From a Newbery Award–winning These seven beloved classics beautifully capture growing up and overcoming challenges across America. In her Regional America series, author and illustrator Lois Lenski presents realistic portrayals of unforgettable young people facing hardships and triumphs across the diverse United States. The Newbery Medal–winning Strawberry Girl follows day-to-day life for Birdie and her family on a berry farm in Florida, as they deal with heat, droughts, cold snaps, and difficult neighbors. In Prairie School, a young girl gets stranded at her South Dakota school by a winter storm; in Bayou Suzette, the Cajun Suzette strikes up an unlikely friendship with a Native American girl in the swamps of Louisiana; and Blue Ridge Billy is the story of a boy who dreams of playing the fiddle. Other novels follow the lives of a young farmer who wants to quit school and work on his family’s Iowa farm; an Asian-American boy adjusting to city life in San Francisco’s Chinatown; and an adolescent lumberjack in the forests of Oregon. Beyond changing the face of children’s literature, Lenski’s stories endure because of their moving and believable depictions of young people from often overlooked communities. Through her art, Lenski gives these characters a voice that continues to ring loud and clear for modern readers. This ebook includes Strawberry Girl, Prairie School, Bayou Suzette, Blue Ridge Billy, Corn-Farm Boy, San Francisco Boy, and To Be a Logger.
Author
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lois\_Lenski Many of Lenski's books can be collated into 'series' - but since they don't have to be read in order, you may be better off just looking for more information here: http://library.illinoisstate.edu/uniq... Probably her most famous set is the following: American Regional Series Beginning with Bayou Suzette in 1943, Lois Lenski began writing a series of books which would become known as her "regional series." In the early 1940s Lenski, who suffered from periodic bouts of ill-health, was told by her doctor that she needed to spend the winter months in a warmer climate than her Connecticut home. As a result, Lenski and her husband Arthur Covey traveled south each fall. Lenski wrote in her autobiography, "On my trips south I saw the real America for the first time. I saw and learned what the word region meant as I witnessed firsthand different ways of life unlike my own. What interested me most was the way children were living" (183). In Journey Into Childhood, Lenski wrote that she was struck by the fact that there were "plenty of books that tell how children live in Alaska, Holland, China, and Mexico, but no books at all telling about the many ways children live here in the United States" Bayou Suzette. Strawberry Girl. Blue Ridge Billy. Judy's Journey. Boom Town Boy. Cotton in My Sack. Texas Tomboy. Prairie School. Corn-Farm Boy. San Francisco Boy. Flood Friday. Houseboat Girl. Coal Camp Girl. Shoo-Fly Girl. To Be a Logger. Deer Valley Girl.
