Laura Amy Schlitz Reviews

Laura Amy Schlitz  Good Masters! Sweet Ladies!: Voices from a Medieval Village; illus. by Robert Byrd
     85 pp. Candlewick
     Reviewed 11/07
Schlitz gives teachers a refreshing option for enhancing the study of the European Middle Ages: here are seventeen monologues and two dialogues that collectively create a portrait of life on an English manor in 1255. A plowboy, a knight’s son, and a sniggler (eel-catcher), among other boys and girls ages ten to fifteen, say their pieces. Rhythm and style vary to suit each role, from breathless, thrusting phrases as a knight’s son describes a boar hunt to the lighthearted rhyming of a shamelessly dishonest miller boy. Schlitz conveys information about class, attitudes, and social practices through the monologues, footnote-like sidebars, and six spreads titled “A Little Background” that offer fuller explanations of farming practices, the Crusades, falconry, and more. Schlitz acknowledges some of the nastier aspects of this oft-romanticized period (such as its persecution of Jews), but in gentle, moderate language. Byrd’s pristine, elegant pen-and-ink illustrations in opulent colors make the book almost too visually appealing, belying the realistically dirty, stinky conditions described in the text. Deirdre F. Baker

Laura Amy Schlitz, reteller  The Bearskinner: A Tale of the Brothers Grimm; illus. by Max Grafe
     40 pp. Candlewick
     Reviewed 11/07
In a somber tale of the devil more outlasted than outwitted, an ex-soldier accepts a hard bargain: he’ll be rich for the rest of his life if, for seven years, he wears the skin of the bear he’s just slain, without bathing, prayer, or explanation; but failure will mean eternal perdition. Schlitz narrates with clarity, grace, and sensitivity to the larger ideas her words suggest (“He had run away to war when he was a boy. Now that the war was over, he had nowhere to go. His childhood home was ashes, and all he loved were dead”). A few minor alterations actually strengthen the story: the soldier eventually lessens his misery in the increasingly noxious skin by using his wealth to help the needy; in turn, they pray for him. Also, the faithful woman he weds in the end is the middle sister, and her unkind siblings are spared the wretched end the Grimms allotted them. Except for the devil’s coat of darkest green, Grafe’s atmospheric full-page illustrations are almost monochromatic, entirely composed of deep grays and browns barely mitigated by an occasional wash of blue, gleam of gold, or sunset hue. A provocative edition that should set older children thinking about the meaning of endurance and heroism. J.R.L.

Laura Amy Schlitz  A Drowned Maiden’s Hair: A Melodrama
     389 pp. Candlewick
     Reviewed 11/06
In the taxonomy of the Barbary Asylum for Female Orphans, Maud “knew quite well that she was plain, clever, and bad,” but she achieves an orphan’s dream when pretty, sympathetic Hyacinth Hawthorne brings her home. The discovery that the maiden Hawthorne sisters expect Maud to live as a “secret child” and help them with sham séances for wealthy bereaved individuals does nothing to dampen Maud’s devotion to her charismatic guardian, who wants Maud to impersonate eight-year-old Caroline Lambert. Caroline drowned at the summer resort of Cape Calypso, and her mother is offering five thousand dollars to any medium producing a genuine manifestation of her daughter. Schlitz realizes both characters and setting (an early twentieth-century seaside town) with unerring facility, generating the “melodrama” of the title from Maud’s hunger for a mother-figure and supplying several other contenders besides the selfish Hyacinth, including a deaf housekeeper, Muffet, and Mrs. Lambert herself, whose grief causes Maud a few pangs of conscience. The culmination of the fraudulent séances—Maud’s appearance as the ghostly Caroline—neatly precedes the climactic episode in which Maud faces the inescapable truth about who cares for her and who doesn’t, bringing this orphan story full circle before ending on a resounding note of triumph. Anita L. Burkam

Laura Amy Schlitz  The Hero Schliemann: The Dreamer Who Dug for Troy; illus. by Robert Byrd
     76 pp. Candlewick
     Reviewed 7/06
Hero, crook, accomplished linguist, successful businessman, lucky archaeologist, storyteller—Heinrich Schliemann was all that and more. This irreverent biography of the nineteenth-century German who rediscovered ancient Troy attempts to disentangle the facts from the fictions in Schliemann’s life and work. By his own account, his was an exciting life, filled with adventure. By his own account, too, he pinpointed the location of the fabled Troy from his reading of the Iliad, dug down through the layers to the Bronze Age city, and discovered “Priam’s treasure.” Archaeologists mostly agree that Schliemann had the correct location, although he was not the first to claim it, and that he found treasure—but perhaps not all in one place and probably not Priam’s, since he dug down through Priam’s city to one that existed a thousand years earlier. Byrd’s cartoonlike illustrations add to the appeal of the gently humorous text but make it difficult to take Schliemann’s genuine accomplishments seriously. A world map shows his travels, and two helpful timelines place events in historical context, but there is no map showing Turkey or Troy to help the intended audience, who may also struggle with the complex sentences and unfamiliar vocabulary. Engagingly told and well documented, this will be particularly welcome where students already have some familiarity with ancient history. Kathleen Isaacs

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