Category Archives: Middle Grade

Rereading Gone Wolf by Amber McBride, with Keiana Mayfield

(You can listen to this episode here.)

Keiana Mayfield, an assistant professor of social work at George Mason University and the Diversity in KidLit Advocate for East City Book Shop in Washington, D.C., joined us to discuss Gone Wolf by Amber McBride, which was published in 2023. Gone Wolf is the story of two girls named Imogen, one in a future racist dystopia and one in current-day Charlottesville, Virginia. We also talked about reading diversely: what it means, why it matters, what the publishing industry is doing well, and what it could be doing better.

Discussed in this episode:

Other books by Amber McBride:

The Leaving Room (Deborah’s interview with McBride about this book is here.)

Onyx and Beyond

Also mentioned.

East City Book Shop in Washington, D.C., where Keiana hosts the W(h)ine and Angst book club for adults and several book clubs for children

The Xenogenesis series by Octavia Butler, including Book 3, Imago

Beauty Queens by Libba Bray

Interviews with Amber McBride in Publisher’s Weekly and Virginia Living

The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison

We Need Diverse Books, an organization promoting diversity in children’s literature

About the B’Nai Bagels by E.L. Konigsberg

Recommended for fans of Gone Wolf:

Keiana: The Last Cuentista by Donna Barbra Higuera, winner of the 2022 Newbery Medal; Candace, The Universe, and Everything by Sherri L. Smith; Other Words for Home by Jasmine Warga; The Extraordinary Orbit of Alex Ramirez by Jasminne Paolino

Deborah: Candace, The Universe, and Everything by Sherri L. Smith (seconding Keiana’s recommendation; Deborah’s interview with Smith about this book is here); other books by Amber McBride

Other recommendations from Keiana: Rainbow Shopping by Qing Zhuang; The Village Beyond the Mist by Sachiko Kashiwaba; How to Walk a Dog by Joanne Levy

Other Rereading Our Childhood episodes mentioned:

Rereading A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle

Rereading From The Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsberg

Our Favorite Picture Books

The podcast is hosted by Buzzsprout at rereadingourchildhood.buzzsprout.com and is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other platforms.

You can find Keiana at keianamayfield.com, Deborah at deborahkalb.com Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Rereading The Borrowers by Mary Norton

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(You can listen to this episode here.)

For this episode, we revisited The Borrowers, Mary Norton’s 1952 novel about a family of tiny people who live under the kitchen of a house in the British countryside. We were as charmed as ever by the ingenuity of the Borrowers, who have a dresser made of matchboxes and a teapot made of an acorn shell, but there was a layer of darkness in the story that we hadn’t remembered.

Mentioned on this episode:

Other books in the series:

The Borrowers Afield

The Borrowers Afloat

The Borrowers Aloft

The Borrowers Avenged

Also by Mary Norton:

Bedknob and Broomstick

Film adaptations:

Bedknobs and Broomsticks, 1971 movie (trailer here)

The Borrowers, 1973 Hallmark Hall of Fame TV special (IMDB entry here)

The Borrowers, 1997 live-action adaptation (trailer here)

Arietty, 2010 Japanese anime adaptation (trailer here)

Also mentioned:

Gone-Away Lake by Elizabeth Enright, illustrated by Beth and Joe Krush, who illustrated the American edition of The Borrowers

All-of-a-Kind Family Downtown by Sydney Taylor, illustrated by Beth and Joe Krush

The English Bookshop, in Uppsala, Sweden and other locations

Independent obituary of Mary Norton

Independent obituary of Mark Norton, Mary Norton’s son

Recommended by Mary Grace: The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett

Recommended by Deborah: Stuart Little by E.B. White

Other Rereading Our Childhood episodes:

Rereading The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett

Rereading Stuart Little by E.B. White

The podcast is hosted by Buzzsprout at rereadingourchildhood.buzzsprout.com and is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other platforms.

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Rereading The Moffats by Eleanor Estes

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(You can listen to this episode here.)

We had completely forgotten about Eleanor Estes’s The Moffats until a friend suggested that we reread it. Published in 1941, it’s the first in a series about four children growing up in small-town Connecticut in the 1910s. Both of us could relate to Jane, Estes’s anxious and bookish autobiographical stand-in.

Mentioned on this episode:

Other books in the series:

The Middle Moffat (1942), a Newbery Honor Book

Rufus M. (1943), a Newbery Honor Book

The Moffat Museum (1983)

Other books by Estes:

The Hundred Dresses (1944), a Newbery Honor Book

Ginger Pye (1951), winner of the 1952 Newbery Medal

Pinky Pye (1958)

Also mentioned:

Many Moons (1943) by James Thurber, with illustrations by Louis Slobodkin, winner of the Caldecott Prize

“The Little Match Girl” by Hans Christian Andersen

“Eleanor Estes: Chronicler of the Family Story,” by Claudia Mills, on the UConn Archives and Special Collections Blog. (This is the website with the story about pioneering children’s librarian Annie Carroll Moore, who was Estes’s boss, disparaging The Moffats after reading the manuscript.)

“Celebrating Children’s Books Week–and a pioneering children’s librarian,” on Mary Grace’s blog, My Life 100 Years Ago

Recommended by Deborah: The Saturdays by Elizabeth Enright; Beverly Cleary’s books

Recommended by Mary Grace: The All-of-a-Kind Family series by Sydney Taylor

Other Rereading Our Childhood episodes:

Rereading The Young Unicorns by Madeleine L’Engle

Rereading Ramona the Pest by Beverly Cleary

Rereading Stuart Little by E.B. White

Rereading Charlotte’s Web by E.B. White

The podcast is hosted by Buzzsprout at rereadingourchildhood.buzzsprout.com and is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other platforms.

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Rereading From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsburg

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(You can listen to this episode here.)

For the first episode of our fourth (!) season, we reread E.L. Konigsburg’s Newbery Medal winner From The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, which was published in 1967. This book, one of our all-time favorites, has one of the best plot premises of all time: a suburban brother and sister run away from home and camp out at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Mentioned on this episode:

Other books by Konigsburg:

Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth

A Proud Taste for Scarlet and Miniver

About the B’nai Bagels

Also mentioned:

Ban this Book by Alan Gratz

1965 New York Times article about the Metropolitan Museum’s purchase for $225 of a statue that may be a Leonardo da Vinci

1996 New York Times article about a cupid statue at the French cultural center in New York that may be by Michaelangelo

Post on the Metropolitan Museum website about celebrating the 50th anniversary of From the Mixed-Up Files

2017 Smithsonian magazine article in which Johnny Doran reminisces about playing Jamie in a film version of From the Mixed-Up Files

Recommended by Mary Grace: Freaky Friday by Mary Rodgers

Other Rereading Our Childhood episodes mentioned:

Rereading Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth by E.L. Konigsburg

Rereading Freaky Friday by Mary Rodgers

Rereading Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh

The podcast is hosted by Buzzsprout at rereadingourchildhood.buzzsprout.com and is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other platforms.

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Rereading Theater Shoes, with Jean Freedman

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(You can listen to this episode here.)

Writer and scholar Jean Freedman joins us to talk about Noel Streatfeild’s 1944 book Theater Shoes (originally published in the UK as Curtain Up), the story of three children who attend a theatrical school. We discuss London during World War II and welcome the (offstage) reappearance of the three sisters in Streatfeild’s beloved Ballet Shoes (1936), who are now young women pursuing their careers.

Mentioned on this episode:

Books by Jean Freedman: Whistling in the Dark: Memory and Culture in Wartime London and Peggy Seeger: A Life of Music, Love, and Politics

Other books by Noel Streatfeild: Circus Shoes, Dancing Shoes, Tennis Shoes, Skating Shoes

Mrs. Miniver (1942), trailer here

A website on Streatfeild that includes a detailed discussion on Theater Shoes/Curtain Up

Books and other works of literature mentioned in Theater Shoes: Little Women by Louisa May Alcott, Little Lord Fauntleroy by Frances Hodgson Burnett, David Copperfield by Charles Dickens, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Tempest by William Shakespeare, The Princess and the Pea by Hans Christen Andersen

Recommended by Jean: Little Women by Louisa May Alcott, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain, A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett; Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery, The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare, Johnny Tremain by Esther Forbes, A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle, and Dress Rehearsal by Monica Stirling; books by Beverly Cleary and Judy Blume; fairy tales by Oscar Wilde

Recommended by Debby: The Saturdays by Elizabeth Enright; Half Magic by Edward Eager

Recommended by Mary Grace: The Saturdays by Elizabeth Enright; The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis

Other episodes: Rereading Ballet Shoes by Noel Streatfeild; Rereading Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren; Rereading Little Women, with Jamie Stiehm; Rereading The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare

The podcast is hosted by Buzzsprout at rereadingourchildhood.buzzsprout.com and is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other platforms.

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com, Mary Grace at My Life 100 Years Ago, and Jean at jeanfreedman.com.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Rereading Charlotte’s Web by E.B. White

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(You can listen to this episode here.)

For this episode, we reread E.B. White’s 1952 classic Charlotte’s Web, one of the most beloved children’s books of all time. We enjoyed revisiting Wilbur, Fern, Charlotte, and the underrated Templeton the Rat.

Mentioned on this episode:

Other books by E.B. White:

Stuart Little (1945)

The Trumpet of the Swan (1970)

The Elements of Style, with William Strunk Jr. (1959)

Is Sex Necessary?, with James Thurber (1929)

Essays of E.B. White (1977)

Letters of E.B. White (1976)

Boo at the Zoo event, National Zoo

Also mentioned:

The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis

Post on Henry Fussy from the blog Naomi Loves

“Garth Williams, Illustrator of American Childhood,” by Sarah Larson, The New Yorker, June 3, 2016

Dear Genius: The Letters of Ursula Nordstrom, edited by Leonard Marcus (1998)

Goodreads reviews of Charlotte’s Web

The Story of Charlotte’s Web: E.B. White’s Eccentric Life in Nature and the Birth of an American Classic, Michael Sims (2011)

“Death of a Pig” by E.B. White, The Atlantic, January 1948 (paywalled)

Archy and Mehitabel by Don Marquis (1927)

Eudora Welty’s New York Times review of Charlotte’s Web, October 19, 1952

Secret of the Andes by Ann Nolan Clark (1952)

Mary Grace’s blog post on children’s librarian Annie Carroll Moore

Boo at the Zoo event, National Zoo

Recommended for fans of Charlotte’s Web: Anne of Green Gables and Caddie Woodlawn (Mary Grace); Stuart Little, The Trumpet of the Swan, Misty of Chincoteague, and The Cricket in Times Square (Deborah)

Charlotte’s Web, 1973 movie (trailer here)

Charlotte’s Web, 2006 movie (trailer here)

Charlotte’s Web, 2025 miniseries (trailer here)

Other Rereading Our Childhood episodes:

Rereading Stuart Little by E.B. White

Rereading Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

Rereading The Summer of the Swans by Betsy Byars

Rereading Caddie Woodlawn by Carol Ryrie Brink

The podcast is hosted by Buzzsprout at rereadingourchildhood.buzzsprout.com and is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other platforms.

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace’s adventures in the 1920s at My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Rereading Encyclopedia Brown Finds the Clues by Donald J. Sobol

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(You can listen to this episode here.)

For our third annual Encyclopedia Brown episode, we matched wits with each other and with Encyclopedia in trying to crack the cases in Encyclopedia Brown Finds the Clues, which was published in 1966. The relevant clues are included in our discussion, so you can solve along with us. We discussed the origins of Bugs Meany’s hat and solved the mystery of what state Idaville is in. Also, Mary Grace mispronounced “divining rod” about 15 times.

Mentioned on this episode:

Other Encyclopedia Brown books:

Encyclopedia Brown, Boy Detective

Encyclopedia Brown and the Case of the Secret Pitch

Other Rereading Our Childhood episodes:

Rereading Johnny Tremain by Esther Forbes

Rereading Henry Reed, Inc. by Keith Robertson

Also mentioned:

Goodreads review of Encyclopedia Brown Finds the Clues by Chance Hansen

Reddit thread on what state Encyclopedia lives in

“Donald Sobol and the Case of the Elusive Mystery Writer,” interview with Donald Sobol by Elizabeth Weinstein, Oberlin Alumni Magazine, Fall 2011

Clip from a 2024 episode of Futurama featuring Wikipedia Brown

The podcast is hosted by Buzzsprout at rereadingourchildhood.buzzsprout.com and is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other platforms.

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace’s adventures in the 1920s at My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Rereading The Long Secret by Louise Fitzhugh

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(You can listen to this episode here.)

For this episode, we reread Louise Fitzhugh’s 1965 novel The Long Secret, the sequel to Harriet the Spy. We discussed Harriet’s summer friendship with her classmate Beth Ellen, a minor character in Harriet the Spy, the mystery of who is leaving notes for residents of the Long Island town of Water Mill, and Fitzhugh’s fascinating but tragic life.

Mentioned on this episode:

Other books by Fitzhugh:

Suzuki Bean, written by Sandra Scoppettone, illustrated by Louise Fitzhugh (1961)

Harriet the Spy (1964)

Nobody’s Family is Going to Change (1974)

Sport (1980)

Also mentioned:

Sometimes You Have to Lie: The Life and Times of Louise Fitzhugh, Renegade Author of Harriet the Spy, by Leslie Brody

Deborah’s interview with Leslie Brodie on her blog Book Q&A’s with Deborah Kalb

The Tap Dance Kid, the Broadway musical based on Nobody’s Family is Going to Change (highlights from the 2022 Encores! performance here)

Gloria Vanderbilt’s New York Times review of Harriet the Spy, November 22, 1964

Goodreads reviews of The Long Secret by Robyn and Jamie

Recommended by Deborah: Freaky Friday (1972) and A Billion for Boris (1974) by Mary Rodgers; Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret (1970) by Judy Blume

Recommended by Mary Grace: Magic by the Lake by Edward Eager (1957); The Summer of the Swans by Betsy Byars (1970); All-of-a-Kind Family by Sydney Taylor (1951)

Previous episodes of Rereading Our Childhood:

Rereading Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh

Rereading Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret by Judy Blume

Rereading Freaky Friday by Mary Rodgers

Rereading Magic by the Lake by Edward Eager

Rereading The Summer of the Swans by Betsy Byars

Rereading All-of-A-Kind Family by Sydney Taylor

The podcast is hosted by Buzzsprout at rereadingourchildhood.buzzsprout.com and is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other platforms.

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace’s adventures in the 1920s at My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Rereading Little Women, with Jamie Stiehm

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(You can listen to this episode here.)

For this episode, we reread Louisa May Alcott’s classic novel Little Women, which was published in two parts in 1868 and 1869. (In the UK, it’s still published as two separate novels, the second one titled Good Wives.) We’re joined by Jamie Stiehm, a syndicated columnist at Creators Syndicate. We talk about our love for the book as girls, how it held up as a reread (still wonderful if a little preachy at times), and Alcott’s (and Jo’s) gender identity.

Mentioned on this episode:

Other books by Alcott:

Little Men (1871)

Eight Cousins (1874)

Rose in Bloom (1876)

Jo’s Boys (1886)

Also mentioned:

Peyton Thomas’s tweet saying Alcott was trans, which Mary Grace (and Martina Navratilova) replied to

Peyton Thomas’s New York Times guest column saying that Alcott was trans

Jo’s Boys, Peyton Thomas’s podcast on Little Women (on Apple and Spotify). (Update: It’s great!)

Film adaptations:

Little Women (1933), with Katharine Hepburn as Jo (trailer here)

Little Women (1949), with June Allyson as Jo and Elizabeth Taylor as Amy (trailer here)

Little Women (1994), with Wynona Ryder as Jo (trailer here)

Little Women (2019), directed by Greta Gerwig (trailer here)

Recommended for fans of Little Women:

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen (Jamie); My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante, Men in Trouble by Sarah Payne Stuart, and Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason (Mary Grace); Lit t le House on the Prairie (Deborah)

Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy: The Story of Little Women and Why it Still Matters, by Anne Boyd Rioux

March, Geraldine Brooks’s 2006 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel about Alcott’s father

Other Rereading Our Childhood episodes mentioned:

Rereading Caddie Woodlawn by Carol Ryrie Brink

Rereading Little Town on the Prairie, with Judith Kalb

The podcast is hosted by Buzzsprout at rereadingourchildhood.buzzsprout.com and is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other platforms.

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace’s adventures in the 1920s on her blog, My Life 100 Years Ago. You can find Jamie at jamiestiehm.com.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.

Rereading Magic by the Lake by Edward Eager

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(You can listen to this episode here.)

On this episode, we reread Edward Eager’s 1957 book Magic by the Lake. It’s the sequel to Half Magic, which we discussed during our first season. We talk about our love for Eager’s magical adventures and our discomfort with some scenes that wouldn’t pass muster today.

Mentioned on this episode:

The Time Garden, the fourth book in the Half Magic series, featuring Katharine and Martha’s children

Seven-Day Magic, Eager’s last book

Also mentioned:

Edward Eager’s New York Times obituary

By Pike and Dyke: A Tale of the Rise of the Dutch Republic by G.A. Henty (read by Mark)

Deborah’s time travel novels, George Washington and the Magic Hat, John Adams and the Magic Bobblehead, and Thomas Jefferson and the Return of the Magic Hat

The books of E. Nesbit, Eager’s favorite children’s writer

The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis

The Magic Tree House books

“Goodbye, John,” Edward Eager’s biggest hit song

Songs the children hear, sing, or request: “Paddling Madeleine Home,” “Do Do Do What You Done Done Done Before,” “Yes! We Have No Bananas,”

Recommended for fans of Magic by the Lake: The Saturdays by Elizabeth Enright (Deborah); The Four-Story Mistake by Elizabeth Enright and The Long Secret by Louise Fitzhugh (Mary Grace)

Other Rereading Our Childhood episodes:

Rereading Half Magic by Edward Eager

Rereading Mary Poppins by P.L. Travers

Rereading Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren

Rereading The Saturdays by Elizabeth Enright

The podcast is hosted by Buzzsprout at rereadingourchildhood.buzzsprout.com and is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other platforms.

You can find Deborah at deborahkalb.com and Mary Grace’s adventures in the 1920s on her blog, My Life 100 Years Ago.

This episode was edited by Adam Linder of Bespoken Podcasting.