COULD THESE BE THE MOST DEPRESSING PAIR OF CHILDRENS BOOKS I HAVE EVER READ?

ON THE BANKS OF PLUM CREEK by Laura Ingalls Wilder [1937]

STEPPING ON THE CRACKS by Mary Downing Hahn [1991]

So let's begin with Ms Hahn. She was 7 when WWII ended, making her my dad's age. Not tremendously old, so she may be alive and she may even read this someday! So I will say, right up front, I really liked this book. The setting was beautifully rendered and the main character was appealing without being perfect or cloying. The time period was lovingly set and I think this is a wonderful representation of the era. It is not the fault of any of those things that I felt I needed a handful of valium at the end of this book.

Wow, this book was depressing. And I kind of appreciate it now that I am finished (weeping). War is hell, and not just for poor Jimmy who dies in the Ardennes or Stu who is a pacifist and nearly dies in the woods rather than be sent overseas to kill in the name of America. Margaret is in sixth grade, I believe. She is kind of timid, the much younger sister of Jimmy. She is living as a wartime only child with her parents in College Park, Maryland. (Called College Hill in the book.) Her best friend Elizabeth is that kind of asshole best friend who makes bad decisions and makes you feel like the asshole for being reluctant to go along with it. Their nemesis is Gordy, the worst bully in their class who is (spoiler) acting out because of a spectacularly horrible home life.

The war in Europe and the Pacific is a constant backdrop to the war in College Hill agains Gordy and his hench-brats, Crabbe and Goyle, I mean Toad and Doug. Seriously, Toad. They spit on (or maybe near) the girls and call them Magpie and Lizard. (Come on, Toad, should you be throwing stones?) The brutes tear down Magpie and Lizards kick-ass tree house and steal the boards. Elizabeth decides to get even by invading their turf, the woods.

OH – the lure of the forbidden woods! My fifth grade friends and I used to go to the woods behind Spruce Elementary School with our Dad's filched cigarette butts to not inhale and talk about boys. It was glorious. I still remember that pit-of-the-stomach feeling the day my mom took my little sister biking and caught us. The horror.

Well, the woods in this book have a secret – Stuart, Gordy's older brother, the aforementioned young deserter. The boys have built him a shack where he can hide out and are sneaking food to him. Because he is kind and good. And he really is. Even Margaret loves him in spite of the fact that he is hiding from the violence that her brother faces every day.

When Stu becomes violently ill, they enlist the help of Barbara, a war widow who was married to a friend of Jimmy and Stu. She takes him to the hospital and nurses him back to health with the son her husband never knew attached to her hip. The romance that blossoms (off screen) between the pacifist and the widow is one of the few bright spots in the book.

Gordy's dad is a drunk abuser who nearly kills Stuart, who has risked his life to protect Gordy, his mother and his younger siblings from his violence. At the end of the story, Gordy's mom moves the kids away and they never see him again. And Jimmy is dead. And Margaret's dad can't deal with the loss. War is hell, indeed. But the book is a quiet indictment that proves it calmly and thoroughly.

WHAT THE HELL IS UP WITH THIS COVER???

ON THE BANKS OF PLUM CREEK is similar in that a ton of really bad stuff happens, but I have never before realized how bad it got. Shall we recap?

• The Ingalls family has to sell their horses.
• Oxen are horrible and dull.
• Their new house is a hole in the ground.
• Pa nearly drowns Laura to teach her a lesson.
• (It doesn't stick.)
• Laura fights a badger.
• Laura gets grounded for planning on going back to the water. (Even though the badger-battle prevented her from actually doing it.)
• Stupid effing Pete the ox steps through the roof of the house.
• Laura and her sister Mary develop a straw-sliding addiction.
• Laura and Mary have to scare cattle away from the straw they have just learned to leave alone.
• The stupid, STUPID oxen nearly kill Ma and baby Carrie by nearly running of a ledge. (Like, three hours after the oxen revolt!)
• They have to wish for horses instead of presents for Christmas because Ma is a huge killjoy.
• Laura nearly drowns in the creek.
• Pa builds a house on credit. I know, it seems nice, but credit makes you BEHOLDEN TO OTHERS!!
• Laura is attacked by and old crab and bloodsuckers.
• They have to eat fish all the time.
• They have to go to school
• Two words – NELLIE OLESON. Seriously, she is the WORST!!
• Nellie pulls her hair.
• Nellie has a party and is a stone cold bitch.
• Nellie dismisses the perfection of vanity cakes.
• Nellie doesn't die of leech poisoning.
• Sunday school sucks.
• The sermon lasts forever.
• Pa gives his boot money to Reverend Alden to buy a church bell.
• GRASSHOPPERS ARE COMPLETEY DISGUSTING AND EAT EVERYTHING!!!
• The wheat crop is gone and they lay eggs so there won't be wheat next year either.
• Pa has to go away to work.
• That stupid shit-head baby Anna steals Charlotte.
• SSHB Anna just drops Charlotte in a puddle to DIE! (But it turns out to be good in the end...)
• The grasshoppers are back and as disgusting as ever.
• Pa goes away again.
• Fire tries to get at the hay and Laura, Mary, Ma and Mr. Nelson have to fight it off.
• They just eat turnips all the fucking time.
• There is a blizzard when Ma and Pa are in town and the girls carry all the wood in because they are afraid of freezing to death.
• There is another blizzard when Pa is out of town. When will they learn to just stay home?
  Fireballs come down the chimney during the blizzard and freak everybody out.
• Turns out Pa was under the ledge right by the creek the whole time nearly freezing to death.
• Pa eats all the oyster crackers.
• Pa eats all the Christmas candy.
• There are oysters left.
• And the final indignity, the whole last three pages is mostly song lyrics. And Laura's eyes are shiny. I'm guessing someone is going to go blind pretty soon.

I love this book, but man, that family suffered! Here is a picture of me wading in Plum Creek to cheer you up.