HF aimed at Jr. High girls

[MLE]

And I thought, as long as I started the boy's thread, better start one for girls. Actually, there is a lot out there for girls -- maybe some good tips would include books you would not recommend for this age (despite their being called YA) due to content that was objectionable or just plain vapid, as well as those you would.
I think I heard Divia say something like this about the Luxe.

So on my recommended list, I would start with Elizabeth Speare's Witch of Blackbird Pond. I'd be hesitant about the classics, like Pride and Prejudice and Little Women, until I had a good feel for the reading level of the young lady in question. Those have a pretty chewy vocabulary by today's reading standards.

[Divia]

yes the Luxe series is nothing more that catty girls in victorian dresses. Its not very accurate.

I just finished Keeping Corner about a young woman in India during WWII. She is a widow and therefore must stay in her house for an entire year. It was very good.

Earlier this summer I finished Climbing the Stairs about another girl in India during WWII. This girl was more educated and driven to go to college so it was different than the first book which delt with more cultural issues.

Queen Soprano was an excellent read about a young woman who is forbidden to sing even though her voice is amazing. In Italy the Pope has outlawed it.

A Northern Light is still my fav. book of all time when it comes to YA stuff.

[diamondlil]

So on my recommended list, I would start with Elizabeth Speare's Witch of Blackbird Pond. I'd be hesitant about the classics, like Pride and Prejudice and Little Women, until I had a good feel for the reading level of the young lady in question. Those have a pretty chewy vocabulary by today's reading standards.


I read Witch of Blackbird Pond not too long ago and really enjoyed it! I will try to rustle up the review and post it!

[Evangeline H]

Anything by Ann Rinaldi. She has written excellent, excellent YA historical fiction. Her novels sparked my love for history.

[Jack]

Alchemy of Fire, Lady Illena, Prisoner of Tordesillas. These should get you going.

[Jack]

I almost forgot two really good ones. The Second Mrs. Giaconda would be enjoyable for a gal, and A Proud Taste for Scarlet and Miniver, by E. L. Konigsburg will be really good. I Rode a Horse of Milk White Jade, and Caddie Woodlawn are nice books for young ladies, and Strongbow, by Morgan Llwellyn is also very good. You have to be careful with Llwellyn, she is often not for younger audiences. She can be a little graphic with the physical love, but in this case she isn't at all, and the book is only @180 pp, something also not the norm for her. Don't get me wrong, I really enjoy all of her work, and her piece on Granniule the female Irish pirate who had a face to face meeting (in real life) with Queen Elizabeth is first rate. But this thread is about YA stuff for gals, not adult material.

I'll try to go through my library and come up with some more materials-I am fortunate in that I have two rooms semi devoted to being "libraries" so I can hold onto my books, but it is football season (American) and I am a coach, so I also have white boards on walls, and I spend at least 50 hours a week in practice or watching film of opponents and scheming to defeat them, I am told by a friend that is the reason for my love of history and its conflicts. Who knows. Enjoy the books!!!

[Ash]

>But this thread is about YA stuff for gals

It is? My DH read every HF he could get his hands on, and think many boys would enjoy them as well.

>But not adult material

Why not? How do you define YA versus adult? I was reading adult material at 11 (at a time that we weren't allowed in the adult section till we were 13, but I got by thanks to my big sis!). I think some of the stuff now marketed to YA are an insult to their intelligence. Teens and preteens should be exposed to a variety of books accrding to their reading level. So recommend away, if you know an 'adult' book that would be good for this age.

[Misfit]

Me I never had kids so I am no judge of what's appropriate for a teenager, especially in this day and age. I see no one has mentioned Gwen Bristow. Her books are very good and clean as a whistle. She can actually build a nice job of romance and sexual tension in a couple with just kisses. I've got a list of her books here (http://www.amazon.com/Gwen-Bristow-s-Historical-Novels/lm/R1QHL8Z404HXMZ/ref=cm_lm_byauthor_title_full). Calico Palace is my all time favorite, Jubilee Trail and Celia Garth close seconds.

[MLE]

>But this thread is about YA stuff for gals

It is? My DH read every HF he could get his hands on, and think many boys would enjoy them as well.

>But not adult material

Why not? How do you define YA versus adult? I was reading adult material at 11 (at a time that we weren't allowed in the adult section till we were 13, but I got by thanks to my big sis!). I think some of the stuff now marketed to YA are an insult to their intelligence. Teens and preteens should be exposed to a variety of books accrding to their reading level. So recommend away, if you know an 'adult' book that would be good for this age.

Actually, in this usage, by 'adult' I meant sexually explicit. For instance, my library has 'Gone With the Wind' under YA, not because it is juvenile in theme or content -- far from it -- but because you don't have to worry about the negative impact on younger readers. ( I posted about this on another thread, I'll go dig it up.)

I started another thread on 'recommended for boys.' Of course, there is a great deal of overlap in the statistical bell curves re what each gender will like.

[MLE]

Okay, this is from Misfit's Trade Winds review thread, and should explain my concerns regarding YA HF for girls:

I liked Trade Winds, but yes, I do have a problem with that rape scene. I will try to be boil down my years of counseling women with sexual problems to a few paragraphs in explaining why:

Women tend to be verbal/textual, where men are visual. This is why men have girlie magazines full of pictures and women have romance novels -- both can run the gamut from mild to horrific. The problem comes from the material that first crosses a youngster's path at the time they are first beginning to be sexually interested. These images (textual or graphic) have a very lasting effect -- one of the words currently in use is 'imprinting' -- because there is no context for those images. This shapes what titillates the person in the future.

A girl whose first encounter with sexual stimulation is a written rape scene in which the victim is portrayed as enjoying it, either then or eventually, pre-conditions her to fantasize violence linked with sex. However, this does not equate to enjoying violence in real-life. The result, if the girl repeats the images over and over in her mind for stimulation, is a mental picture that is always out-of-sync with normal physical realities, resulting in less satisfaction with healthy sexual experience.

And that is the real cost of those literary rape scenarios, even the ones that are not graphic, like Trade Winds. Males generally, and females with the context of real sexual experience, are not at risk. But the developing human psyche is terribly fragile and moldable in this area.

[Divia]

Why not? How do you define YA versus adult?

I define it as a book whose main characters are teenagers and the adult characters are secondary characters. That doesnt mean that teens cant read adult books because some of them do. I had a student who didnt want all the stupid YA romance stuff, as she put it.

[Tapper1]

The book I mentioned on your "boys thread" I could recommend for girls to, to be honest. My daughter goes to an all girls school, from where she got this book in the library, and it appears to be a popular read. She certainly enjoyed it and has learnt alot about that particualr period of history too.

[MrsMorland]

Libba Bray's series is really good, I think. The first is A Great and Terrible Beauty. Has lots of supernatural elements to it, and is set in the early Edwardian era I believe. I enjoyed them.

[diamondlil]

I enjoyed the first two. Haven't read the third one yet.

[Divia]

Third one is a bit long winded for my taste.

[Anna Elliott]

Laurie R. King's The Beekeeper's Apprentice is one of my favorite reads and would appeal to girls 14 and up, I think. It's a historical mystery--Mary, the main character and a 15 year old girl, becomes friends and informal "apprentice" to a retired Sherlock Holmes. It's often shelved in the adult section, but there's nothing objectionable in terms of subject or language, and the book paints an incredibly vivid picture of WWI era Britain.

[ejays17]

Not available at the moment, but probably able to be found in libraries, are the "Mantlemass" books by Barbara Willard. They cover the period between 1485 - 1644, and basically follow 2 families down the time.
Chronologically they are:
The Miller's Boy (1976) - set in 1479
The Lark and the Laurel (1970) - opens in 1485
The Sprig of Broom (1971) - begins in 1506
A Cold Wind Blowing (1972) - set in the 1530s
The Eldest Son (1977) - also set in the 1530s (tells the story of what happens "at home" while the main character of the previous book is away)
The Iron Lily (1973)
A Flight of Swans (1980) - opens as the Spanish Armada sails on England
Harrow and Harvest (1974) is the last Mantlemass novel. In the 1640s, Mantlemass is in decline, and there is uncertainty over who the heir will be.

The Keys of Mantlemass (1981) is a collection of short stories, bridging some gaps between the novels, and relating some incidents in more detail. The collection enhances the unity of the series and answers questions about some of the minor characters. The final story provides the finishing touch, bringing the Mantlemass story up to date, with a young woman from the American branch of the Medleys returning to the forest in search of her family history.


She's also written other YA historicals, but her Mantlemass are the best-known.