From: Barbara Scotto <Barbara_Scotto>
Date: Tue, 7 Oct 1997 23:30:11 -0400

I've been thinking quite a bit about Lily's Crossing because it's rare that I find a book in which the character and place seem so familiar. I feel as if I've been there and known her, and I haven't. Though I was alive in the forties, I was too young to have many memories of the war, so it can't be that. I think that what rings true for me is that Giff has captured the essence of childhood at that time. The way Lily sees the world - what her personal limits were, what was allowed, what she dared to do and how neighborhoods worked - seems familiar. I don't think Giff is recreating a historical period, but rather she is writing about what she knows - what we teachers tell kids to do all the time. It's what gives the book emotional truth.
                                                        Barbara

Barbara Scotto Sixth grade teacher Driscoll School Brookline, Massachusetts
Received on Tue 07 Oct 1997 10:30:11 PM CDT