From: Erzsi Deak <erzsi>
Date: Tue, 23 May 2006 19:48:37 +0200

It's great to read all these influential titles! Thanks for sharing, everyone.

Like lots of you have noted, there's practically a book for every year of the lives.

For me, in 7th grade, the Scholastic Book Club was going strong and I read each and every (I'd dare someone to count'em) girl-in-trouble book -- MY DARLING, MY HAMBURGER; TOO BAD ABOUT THE HAINES GIRL; MR & MRS. BOJO JONES -- these led me into the world (well, kind of tossed me into it) of what was going on in girls' sexuality in the grades above (in those halcyon days, for the most part!). They also gave me, in an extended way, that historical reference to put together PERIOD PIECES: STORIES FOR GIRLS. Which segues into hearing about a book that changed a kid's life. Just last week, I was thrilled to hear from a reader that she was so relieved and happy to find my book, because her mom wasn't available at the time when she started her period at 11-years-old. Luckily, her grandmother handed her the book, even if she didn't stick around to chat. The girl said that reading it made her realize she wasn't weird, but that she was normal; she said it saved her life (I'm not exaggerating). When I was writing my story for PERIOD PIECES, all the pregnant-girl books came flooding back to me. That said, by the end of 7th grade, I'd read all of Paul Zindel and SE Hinton. Again, the Scholastic Book Club ruled!

As I live outside of the US now, I'm curious if the Scholastic Book Club still holds sway over classroom book orders.


Erzsi De?k

---------------------------- www.erzsideak.com
Received on Tue 23 May 2006 12:48:37 PM CDT