Fig Pudding

April 24, 1995
Twelve-year-old Cliff, the eldest of the six Abernathy children, looks back on a year that feels like ``five years crammed into one. With plenty of stuff I want to remember forever. And stuff I wish I could forget.'' In a style reminiscent of Cheaper by the Dozen, this warm story (unobtrusively set in what seems to be the '70s) neatly blends the humor and frustrations of growing up in a large family headed by two sanguine parents. Each chapter, while centering around a particular child, subtly weaves together household events, large and small. In the first vignette, the youngest child is hospitalized just before Christmas and asks only for a ``yidda yadda'' from Santa; the family eventually interprets the demand as a ``little ladder'' and everyone works all night to build one. The episodes smoothly move forward to the family's ultimate crisis: Brad, the gentlest of the children, is killed while riding his bicycle. With remarkable restraint and understatement, Fletcher (I Am Wings: Poems About Love) conveys the bewilderment and grief as each of the Abernathys reacts to this loss. A hopeful ending implies that Brad's memory will live on in the family's exchanges. Ages 8-12.

January 1, 2000
These nine chapters, narrated by Cliff Abernathy, the oldest of six kids, chronicle the life of his boisterous family over the course of a year. Often hilarious, these stories show us the warmth of a loving family, making all the more poignant the accidental death of eight-year-old Brad and his family's struggle to celebrate Christmas two months later.

Copyright 2000 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 15, 1995
Gr. 5^-7. Twelve-year-old Cliff, the oldest of six children ("Abernathys always overdo everything" ), recalls the past year in episodes focusing on his brothers and his sister. The year was bittersweet. There were good times, but there were also ones he'd like to forget--among them, the death of one brother, an event that will move readers to tears. Fletcher captures perfectly the humor, irritations, and sadness of life in a large, close-knit family and makes Cliff a sympathetic and thoughtful narrator, occasionally bewildered by his siblings' antics but always a completely believable older brother. The comedy in the final chapter will leave readers recalling hilarious family disasters of their own. ((Reviewed May 15, 1995))(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 1995, American Library Association.)