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4.0 AVERAGE
4.0 AVERAGE
A charming autobiography, I really enjoyed it.
I really enjoyed this book. I appreciated the honesty about her thoughts, feelings & relationships growing up. It reminded quite a lot of my Grandmother & her stories mixed in with familiar Portland places & history.
emotional
funny
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
adventurous
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
sad
medium-paced
A fascinating, poignant memoir about an early 20th-century childhood, from a lady we all know and love.
An interesting read about Beverly Clearly's early life, family, and grade school experiences. I was hoping to hear more about her path to becoming a writer after graduating high school.
She packs so many stories into this memoir! I don't know if I dislike her mother or Gerhart more... turds.
I enjoyed this first installation of Beverly Cleary's autobiography. It is evident how she came up with the character of Ramona Quimby because, in so many ways, Cleary was that little girl! It was fascinating to read about the influences that shaped Cleary in her formative years from her difficult relationship with her mother to growing up in Depression-era Oregon and longing to find her place in the world. Cleary writes with the same conversational, relatable voice we find in her fiction, even as the subject matter is more serious, revealing the honesty, humor, and grit that she so often endowed her characters with.
Clearly (haha!) I am on a Beverly kick. I found this by accident at the library--it's a "prequel" to her other autobiography. It was actually neat to read the earlier years after I already knew what had happened later on. Her style of writing is just so comfortable.
This is not great literature, but I loved reading this book. How amazing to learn about this author's childhood and to recognize the seeds of Ramona within her! Klickitat Street is a real place near her home. Ramona had a doll named Chevrolet, and Beverly had a doll named Fordson-Lafayette, after a neighbor's tractor and a town.
In the end, I wish I could know more about how she resolved her troubled relationship with her mother, or did she? Beverly Cleary is still alive as I write this, but at 102, she is retired. Thank you, Beverly Cleary, for giving us Ramona, Henry, Beezus, Socks, and so many others.
In the end, I wish I could know more about how she resolved her troubled relationship with her mother, or did she? Beverly Cleary is still alive as I write this, but at 102, she is retired. Thank you, Beverly Cleary, for giving us Ramona, Henry, Beezus, Socks, and so many others.