A Big Box of

terrible.
That's all I can say about the first three Boxcar Children.  I am going to publish this post when I finish four of them.  Why four?
Well, they are so popular, even today.  So I feel like I have to give them a chance.  People I love and respect and even admire claim to love the books.  But man.
The Boxcar Children, the first one, written by Gertrude Chandler Warner is just well...sad.
And the second one, Surprise Island is offensive and boring.  And The Yellow House Mystery is offensive, boring and just ridiculous.  Two and three have all of the "Indian" stuff, some tribe that is never named, just "Indian" so that is a huge problem.
I just can't see how these books are still popular.  The language is so dated.
I do want to listen to a new one just to see if Benny is still so freaking annoying.
So I went on and read Mystery Ranch, which was actually two stars!  And so was Mike's Mystery was a two star one as well.  But I am done now!  And glad for it. 

 

  

Flea

In this world where money is king, it does surprise me that Flea doesn't have her own series.  Flea is a big part of Alvin's problems in this third installment:  Alvin Ho:  Allergic to Birthday Parties, Science Projects and Other Man-Made Catastrophes.
The thing that made me pause was the playing of "Indians." I was pretty surprised and I had to give it one star for that.
I did some looking around for thoughts on this.
And this is what I found.
I am not going to throw the baby out with the bathwater.  But this is pretty awful.
Had this been Henry Huggins, published in 1950, it could begin a conversation about how far we have come and why we don't put up with that today.  But man...this just makes so sense at all.
As you will see, I do still love Alvin.  I just really can't recommend this book in the series.