From: HarrySpenc at aol.com <HarrySpenc>
Date: Sat, 29 Jun 1996 13:31:43 -0400

Whenever a read a book, I think about who I might recommend it to. I'm not sure if this is a librarian's curse or if everyone thinks like that. I was not surprised to find that _Taste of Salt_ didn't work in the situation Bruce described. This is something I often struggle with, especially about books that incorporate dialect. I enjoy that added authenticity, but have found many cases where the children I work with don't find it so. I think back to when I was in fourth grade, and _Call it Courage_ was my favorite book. I read it over and over that year, and I still like it. When I have recommended it to children who like survival stories, they often comment about the Polynesian words they don't know and how "hard it is to read". I still think it makes the book better, but brings up the problem of the maturity of the child, not as a person, but as a reader. As an adult, I can savor the dialect, but as a fourth grader, I think I simply skipped the words I didn't know. Reading for overall meaning instead of reading each word is a strategy that all readers haven't learned. Maybe some never do. Imagine reading _Taste of Salt_ and laboriously sounding out each word you didn't recognize on sight. For some readers, it might make it impossible to see anything else in the book. We all know that not every book is for every reader , but it's always interesting to speculate about the reasons for that.

Bridget Hill La Crosse, WI

P.S. I'd love to get into the discussion on contemporary/historical characters, but I haven't had time to read them all! So many books, so little time....
Received on Sat 29 Jun 1996 12:31:43 PM CDT