I've decided that it's a really good thing that Little House on the Prairie was February's selection for the Reading to Know Book Club. Reading this book made me discover just how woefully ignorant I am about Little House on the Prairie. For example, I didn't know that this was the second book in the series. Little House in the Big Woods comes first. I just assumed, since the series was essentially called Little House on the Prairie, that it was the first book. Yup, I was pretty ignorant.

As you can tell, I never read this series when I was a kid. They sat there on the bookshelf, occasionally tempting me. But the couple of times I tried to pick them up, they just couldn't hold my interest. This is rather strange, since I read Caddie Woodlawn by Carol Ryrie Brink repeatedly as a child, and they're essentially the same story. I've never seen the television show, either.

All this meant that it was high time I picked up one of the books in this series, and I'm oh-so-glad I did. Little House on the Prairie tells a simple story that is really not that simple. Life wasn't complicated by technology and social media. Each day passed slowly, living in the outdoors. But that's exactly what made it not so simple. Can you imagine living as the Ingalls family did? To pack everything on your wagon, leaving all the furniture behind - after all, you can simply make more. To build a house in a random spot from what you can find on the land. To hunt for each night's supper - otherwise, you won't eat. I guess I am truly a child of the twenty-first century, because I truly cannot fathom being totally self-reliant like that. Settlers who lived in this way just gained an awful lot of respect from me.

I'm sure Laura Ingalls Wilder's treatment of the Indians is a source for much controversy. We all cringe when we read, "The only good Indian is a dead Indian." And while that was an accurate portrayal of many settlers' feelings at the time, it isn't the opinion of Charles Ingalls and his family. Charles views Indians as individuals, as human beings - not savages, as his neighbors do. He offers them respect and peace. Which makes me wonder if this was really Charles' opinion at the time, or was this Laura trying to make her father look good in retrospect?

It took me much too long to truly discover this series. But now that I have, it won't be much longer before I add the rest of it to my repertoire. I just need to go get them from my childhood bookshelf, dust them off, and enter the world of Laura Ingalls Wilder.

I've always loved L.M. Montgomery's books, but I usually don't venture outside of her Anne and Emily series. So this year's Reading to Know Book Club selection provided the perfect balance for me - one Anne book of my choosing and The Blue Castle, Montgomery's only book set somewhere other than Prince Edward Island.

I have read The Blue Castle before (the plot gradually came back to me as I read), but it had been years. There was much that I didn't remember, but I enjoyed rediscovering it all.

Valancy's sense of humor as she began to shake off her mother's shackles was incredibly amusing, even if I can't picture myself ever talking to someone that way. What would it be like if we all went around saying exactly what we were thinking, even (especially) if it wasn't something nice? Would our relationships deteriorate because we were offending our friends and family, or would our relationships grow stronger because everyone is telling the truth and has nothing to hide? Some relationships would survive, I am sure, but it seems like an awfully dangerous experiment.

Valancy and Barney's love story is rather unorthodox. But isn't it just like Montgomery to have her characters fall in love over the beauty and wildness of nature? There have been many moments in my life when I wished I could see the world through Lucy Maud Montgomery's eyes. What a magical place it becomes, and what wonderful writing she uses to describe it!

For the L.M. Montgomery Reading Challenge this month, I also reread Anne of Avonlea (for about the eighteenth time). I always love revisiting Prince Edward Island and renewing my friendship with Anne. And much of that (this time at least) was exactly what I just mentioned in the paragraph above - Montgomery's descriptions of the world around her. I just love to revel in the magic she brings to nature by the word-pictures she draws.

I can't say that The Blue Castle is my favorite Montgomery book, but I was glad to be given the chance to reread it. It helped remind me of all the amazing Montgomery stories there are out there, beyond the world of Emily and Anne. I just may find myself exploring more of these stories in the very near future!

I've never read Kipling's The Jungle Book before, and it's been ages since I've watched the Disney movie. I also didn't own a copy (suprisingly - I tend to buy classics at used book sales and then rarely get around to reading them). So my Book Club experience this month had to start with tracking down a copy. Thankfully, our local library had one, although I'm guessing that no one has checked it out in a very long time. No fancy picture on the cover, no dust jacket. It was just a plain brown hardcover. And since the only copyright date was 1894, I'm pretty certain it's a first edition or very close to it. This meant that in addition to reading the book, I spent a fair amount of time sniffing it. Old books smell wonderful.

I enjoyed every one of the short stories (and the poems! That was a pleasant surprise.) in The Jungle Book, although I was surprised that some of them didn't take place in the jungle (like the story about the white seal). My favorite was the last story, though, titled "Her Majesty's Servants." In this story, we get a peek at what all the animals in an army camp think and feel, as well as their unique class system. I enjoyed the way they were trying to one-up each other in bravery. The ridiculous camels that took fright and crashed their way through the tents were very amusing. It certainly takes some creativity on Kipling's part to imagine the point of view that each of these animals would have.

The Mowgli stories were interesting, but a little hard to understand. I think having more background knowledge about these animals and life in the jungle would have been helpful. I felt like I was missing out on some of the subtle things that Kipling included because I just didn't know enough. Are there any annotated versions of The Jungle Book out there, a mix of fiction and nonfiction? What an interesting way to learn about the jungle and jungle animals!

There was one story I had read before, and that was "Rikki-Tikki-Tavi." I taught seventh grade Literature for one year, and this was in their textbook. It was fun to reread it with the echoes of the seventh grade reactions in my ears. I must say, though, that their favorite part was the YouTube videos of mongooses (mongeese?) and cobras. Turns out they really are enemies in the animal kingdom - more evidence of all the nonfiction that these stories are based on. Just for fun, I've included one of these videos below. It happens just like Kipling describes!

This is my first post for the Reading to Know Book Club. I read The Scarlet Letter in February, but I didn't have a blog to post anything on then! So here are my thoughts on July's selection, The Wind in the Willows.

I read The Wind in the Willows when I was a kid (probably somewhere between fourth and sixth grade; I honestly don't remember for sure). I remember liking it a lot, but I haven't picked it up since then. It's a good thing I did now, because every school year, I get the urge to use it as a read-aloud for my fourth graders. Having reread it now, I think it would be a bit beyond them. The vocabulary is not all that common for today's fourth grader, and there are some quite convoluted sentences that would be difficult to follow when read aloud.

For myself, though, I enjoyed the story as much as ever. All I really remember from my childhood reading of it was Mr. Toad and his motor car, but the book holds many more delights than that! I think my favorite part this time around was the night that Rat and Mole revisited Mole's home. Rat was such a good friend, cleaning up and getting supper in order to cheer Mole up. And I loved the field mice, all bundled up in scarves and singing Christmas carols.

I also found the chapter where Mole and Rat find Otter's son to be very intriguing. It turns out they found Portly with the god Pan, but I think the descriptions fit better for a God-experience, than a god-experience. Take this, for example, "Then suddenly the Mole felt a great Awe fall upon him, an awe that turned his muscles to water, bowed his head, and rooted his feet to the ground. It was no panic terror - indeed he felt wonderfully at peace and happy - but it was an awe that smote and held him and, without seeing, he knew it could only mean that some august Presence was very, very near" (p. 154, at least in my e-book edition). Doesn't that sound like God is near? Wouldn't Moses have experienced something similar as he approached the burning bush? I begin to wonder what Kenneth Grahame's views on religion and God were. . .

All in all, there is much to love in this story. If you haven't read The Wind in the Willows before, or if it's been a long time, reread it with the eye of a child and the mind of an adult. You might be surprised at what you find.