Now granted, this is a bit of an old-fashioned book. In fact, the copy I have is the 60th anniversary edition. But I loved it almost because of, not in spite of, it’s homey, old-fashioned atmosphere and story lines.
The Moffats are a family that consist of 4 children, one mother, and one cat (the father having died when the littlest Moffat was a baby). When we meet them, Slyvie is 15, Joey is 12, Jane is 9 and Rufus is 5. Their mother is a seamstress who sews dresses for the ladies of the town to provide for her family. The book is full of the adventures of the children individually and together. Eleanor Estes does a great job of relating the incidents and happenings of their lives as a child would see and feel them – the horror and anxiety of their home that they’d lived in for years being put for sale, trying to run away on the first day of school, and joining together as siblings to play pranks on an annoying neighborhood kid. It is a happy book, sprinkled with humor. The joy of this book is that it is about everyday events that turn into adventures for the Moffat children. One Moffat gets stuck in a bread box all afternoon and one Moffat ends up driving a horse and buggy clear to another town while the original driver sleeps on in the buggy! (Were they ever late for Sunday School that morning!)
Will they get to stay in their dearly loved yellow house? Will Rufus ever make it to kindergarten? Is there really a ghost in the attic? Be sure to read The Moffats and find out!
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March 6th, 2008 at 9:10 pm
Thanks for the review. I’ll have to read that book. Sounds entertaining! I wonder why I didn’t read this book when I was a kid?