Scan barcode
A review by librariandest
Henry and Beezus by Beverly Cleary
3.0
My daughter and I have read all the Ramona books, so now we're moving on to the Henry books. There were some funny parts for sure (like when Henry trains Ribsy to retrieve their newspaper but Ribsy ends up retrieving *every* newspaper on Klickitat Street or when Henry thinks he can sell gum to get rich and it backfires big time) but Henry's attitude toward girls was not cool. Even though this is an everyday life book, I'm tagging it as historical fiction because of the casual sexism.
I had always thought of Henry Huggins as a nice kid but in this book he treats Ramona and Beezus with such disdain. I think part of it might've been the audiobook narrator's performance. He put this harsh edge in Henry's voice that doesn't need to be there.
Why do I keep choosing these Beverly Cleary books when they are so dated? They crack us up and the characters are very endearing. Ramona is like a real person to us. We also read contemporary everyday life stories (we've enjoyed Ivy + Bean, Mya Tibbs, Meet Yasmin, Jasmine Toguchi, and especially Anna Hibiscus). But Ramona remains #1 in our hearts.
I had always thought of Henry Huggins as a nice kid but in this book he treats Ramona and Beezus with such disdain. I think part of it might've been the audiobook narrator's performance. He put this harsh edge in Henry's voice that doesn't need to be there.
Why do I keep choosing these Beverly Cleary books when they are so dated? They crack us up and the characters are very endearing. Ramona is like a real person to us. We also read contemporary everyday life stories (we've enjoyed Ivy + Bean, Mya Tibbs, Meet Yasmin, Jasmine Toguchi, and especially Anna Hibiscus). But Ramona remains #1 in our hearts.