The Berry-Picking Man [Hardcover]

Jane Buchanan (Author), Leslie Bowman (Illustrator)

Book Description

Age Level: 7 and up | Grade Level: 2 and up

A story about empathy and charity

Nine-year-old Meggie hates Old Sam, the berry-picking man. He smells bad, he talks to himself, and, worst of all, he likes Meggie. She wishes her mother, a photographer, didn’t feel responsible for Old Sam, and especially that Mama didn’t involve Meggie in her charitable activities. Mama doesn’t bother Meggie’s sisters. Maybe it’s because they’re older. Meggie figures being the baby in the family must also be why she can’t have what she wants most, a camera of her own. As Christmas approaches, she longs for one, and when she finally opens her heart to Old Sam, Meggie earns her camera.

Illustrated with poignant watercolor paintings, this is an unusual and thought-provoking story about a girl who discovers more than one common bond with her mother, and who wonders whether she is cursed or blessed.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 2-4-A formerly hospitalized mental patient released to live in the community shows up in church one day, and Meggie's photographer mother reaches out to him, providing a meal, buying the berries he picks, and chauffeuring him in the family car, always taking her youngest daughter with her. When the nine-year-old asks her mother why she supports the man, Mama answers, "It's called empathy.- This being able to feel other people's hurts. To see the world through their lens." When Sam asks to spend Christmas with the family, Meggie and her two older sisters refuse, and he is injured while hitchhiking and hospitalized. Feeling guilty, Meggie has a change of heart and convinces her family to include him for Christmas. Parents who try to instill a sense of civic responsibility in their children will identify with the mother who, except for one daughter, seems to be fighting an uphill battle with the rest of the family. Those who stick with the quiet story may appreciate Meggie's bonding with her mother and the slight changes in the older sisters' attitudes. Bowman's black ink wash illustrations lighten the short chapters, but the story's didactic tone and message tend to overwhelm its appeal.
Susan Hepler, Burgundy Farm Country Day School, Alexandria, VA
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

*Starred Review* Gr. 3-5. Nine-year-old Meggie is angry that her mom keeps inviting Old Sam into their home. He's a math genius, but he dresses like a bum. After 25 years in a mental hospital, he now lives in a room in town. Crazy, deaf, and unwashed, he's a joke to the local kids. Meggie is ashamed when she joins in the teasing, and she's angry that she feels guilty. Why can't she be less like her mom and more like her dad and her self-involved older sister, who just ignore the stinky old man? The simple, eloquent narrative stays true to Meggie's seething viewpoint, which is also beautifully expressed in full-page, realistic, gray-shaded watercolors. Bowman uses body language to show the connections and the spaces between people as well as Meggie's efforts to avoid Old Sam, who appears on the edge of her vision. Buchanan writes without sentimentality; Sam remains a disturbance. But when the whole family finds room for him at Christmas dinner, there's a heartrending sense of redemption. Readers will find a lot to discuss here: about people who jeer, and don't see, and also people who change and are moved to empathy. Hazel Rochman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 7 and up
  
• Hardcover: 96 pages
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR); 1st edition (May 13, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374406103
• ISBN-13: 978-0374406103
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.5 ounces
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,355,838 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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