Product Description

Dear Gram and Grampop,
Please do not address yours truly as California anymore, California Morning Whipple being a foolish name for a duck much less a girl. I call myself Lucy now. I cannot hate California and be California. I know you will understand.California doesn't suit Lucy Whipple -- not the name, not the place. But moving out West to Lucky Diggins, California, was her mama's dream-come-true. And now her brother, Butte, and sisters, Prairie and Sierra, seem to be Westerners at heart, too. For Lucy, Lucky Diggins is hardly a town at all -- just a bunch of ramshackle tents and tobacco-spitting miners. Even the gold her mama claimed was just lying around in the fields isn't panning out. Worst of all, there's no lending library! Dag diggety!

So Lucy vows to be plain miserable until she can hightail it back East where she belongs. But Lucy California Morning Whipple may be in for a surprise -- because home is a lot closer than she thinks...

When California Morning Whipple's widowed mother uproots her family from their comfortable Massachusetts environs and moves them to a rough mining camp called Lucky Diggins in the Sierras, California Morning resents the upheaval. Desperately wanting to control something in her own life, she decides to be called Lucy, and as Lucy she grows and changes in her strange and challenging new environment. Here Karen Cushman helps the American Gold Rush spring to colorful life, just as she did for medieval England in her previous two books, Catherine, Called Birdy and The Midwife's Apprentice, which won Newbery Honor status and a Newbery Medal respectively.

---

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #461798 in Books
• Published on: 1998-05-31
• Released on: 1998-04-03
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 218 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780064406840
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

Amazon.com Review
When California Morning Whipple's widowed mother uproots her family from their comfortable Massachusetts environs and moves them to a rough mining camp called Lucky Diggins in the Sierras, California Morning resents the upheaval. Desperately wanting to control something in her own life, she decides to be called Lucy, and as Lucy she grows and changes in her strange and challenging new environment. Here Karen Cushman helps the American Gold Rush spring to colorful life, just as she did for medieval England in her previous two books, Catherine, Called Birdy and The Midwife's Apprentice, which won Newbery Honor status and a Newbery Medal respectively. For ages 8-12.

From Publishers Weekly
PW gave a starred review to this gold-rush novel by Newbery Medalist Cushman, calling it "a coming-of-age story rich with historical flavor." Ages 8-12.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal
Grade 5-8. Lucy is no stranger to heartache yet she recounts her New England family's move to a California gold rush town with verve and wit. A rich historical novel.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

---

Customer Reviews

Karen Cushman's Best
When I was nearly finished with LUCY WHIPPLE my teacher told me that I might be assighned to that book for a book report. But that would have been fine with me, because I enjoyed it so much that I would've been glad to read it again.

LUCY WHIPPLE is set in the mid 1800's, the time of The California Gold Rush. It is about a girl whos mother decides to move from Massachusets to California to search for gold. Unfortunately, Lucy hates the town (Lucky Diggins) they move to, and wants to move back to Massachusets.

This book was funny, original, yet it had some features that every book must have. LUCY WHIPPLE had some sad parts that made me cry. But all books must have something sad. Some authors don't write the sad parts very well, but Cushman did a fabulus job. The ending suprised me, and I'm glad Cushman chose to end it like that. LUCY WHIPPLE is definately on my list of "Books That Everyone Must Read".

An exelent, realisic read
This a wonderfully realistic book about a girl with values, a girls we can all relate to some time or another. I like this book because, mainly, of the charectors and how real it seems. I'ts almost like you are there in the gold rush with Lucy, saving up gold in a pickle crock and trying to read Ivanhoe in between washing the dishes and making dinner for a tent full of dirty men trying to strike it rich. This is good book for anyone who likes realistic fiction, and a supurb heroine who wants to go back east.

Walking Lucy's path
I think that "The Ballad of Lucy Whipple" is a very good book because of how clearly the author shows Lucy's personality within the book. Such as when Lucy states "Mama, that gold you claimed is lying in the fields around here must be hidden by all the lizards, dead leaves, and mule droppings, for I can't see a thing worth picking up and taking home." Lucy hates California at first, until she understands the true beauty of it at the end of the book.

I also enjoyed how the story sucks you into a whirlepool of adventure and another world so that you can put yourself in Lucy's shoes and walk her path in the story. Like when the author writes, "Small tents, shacks, and brush-covered lean-tos huddled along one bank of the river." and
"The air, heavy with heaty and dust, burned my nose and stung my eyes."

I recommend this book to people who love adventure, a little humor, and who aren't afraid of history. The Ballad of Lucy Whipple makes you laugh when you least expect it and gives you a taste of gold rush life.