“Ramona Quimby, Age 8” - Beverly Cleary

 (Ramona book 6)

🐳 This classic Newberry Honor book will be nostalgic for most everyone. Here I speak to elder millennials and older, it’s the 2nd cover (if I’m not mistaken), that you’ll all recall from our childhoods.

🐳 I knew there was a Ramona series, but I didn’t realize RQA8 comes up sequentially in the middle. We went ahead and jumped in with this one for the sake of my memories.

🐳 Cleary is an absolute  star at capturing the child’s POV of her elementary school and home life. Even when adults do their best to shield children from tough topics, Cleary shows what observant kids invariably will notice. We see Ramona’s 8 year-old anxieties about serious topics such as her father’s job security, the family’s tight budget,  and divorce. On the lighter side, we see Ramona’s self-pity party when staying home sick from school and her worries about being liked by her new teacher. 

🐳  Rereading RQA8 as an adult brought back happy memories of one of my favorite activities in elementary school: Sustained Silent Reading.  I hadn’t thought about that in ages. Along with nap time, I’d love to have mandatory SSR incorporated into my daily schedule now. 

The part where she ate dinner she didn’t like (cabbage and peas for me) stayed with me since when I read this book way back when because it was so relatable to me as a child. It’s fun to go back over childhood memories with your own kids and watch what strikes them particularly.