Charles Joseph Finger)

[justice_turtle]

I'll post a review of "The Dark Frigate" later; I'm in a bit of a hurry right now.

****

1925 had two Newbery Honor Books: The Dream Coach by Anne Parrish and Nicholas: A Manhattan Christmas Story by Annie Carroll Moore. Neither one is available to me. The next book on my reading list, therefore, is "Tales from Silver Lands" by Charles Joseph Finger. It's billed as a collection of folktales from the natives of the South American back-country, which Mr Finger apparently explored.

( Here goes! )

I'M DONE NOW. Jerk.

* Reading Charles Finger's Wiki bio, though, I'm struck by how many of the writers I've read here so far aren't American-born and/or don't set their stories in the USA. Finger and Lofting were both British-born, Van Loon Dutch-born, Padraic Colum Irish; Hawes and Bernard Gay Marshall, American-born, seem to prefer England and (in Hawes's case) the Spanish Main for their settings; William Bowen appears to have no biographical information anywhere. (Perhaps he disappeared from the timestream in shame, but couldn't erase The Old Tobacco Shop from the Newbery list. TOO BAD.)

Only Cornelia Meigs, so far, is both definitely American-born and set her Newbery Honor story completely in America.

Review: The Dark Frigate (Charles Boardman Hawes)

[justice_turtle]

Summary: ( Spoilers )

Reaction: There are no awesome ladies whatever in this book, only nasty and/or boring ones. The writing is a bit better than in "The Great Quest", but people are still given to doing things for either plotty reasons or bad excuses a lot more than for anything that makes sense. I did get all the way through it, mainly because the slave trade is not involved, thus racism is barely hinted at. But the protagonist is still a dope, just not quite as much of a one. And it's a lot more gory / violent in places. Plus, there's quite a lot of incredibly weird mental sophistry / gymnastics trying to defend the plotty reasons, and a fair bit of "making fun of less fortunate people is something all good and true men should do!" :P

Overall, I'd say he was becoming a better writer but still wasn't a good one.

Conclusion: Two stars. For having something resembling a coherent plot, and for not addressing questions of race at all.

Review: Tales from Silver Lands (Charles Joseph Finger)

[justice_turtle]

Summary: Retellings of South American folktales apparently collected by Mr Finger in his youth.

Reaction: I didn't finish, because the retellings were... well, about half of the ones I read were pretty good but could have been better. The other half had this blatantly colonialist kind of "look at the quaint natives!" attitude going on. Also, whitewashing, and hints of sexism. I quit after a wise old man advised a guy who'd fallen in love with a star-maiden that he had a chance with her if he only wanted her for her beauty and not to make others envious. Because CLEARLY those are the only two reasons to romance a woman. I know fairy-tales aren't much on the "you don't actually know her, why don't you look around down here?" thing, but EVEN SO.

Conclusion: One star. For not being The Old Tobacco Shop. ;-)