Customer Reviews

The Night Swimmers

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This is an awesome book and you just could not stop reading it when you get into it. This is a book that has many cliffhangers in some parts of the book. This book gets you very excited, frightened, and very surprised. You can usually never put it down. This is probably one of the best books I have ever read. So if you are looking for a book to read get this one and it will completely change your life. It has some good lessons to learn. Well if you have any questions about this book and if you have any complements, if you have read this book, e-mail me. Thanx for reading this and remember to read this book you will love it, trust me because I hate reading but this book changed my life. Now I love to read. See how important this is.

The Night Swimmers Aislinn Channon
That pool gave the night swimmers a feeling of belonging and happiness, even though the pool didn't belong to them, it made them feel good pretending. Reality was not as good as the life they pretended when they went out at night. Retta, Roy, and Johnny are the new kids in town. Their father doesn't spend much time with them, he is usually at a club at night, there he sings his country music. The kids spend their nights at the Colonel's pool, the neighbors disapprove of their family for this among other things, which doesn't' make a new family feel better at all. Their mother died and with her, the normalcy of their family died. Retta, the eldest, has tried her best to replace their mother, but Johnny, the middle child, is fed up with Retta. He refuses to let her have any control over him. Desperate to try be a mother to him, she follows him one night when he slips out to be with a friend. She scolds him, but his friend sticks up for him, she can't help be angry at both of them. Roy, who was left at home, is upset because he was left out of some "secret operation". He thinks they are at the pool and he is determined to fearlessly cannonball into the pool and make a big loud splash that would wake the Colonel and he would be running ahead and lead them home and they would admire him and he would be in charge for the first time ever. That was what he hoped for anyway, but instead, he finds they aren't there and the Colonel busts him and takes him home. When Retta and Johnny get home, their father, Roy, the Colonel, and their father's sweet , maternal, girlfriend is there. They all get a wake up call, they all realize each other's, and their own imperfections. In the end, Brendelle, the girlfriend, points the family in the direction of improvement, and will hopefully come to replace their mother. I really loved this book and would recommend this to anyone who thinks they have a mediocre family.
I liked this book because of its characters, it was one of those books that could pull off the few clichés. I felt I could identify with each character because at different times I feel like each character. Retta, the responsible older sister trying to replace mom, frustrated by the lack of appreciation for her efforts and is hurt by the lack of loyalty from her brothers. Johnny, the pre-teen experiencing a need for rebellion and independence. He's trying to make a splash because of the lack of attention he gets and how fed up he is with being told what to do. He is relishing the annoyance he causes in his older sister and his younger brother. Roy is the young, stupid, naïve little kid. He always gave into his sister, loving her especially when she was like one of those "stern grocery store moms". He gets frustrated when being left out because he seems like a young little pest. He is upset by the constant loss of the magic and happiness that was once in his life.
Something else that made this a good book was the detailed descriptions. The author found ways to describe actions and images creatively and effectively without frustrating the reader. Some problems that I often encounter when an author is describing something is either a lack of detail or so much that it makes one ask when the author will get to the point. The author cleverly avoided these and also used metaphors that fit in with a sort of country theme (the father is a struggling country singer). For instance, Roy slipped like he was on a greased griddle.
I also liked this book because it was bittersweet. When they described the father in his pink velour suit (his favorite for performance), it described how he was chubbier and paler than the kids remembered, the seams of his suit were stretched, I found this sad because at one time he had a hit song and then he got lost. I thought the ending was kind of sweet, even though everyone was arguing and making sad realizations about each other, a new hope for better times came.
My best reason for liking this book was that I felt a maternal connection to the kids. I felt a bit of pity for them and wanted to take care of them, or at least for them to have someone to take care of them. Their father is always away and they don't know much about taking care of themselves, and most of the burden is on Retta, but her brothers are wiggling out of her control. Retta's feeble attempts at making things better make me want to fix things for her, so. that dinner isn't either spaghetti made by putting tomato soup over noodles or grilled peanut butter sandwiches. The dinners they have make me want to cook for them, it's almost tear-jerking. I really liked this book and I highly recommend it.

Reading is about exploratation, making friends for a few hours, then returning back to life. Betsy Byars allows one to do this in her book, The Night Swimmers. I was reluctant to read it at first (because of the cover) but I never put it down--literally. I recommend this book for children and parents. I want all my children to expierence the fantastic writings of Betsy Byars.

ISBN 0440458579 - Betsy Byars always manages to make a story more interesting than I expect, and Night Swimmers - winner of the American Book Award - does it again.

Retta, Johnny and Roy are the new kids in town. Their mother is dead and their father, a has-been country singer, is almost irrelevant as a parent, usually choosing to ignore a problem until it goes away. Retta has stepped in as the primary parent to her brothers, a role that she clings to desperately. Deciding to broaden their horizons, Retta searches for experiences outside their own limited world and finds a pool in the neighborhood where she takes the boys swimming at night. When Johnny makes a new friend and begins to do things without his siblings, Retta feels that her position is threatened and that she's failing as a parent.

Shorty, their father, had one hit in his musical career - a song about the death of his wife. Since then, he struggles to support his family by performing locally. Beyond the very basics of a roof over their heads, clothes on their backs and food on the table, Shorty doesn't seem to know what to do for these people who are his children. When tragedy brushes up against his youngest son, Shorty is brought into sharper focus: his once glittering appearance is shabby and worn. His parenting skills are highlighted in his words - none.

Roy's certainty that the Bowlwater Plant is a magical Jack-and-the-Beanstalk type of plant is, in the end, the perfect symbol of the entire story. The suddenly arrived at conclusion that it is, indeed, just a factory, is sad but important for Roy. The entire family needs to get back to reality before the whole loose bundle that is their lives falls apart.

- AnnaLovesBooks

-- Kathryn 3rd grade

We open on the story of three kids who sneak into nieghbors' pools to swim at night without permission. Sounds like a regular story- right? Then as in all bad kids at a secret pool stories- one of them almost drowns! Oh, no! How sad and depressing! This book is dreadful! Don't waste your time reading about skinny-dipping kids who get yelled at by a bunch of western singers in bright pink outfits!