Helpful Score: 12
This classic is just as wonderful as it was the first time I read it as a teenager. The colorful characters, the honesty in which life in 17th Century New England is written, brought back all the memories which made this a favorite book of mine. I think I was also able to read more into it as an adult, as well. Not just the story, but between the lines, the hardships of life back then, the sharp differences in religion and loyalty to home and family. How friendships come about and thrive when you stand up for what you believe in, no matter the cost. This is a keeper for me. I hope someday my daughter will love this book as much as I do.
Helpful Score: 5
Ms. Speare does a wonderful job with this book. There is a very strong plot with convincing characters. The story of a girl whose rebellion against bigotry and her Puritan surroundings explode in a witch hunt and trail.
Helpful Score: 4
Good read showing what prejudices existed in the late 1600's puritian communities. While I think the book was written to the lighter side of "fitting-in" the treatment of Hannah was most likely a very real thing during that time period as well as mean spirited. The book ends with all being happy (except the real mean woman), which I always like, but may not have been real for the times.
Helpful Score: 3
I loved this book! I couldn't put it down once I started it!
IT WON A JOHN NEWBERRY MEDAL TOO!
IT WON A JOHN NEWBERRY MEDAL TOO!
Helpful Score: 3
A CLASSIC. wonderful book.
Helpful Score: 2
As this is such a well-known book, it's hard to write anything original. This is required reading in many schools for good reason. Timeless in it's portrayal of "mob justice", it's also wonderful to read about this period of history. Suspenseful enough to keep me reading into the night, it's a great story for middle-schoolers to adult.
Helpful Score: 2
Historical novel of a girl who rebels against the ways of the Puritan family she goes to live with after her Grandfather dies.
Helpful Score: 1
This is one of my top five favorite books. It's short, but excellent through and through. I first read it when I was 16, and thoroughly enjoyed it, and I have read it many times since. This is a short, easy-to-read book.
Helpful Score: 1
As an adult I still remember reading this book in Elementary school. Good read.
Helpful Score: 1
Katherine Tyler (who prefers to be called Kit) finds herself in Connecticut seeking her aunt. Raised in Barbados where she lived a pampered life with her gentle grandfather, she finds life with the strict, religious Puritans quite different. Her beautiful clothes are only the first difference. When she plunges into the water to rescue a child's doll, she finds herself viewed with suspicion and wary looks. Later she learns that women do not swim. This is a test to determine a witch since innocent women sink.
Learning how to work as the Puritans do, she finds herself yearning for the sunny shores of Barbados. Her hands are blistered, there is no time to run free, no books to read other than the Bible and plays are forbidden. When she makes friends with a widowed woman who lives by Blackbird Lake labeled a witch, she finds herself accused as a witch by association and put on trial. When a frenzied mob searches for the widow, Kit helps her escape.
How Kit wishes she had never come to this frigid land where people are as frigid as the land. Can she survive? The author portrays the fears of the accused and the accusers alike for readers of this YA historical fiction story.
Learning how to work as the Puritans do, she finds herself yearning for the sunny shores of Barbados. Her hands are blistered, there is no time to run free, no books to read other than the Bible and plays are forbidden. When she makes friends with a widowed woman who lives by Blackbird Lake labeled a witch, she finds herself accused as a witch by association and put on trial. When a frenzied mob searches for the widow, Kit helps her escape.
How Kit wishes she had never come to this frigid land where people are as frigid as the land. Can she survive? The author portrays the fears of the accused and the accusers alike for readers of this YA historical fiction story.
Helpful Score: 1
I loved this book as a teenager and enjoyed it just as much now that I am an adult. A very good read.
Helpful Score: 1
This is a brilliant Young Adult book, and a deserving winner of the Newberry Award for American Children's LIterature. Love, orphans, Puritans, Quakers and suspected witchcraft all make this a must-read.
A must for any study of colonial America.
I always loved this book as a child...great read.
I just read this again 25 years later, and it still struck me with the same passion I felt the last time. It's still a book I would recommend for a tween, but even though the issues are simplified, it really gives an idea of what life was like for puritans in New England. Viewed from another outsider, it makes us feel like we are really there. I highly recommend...
This is my favorite book of all times!! I read it at least once a year.
I read this book so many times as a kid - I loved it.
This book was read to my class when I was in 5th grade. I loved it so much that I later read it myself. I kept a copy clear through high school. It has been many years since I have read it, but the story is one that I have never forgotten. It's a great book for young readers. I think 11-14 is the best age range for this book.
This is a great story. I'd put it right up there with Caddie Woodlawn, Island of the Blue Dolphins, Summer of the Monkeys, and all of the other books one should read at young ages.
This was one of the best young adult novels I've read in quite a while. I love historical fiction, but what makes this one great is that it is utterly grounded in historical reality. The one aspect which probably wouldn't have been realistic is that the protagonist, a spirited sixteen-year-old from faraway Barbados, would likely have not been acquitted after a charge of witchcraft, in the wake of an epidemic which caused the death of several townspeople, including several children, despite the protestations of her powerful family members. That didn't save The Accused in Salem, and it rarely was sufficient to warrant a verdict of not guilty in other cases as well.
All that aside, this was a wonderful book, which was written in the 1950s. Some have claimed that it was written in the wake of the persecution of accused communists in the McCarthy era, which has been called a proverbial "witch hunt," but if that's the case, it doesn't seem to be a direct metaphor. It may have served as an inspiration (or protest) sparked by prevailing attitudes at the time, but this young adult novel is a cautionary tale in many respects. Perhaps, though, the author wrote it as a criticism in a veiled manner on purpose - both to appeal to young adults and children of the era, and to avoid being attacked herself for criticism of what was happening politically at that time.
This very engaging short novel tells the story of Katherine "Kit" Tyler, a free spirit who was raised in sunny Barbados, who has spent her days in relative luxury and relaxation, enjoying the fruits of an informal but very capable education, being cared for by multiple servants living on the sugar plantation of her grandfather. After being orphaned following his death, however, and having no money or prospects after the sale of his heavily-indebted estate, Kit decides to travel to colonial Connecticut, where the Puritans have settled and live according to a charter granted by the previous king of England, to whom Kit is loyal. Kit gets her first taste of what life will be like when the ship captain's son tells her not to let anyone know that she can swim because Puritans believe that women who float are witches!
Indeed, Kit has apparently been less than honest with everyone: it turns out that she has neglected to write to her aunt, the sister of her late mother, and her husband, to inform them of her coming. They somewhat reluctantly welcome her into their home, however, where they have two daughters of their own. Life is harsh for free spirit Kit, especially when she's essentially forced to adhere to the Puritans' strict way of life. She soon befriends an old widow woman, who has been exiled from Massachusetts for being a Quaker, who lives in an old house down by the river. Kit begins to visit her regularly, along with the ship captain's son, Nat, to escape from the drudgery of life in a Puritan household headed by a patriarch who rules with an iron fist. Unfortunately, however, it is widely whispered that the old widow is really a witch, which has some serious consequences for Kit.
I won't rehash the whole plot and the ending, other than what I wrote above. Even if the ending is fairly well-known, the book is still definitely worth reading, as it addresses many of the themes young people still engage with today: parents, responsibility, relations with siblings, community values and standards, tolerance, and counting gentlemen. It's a quick read, but it touches on some very profound and universal themes, and is overall a very engaging story, which in general ends happily for everyone.
All that aside, this was a wonderful book, which was written in the 1950s. Some have claimed that it was written in the wake of the persecution of accused communists in the McCarthy era, which has been called a proverbial "witch hunt," but if that's the case, it doesn't seem to be a direct metaphor. It may have served as an inspiration (or protest) sparked by prevailing attitudes at the time, but this young adult novel is a cautionary tale in many respects. Perhaps, though, the author wrote it as a criticism in a veiled manner on purpose - both to appeal to young adults and children of the era, and to avoid being attacked herself for criticism of what was happening politically at that time.
This very engaging short novel tells the story of Katherine "Kit" Tyler, a free spirit who was raised in sunny Barbados, who has spent her days in relative luxury and relaxation, enjoying the fruits of an informal but very capable education, being cared for by multiple servants living on the sugar plantation of her grandfather. After being orphaned following his death, however, and having no money or prospects after the sale of his heavily-indebted estate, Kit decides to travel to colonial Connecticut, where the Puritans have settled and live according to a charter granted by the previous king of England, to whom Kit is loyal. Kit gets her first taste of what life will be like when the ship captain's son tells her not to let anyone know that she can swim because Puritans believe that women who float are witches!
Indeed, Kit has apparently been less than honest with everyone: it turns out that she has neglected to write to her aunt, the sister of her late mother, and her husband, to inform them of her coming. They somewhat reluctantly welcome her into their home, however, where they have two daughters of their own. Life is harsh for free spirit Kit, especially when she's essentially forced to adhere to the Puritans' strict way of life. She soon befriends an old widow woman, who has been exiled from Massachusetts for being a Quaker, who lives in an old house down by the river. Kit begins to visit her regularly, along with the ship captain's son, Nat, to escape from the drudgery of life in a Puritan household headed by a patriarch who rules with an iron fist. Unfortunately, however, it is widely whispered that the old widow is really a witch, which has some serious consequences for Kit.
I won't rehash the whole plot and the ending, other than what I wrote above. Even if the ending is fairly well-known, the book is still definitely worth reading, as it addresses many of the themes young people still engage with today: parents, responsibility, relations with siblings, community values and standards, tolerance, and counting gentlemen. It's a quick read, but it touches on some very profound and universal themes, and is overall a very engaging story, which in general ends happily for everyone.
Wonderful book to read and learn!
Prisoner in ta house of Strangers :
The sunshine and laughter of childhood seemed centuries and worlds away as Kit Tayler viewed the forbidding New England coast. The lovely young woman had been raised amid luxury in th eCaribbean, but now she was an orphan , unloved and alone, dependent on relatives she had never seen.
Awaiting her in the bleak dwelling that was her new home were suspicions and loneliness. The master of the house despised everything about her. The man, who chaimed he loved her, abandoned her to the circle of teror. And ther was nowhere to turn, no way to escape the evil claiming her as victim...
"COMPELING"
"OUTSTANDING"
The sunshine and laughter of childhood seemed centuries and worlds away as Kit Tayler viewed the forbidding New England coast. The lovely young woman had been raised amid luxury in th eCaribbean, but now she was an orphan , unloved and alone, dependent on relatives she had never seen.
Awaiting her in the bleak dwelling that was her new home were suspicions and loneliness. The master of the house despised everything about her. The man, who chaimed he loved her, abandoned her to the circle of teror. And ther was nowhere to turn, no way to escape the evil claiming her as victim...
"COMPELING"
"OUTSTANDING"
Classic story - historical fiction. My 11 year old son and I read it aloud to each other.
Not at all what I expected but I really liked it.
This is a wonderful story that tells you the way things really were in Colonial America.
I read this back in grade school,excellent book.
Great book for 5th grade and up. Deals with issues of Colonial American. What life was like for young women and widow women of different faiths. Great book for discussion.
Sonlight 3
This is a wonderful book. It is a well written story of some of the first settlements in New England. Although fictitious, the author makes you feel like you are there. Although it was required reading in high school, I am reading this with my elementry aged children. Very enjoyable book!
Award winning classic.
This is a wonderful book! I couldn't put it down when I first got my hands on it!
The sunshine and laughter of childhood seemed canturies and worlds away as Kit Tyler viewed the forbidding New England coast. The lovely young woman had been raised amid luxury in the Caribbean, but now she was an orphan, unloved and alone, dependent on relatives she had never seen.
Awaiting her in the bleak dwelling that was her new home were suspicions and loneliness. The master of the house despised everything about her. The man, who claimed he loved her, abandoned her to the circle of terror. And there was nowhere to turn, no one to help, no way to escape the evil claiming her as victim...
Awaiting her in the bleak dwelling that was her new home were suspicions and loneliness. The master of the house despised everything about her. The man, who claimed he loved her, abandoned her to the circle of terror. And there was nowhere to turn, no one to help, no way to escape the evil claiming her as victim...
I recommend this book to all who have children! THis book is an excellent addition to any library.
Set in a time that was full of suspicion and lies. If you wanted to get rid of someone that you didn't like, just accuse them of being a witch! This book is a great read. It keeps your attention and makes you think about the way we as a society judge others because they seem to be a bit stranger than us!
Set in a time that was full of suspicion and lies. If you wanted to get rid of someone that you didn't like, just accuse them of being a witch! This book is a great read. It keeps your attention and makes you think about the way we as a society judge others because they seem to be a bit stranger than us!
Excellent novel about assumptions and tolerance. One of my favorites as a child.
AThe sunshine and laughter of childhood seemed centuries adn worlds away as Kit Tyler viewed the forbidding New England coast. The lovley young woman had been raised amid luxury in the Caribbean, but now she was ann orphan, unloved adn alone, dependent on relatives she had never see.
Awaiting her in the bleak dwelling that was her new home were suspicions and loneliness. The master of the house despided everything about her. The man, who claimed to love her, abandoned her to the circle of terror. And there was nowhere to turn, no one to help, no way to escape the evil claiming her as victim...
Awaiting her in the bleak dwelling that was her new home were suspicions and loneliness. The master of the house despided everything about her. The man, who claimed to love her, abandoned her to the circle of terror. And there was nowhere to turn, no one to help, no way to escape the evil claiming her as victim...
EASY READ
One of my childhood favorites
I don't remember a whole lot about this book because it was a book I read as a young teen. I know it must of been one of my favorites though because I only kept my favorite books from when I was a young teen in hopes that someday if I had a girl she would enjoy them too. Well, I've had two boys and am done in the kid department so any young girls who like to read around ages 10-16, I'd say, you will enjoy this book.
I read this book when I was in Junior High. I just loved it. I always loved historical fiction; this was one of my favorites. More students need to discover this great book.
Sixteen-year-old Kit Tyler leaves her home in Barbados and takes a ship to the Colony of Connecticut to live with her aunt and uncle. When Kit arrives, she is surprised to find the family living in a small house, scraping by to make ends meet. Her puritan relatives take her in, but expect her to adhere to their way of life...including working day and night to keep a roof over their heads. Kit has a hard time fitting in and making friends. One friend she does make is Hannah Tupper, and old Quaker woman who lives alone and is thought by the colonists to be a witch.
I read this book in grade school and remember liking it. When I stumbled across it in a bookstore, I thought I'd revisit it. Kit starts out as impulsive young woman who has a hard time fitting into the regimental puritan lifestyle. As she gets to know her cousins and sees the things they go through, she starts to understand their way of life. But she doesn't understand their prejudice against Hannah. Befriending Hannah leads Kit into danger when the townspeople start looking at her with suspicion. My rating: 4.5 Stars.
I read this book in grade school and remember liking it. When I stumbled across it in a bookstore, I thought I'd revisit it. Kit starts out as impulsive young woman who has a hard time fitting into the regimental puritan lifestyle. As she gets to know her cousins and sees the things they go through, she starts to understand their way of life. But she doesn't understand their prejudice against Hannah. Befriending Hannah leads Kit into danger when the townspeople start looking at her with suspicion. My rating: 4.5 Stars.
A historical love story, originally copyrighted in 1958 with over 200,000 hard copies sold by the Dell publishing date of 1971. This is a surprisingly good book, well-written, with characters that are believable and a story that draws you in and won't let go.
I am sorta picky about what I read and even pickier about what I like, but this one qualifies.
I am sorta picky about what I read and even pickier about what I like, but this one qualifies.
My daughter nor I never had the chance to read it.
not the same cover, on cover is a lady. But its the same ISBN
The witch of Blackbird pond by Elizabeth George Speare.
Kit Tyler knew,as she gazed for the first time at the cold,bleak shores of Connecticute Colon, that her new home would never be like the shimmering Caribbean islands she left behind. She ws like a tropical bird that has flown to the wrong part of the world. And in the stern puritan community of her relatives, she soon felt cage as well,and lonely. In the meadows, the only place where she could feel completely free,she meets another lone and mysterious figure,the old woman known as the Witch of blackbird pond. But when their friendship is discovered,Kit is faced with suspicion,fear and anger. she herself is accused of witchcraft.
The witch of Blackbird pond by Elizabeth George Speare.
Kit Tyler knew,as she gazed for the first time at the cold,bleak shores of Connecticute Colon, that her new home would never be like the shimmering Caribbean islands she left behind. She ws like a tropical bird that has flown to the wrong part of the world. And in the stern puritan community of her relatives, she soon felt cage as well,and lonely. In the meadows, the only place where she could feel completely free,she meets another lone and mysterious figure,the old woman known as the Witch of blackbird pond. But when their friendship is discovered,Kit is faced with suspicion,fear and anger. she herself is accused of witchcraft.
