Jacob Have I Loved

1980, 1990 HarperTrophy edition
Katherine Paterson
Jacob Have I Loved
Original and purchase price unknown
Worn paperback
B-

Well, it looks like I don't like this book as much as I used to.  This time, I kept thinking that Sarah Louise complained too much and her twin sister Caroline was much nicer, even if she was spoiled.  Also, it's hard to get worked up about Caroline "stealing" Louise's best/only friend Call, when Louise is always putting him down and they have nothing in common except that they're both misfits.  (It's not at all on the same level as Amy "stealing" Laurie from Jo, and even there Jo didn't want to marry him.)  Unlike some readers, I've never been that bothered by Louise's admittedly strange crush on a 70-year-old neighbor.  There aren't that many single men on their small Chesapeake island, and Louise had earlier imagined herself marrying a man who died at 19, if he'd lived, just because she liked his gravestone.

I like the setting, including the 1940s time period, and the characters are well done.  The later chapters are rushed, but I'm glad Louise has a happy ending.  I just wish that there'd been some sort of closure with her sister.

This won the Newbery, but like some of the other winners, it seems more junior-high level than preteen.  I don't own any other children's books from that year, so I can't really argue that there's a more deserving winner.