11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Great narrative, great characters, complex moral, October 6, 2003
This review is from: The Slightly True Story Of Cedar B. Hartley (Hardcover)
The first novel from Martine Murray, an Australian writer, illustrator, and acrobat, The Slightly True Story of Cedar B. Hartley follows around a 12-year-old Aussie tomboy with red hair and a great personality. Cedar is one of those gregarious almost-teenage girls we all wish we could have been, one who observes the world with a keen eye and open heart, and has her head squarely on her shoulders. She lives with her widowed hippy mother in a suburb filled with the sort of real people infrequently found in typical YA fiction...there's her friend Caramella, the daughter of Italian immigrants; Ricci, the older Yugoslavian with the little dog a fondness for Valium; and an assortment of wealthy and not-so-wealthy kids. Cedar's older brother is also part of the story, even though he's run away and communicates only via cryptic, poetic postcards.
The plot isn't an especially challenging one, but the characters and writing make it shine. Naturally, there must be a boy involved somewhere, but in this book it's not the handsome rich boy (that character is a bullying antagonist), but a tall kid named Kite, the son of circus performers. He and Cedar start practicing acrobatics together, and ultimately build a performance that involves Caramella as well as Oscar, an intelligent disabled friend of Kite's.
Cedar's voice is genuine and fantastic through-out the book, and I loved the slices of life that Murray expertly captures through Cedar's eyes. "Through the window you can see the dusty beams of light reaching down toward you, reaching all the way from heaven or the sun or from an angel's own eyes or whatever it is that watches from up there. I lie in that sunny patch and it makes me go quiet and small and as still as the dried up bugs on the windowsill." Murray's doodley illustrations add nice accents to the book as well, illustrating some of the acrobatics that would have otherwise been impossible to visualize, and giving the book an almost journal-like quality.
I appreciated that the author portrayed untraditional characters with the everyday casual perspective of a young woman accustomed to them. For example, Cedar has a pair of neighbors who Ricci simply calls, "the boys." These two men have just adopted a baby together, and while less subtle authors would have turned these obviously [homosexual] characters into a lesson about untraditional families, Murray lets Cedar's comfort and familiarity with her neighbors and their new baby speak for itself. "The boys" are just two more characters on Cedar's street...friends Cedar can turn to when she's worried she may have broken a rib.
At times, the political correct tone of the book had hints of contrivance, but never overwhelmingly so. Regardless, I'd take a book with a slightly labored espousal of tolerance and respect over "babysitter's club"-style drivel any day. Cedar learns how she can make a difference in the world the same day as she learns how being a mover and a shaker can have heavy costs. That's a complex moral. The book is a nicely balanced perspective on activism and the strengths of character, and I was more than willing to overlook a few fleeting moments where the author's good intentions got a little heavy-handed.
Pre-teen girls will love this book. Cedar offers the inspiration that precocious, active, self-aware young women desperately needed in this era of mary-kateandashley, and Lizzie McGuire.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Read This Book, November 2, 2004
This review is from: The Slightly True Story Of Cedar B. Hartley (Hardcover)
This book is so delightfully simple and it's heroine so wonderfully quirky and complex that it's not much use to try and describe either. I'd recommend it to any teenage girl looking for a story that doesn't involve sex, violence or abusive families and has a happy ending. Every once in a while we all need to set our real lives aside and fantasize about the childhood we all wish we had and Cedar lets us do that.
The characters are so well drawn and fully formed that you don't miss the things a lot of other writers would feel compelled to include. We can empathize with Cedar as a girl on the brink of adulthood without having to see her get her first period or lose her virginity. This is a book reminiscent of The Brady Bunch, where six kids shared a bathroom with no toilet and no one complained. It's sweet without being sappy and real without being vulgar. The villains aren't inordinately cruel (no Draco Malfoys here) and most of the problems are solvable.
A person could talk (or write) all day and never manage to do this story justice so don't listen to me. Just do yourself a favor and read the book.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Awesome!, March 7, 2006
Ilove this book. I read it a couple of years ago, but it's still one of my favorites. I love how Cedar describes things: a red ribbon of thought, many others that I'm afraid I don't quite remember. Martine Murray, I think, is someone I would like to know; I think she must be one of those who never really grew up, past the age where you know things. I'm only thirteen, and I can't even remember such a time. It's wonderful, so simple and whisical and true to life, so real. It's realer than life, because we all wish we knew people like Cedar and Kite and Caramella and Barnaby, and all the rest. It's really great for girls my age. And everyone else, too, come to think of it.
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