The Hired Girl

Description

Newbery Medalist Laura Amy Schlitz brings her delicious wit and keen eye to early twentieth-century America in a moving yet comedic tour de force. A humorous coming-of-age story that will appeal to fans of Anne of Green Gables and Little Women. Fourteen-year-old Joan Skraggs, like the heroines in her beloved novels, yearns for real life and true love. But what hope is there for adventure, beauty or art on a remote farm in Pennsylvania where the work never ends? Over the summer of 1911, Joan pours her heart out into her diary as she seeks a new, better life for herself - because maybe, just maybe, a hired girl cleaning and cooking for six dollars a week can become what a farm girl could only dream of - a woman with a future. Newbery Medalist Laura Amy Schlitz relates Joan's journey from the muck of the chicken coop to the comforts of a society household in Baltimore (Electricity! Carpet sweepers! Sending out the laundry!), taking readers on an exploration of feminism and housework; religion and literature; love and loyalty; cats, hats and bunions.

Laura Amy Schlitz, author of Fire Spell, A Drowned Maiden's Hair and the Newbery Medal-winner Good Masters! Sweet Ladies!: Voices from a Medieval Village has spent most of her life working as a librarian and professional storyteller. She has also written plays for young people that have been performed in professional theatres all over the US. She lives in Baltimore, Maryland.

Relatable, empowering and beautifully written; this is not a novel that you will easily forget. * Read Plus * A modern classic with the charm of Little Women and the wit of Anne of Green Gables. * Magpies Magazine *