Customer Reviews

The Betsy-Tacy Companion: A Biography of Maud Hart Lovelace

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"I thought I was the only one," is the comment most often uttered when meeting another Betsy-Tacy fan. We make up a tight little society that can't be explained to those who have not read the B-T series and this Companion is a most welcome addition to the body of works. It helped me find the pension in Munich where Betsy stayed and the Casa del'Oro in Venice where she fell in love with Marco, even though we were all pining for Joe Willard. I fed the pigeons in St. Mark's Square just as Betsy did and this delightful, informative book helped in my search. The author has done a painstaking research job and I, for one, know that it was a true labor of love. Sharla has taken her rightful place on my bookshelf right next to all of Maud's other works. I can think of no higher honor.

This book represents an incredible effort that can only be described as a labor of love and a gift to all Betsy-Tacy fans. Sharla Scannell Whalen has done an impressive amount of research, interviewing people connected to the characters MHL wrote about, reading correspondence, examining old newspapers and county records, and recreating even the floor plans of old houses.

Probably no biography could ever answer all of the questions of devoted B-T fans like myself. Short of a personal interview with Maud Hart Lovelace, nothing could probably satisfy our curiousity. Whalen's book, in many ways, is less a biography than a corroboration of the Betsy-Tacy books. In itself, that makes it precious to fans of the series. I liked knowing something about the characters' counterparts. Presumably due to the vagaries of historical research, we learn more about some (e.g. Carney/Marney) than others (e.g. Marguerite/Emily). A few of the episodes most important for understanding Betsy's character and growth (and thus, according to Whalen's well-substantiated argument, Maud's), are not verified - for example, the interlude in Betsy's Wedding when Joe's aunt comes to live with them, prompting Betsy to interrogate her own possessiveness and to expand her ideas of family.

I loved this book, but unfortunately I think its appeal will be largely limited to Betsy-Tacy fans and people interested in children's books. I don't know that it would have been feasible for Whalen to do this, given her interest in documenting the similarities between Betsy's and Maud's lives, but I would have liked to see her set the overlapping stories of their lives in a broader social history context. How much richer the book would have been if we could have understood Betsy's and Maud's girlhoods against a larger picture of early 20th century adolescence. How unique was it, for example, that all of Betsy's friends attended high school, and many of them college, in an era when less than 20% of the school-aged population graduated from high school? This suggests important and interesting things about Betsy's/Maud's family and class background, the economy of Deep Valley/Mankato, and the social mores of her Crowd. This book is so readable that, if it had presented the B-T books not only as a window into Maud Hart Lovelace's life but into the lives of young women of a certain racial, social, and class background in the early 20th century, it could be a huge contribution to the field of women's history. In short, the book is long on description and documentation; I would have only liked to see more analysis.

But there is limited use in bemoaning what a book does not do. What this book does is pretty tremendous. It's truly a pleasure to read, and invaluable to anyone who ever wanted to know what happened to Betsy, Tacy, Carney, Tib, Cab, and Tony after the end of the series.

This book is heaven-sent! While probably not very interesting to anyone who has not read the Bets-Tacy books, this book is a jewel for all those who have. It tells absolutely everything! If photos are what you're after, they're in the Companion. If you want to learn all the details of Maud's real life, you'll also find those. I love the clips of Maud's letters to her friends, and I sorely lament the fact that she burned her diaries. Would she have burned them if she had known how much she'd be loved? This book has all the answers to all the questions you've ever asked. I was ecstatic when I found it, and I hope many more people will find it. It's defiantly not worth ignoring!

This book is a lot of fun to have around when you're reading or re-reading the Betsy-Tacy series! It tells the stories behind the stories, compares the events in the books to events in Maud's life, and includes wonderful pictures of the real people behind the fictional names.

It is not intended to be a straight-out biography of Maud but rather how her life paralleled Betsy's. The research is detailed and voluminous, and very well done. This kind of a book could have been very tedious and boring, but I didn't find it that way at all. The writing was sprightly and included some humor, and I just really enjoyed paging through it as I re-read the series this summer!

Any Maud or Betsy fan should own this book!

After reading the reviews, I knew it was a must have! I haven't put it down yet! I can't believe the feelings I have since I have looked at the pictures...Tony really was handsome, and Joe looks just as Maud described him in her books. I can honestly say that this biography is everything that I had hoped for and more. Sharla has made a dream come true. I can't believe my visions of these characters have been brought to life through this biography. Well done, Sharla! It is wonderful to know that I am not the only fan!

Betsy-Tacy fans, rejoice! Sharla Scannell-Whalen has written the ultimate book for those of you who want MORE! The author gives a wealth of information about the real-life counterparts for just about every character in the Maud Hart Lovelace classics. Interesting details about the history of the Lovelace family are also included. The many photographs add immensely to the reader's understanding. I had the pleasure of meeting Sharla several years ago and it was obvious that this project was her joy and her life - and the book shows it, too. You won't be disappointed.

If you are like me, you always feel a bit melancholy as Betsy, Joe and their friends dance back into the mists of time on the last page of "Betsy's Wedding". It's like loosing touch with an old friend, and you are left to wonder what happened to Betsy, Joe and the gang? Why was "Betsy's Bettina" never published?

Did Joe come back from the war?

Thanks to what must have been a time consuming and massive effort by Sharla Scannel Whalen, you can find out. This very thick hardback is crammed full of every minute detail relating to Maud Hart Lovelace's series that the author could find.

The Betsy-Tacy Companion is divided into chapters that address each book in order. In each chapter she compares and contrasts characters and thier real life counterparts, as well as information about the homes and businesses in the real Deep Valley of Mankato where their adventures took place. There is an additional chapter that tells you what happened to as many main characters as possible after the series ended. The book includes photos, illustrations, and clippings in addition to the text.

The format struck me as more textbook than biography. It can at times, seem a very dry read. It's a chapter at a time sort of read for me, as opposed to a straight through read. It's obvious that when Whalen was researching this book that sources of information were becoming increasingly hard to find. Although some information may seem unimportant or unnecesary, it's inclusion is worthwhile in that it keeps those bits of history from being lost forever. You get the sense that was very important to Whalen, this isn't just a book, it's labor of love devoted to preserving as much of the Lovelace legacy as possible.

I may not sit down and read this through annually like I do the novels, but I will keep it and treasure it. More important, I hope someday my own daughters will appreciate having a book that will never be rivaled in detail and depth. If you are a die hard Betsy-Tacy fan, buy this book before it's gone for good. 20 years from now it may be a hard to find treasure that our next generation will appreciate as much as we do!

This book is a treasure if only for the hundreds of photographs of Betsy and the Crowd. The perfect book to curl up with on a long winter's night or any other time of the year. As a lifelong Betsy-Tacy fan, you can't give me enough details about Maud Hart Lovelace. The writing is informative and often humorous -- it's obvious that the author understands who her audience is: true Betsy-Tacyites!

But more than a lot of people want to know about Betsy-Tacy; unless you are a reader of Betsy-Tacy. With a mixture of scholarship, organization and humor, the author has written a book that would make Maud proud. Although this is not a bio. that one would be likely to pick-up unless the subject is known and loved by them, it is a very good read. Besides all sorts of fascinating minutae, there is a great deal of information about turn- of- the-century life, as well as information about how to turn real-life into a work of fiction so real that literally hundreds of people familiar with Betsy, Tacy, Tib and their companions will never completely get over not having grown up in early twentieth century Deep Valley,MN. The material is well organized, each book in the series has a chapter all its own with lots of photographs of the prototypes of the characters. We also get to find out what happened to them. This is an enjoyable reference work for admirers of Maud as wel! l as those interested in turning fact into fiction.

I recently ordered The Betsy-Tacy Companion, and I was quite unsure as to what I should expect. My hopes were high though, and I wasn't to be disappointed. The Betsy-Tacy series is a special one, and the companion goes deep into the magic of Deep Valley and Mankato without killing it altogether. Definitely a must have for anyone in love with Deep Valley.

Oh and I was pleasantly surprised to see chapters for Emily of Deep Valley and Carney's House Party.