#MMGM Middle Grade review: Meg Goes to America

I'm posting today with the fantastic Marvelous Middle Grade Mondays blog hop hosted by Greg Pattridge of Always in the Middle. Check out Greg's blog for a list of additional middle grade reviews. 

IIRC I won today's book in a drawing from someone's web site. It then sat on my TBR pile (the real one, the one that might bury me in an earthquake) for so long that I don't remember from whom I got it. My thanks to you, whoever you are!

 

Title: Meg Goes to America

Author: Katy Hammel

Publication Info: 2020, 193 pages

Source: won it in a giveaway 

My Review:
Meg Goes to America is a fictionalized version of real-life events in the life of the author's mother. As a family story, it's pretty dramatic.  The book deals with some serious issues, and brings up a lot of good food for thought, but somehow it didn't grab me in the way that I think it might have done. 

One reason for that might be the writing style. The reading level is probably a little more toward lower elementary--maybe ages 7-9--though the subject matter at times might be a bit older. At least, it felt to me like it was written a little too simply for older readers. Readers of any age, however, can hear the things the book has to say about war, demonizing "the enemy," and the challenges of knowing what is right and doing it.

It is a very quick read (that simple writing style), and despite everything that happens, felt like a "quiet" read, without too much tension at any point. Meg definitely does some serious growing up over the course of the book, which covers, as far as I could tell, about a year of her life, but the tension never felt that real to me.

Overall, I should have been more excited about the book than I was. I think that the writing style created too much distance, and possibly the author's desire to remain true to her mother's story limited the ability to create real threats and challenges for Meg (I recognize this problem from my own attempts to turn my grandmother's stories into a children's book). I might also quibble at the need for a more careful editing, as there were a few words that stood out to me as used not quite correctly.

Despite all that, I do kind of want to read the next book and see how things come out for Meg in the next stage of her life! 

My Recommendation:
I think Meg Goes to America would be very useful in a classroom setting, where the students are learning about WWII. It will be accessible to a range of reading levels and the issues of the period are pretty well presented. The perspective on the war is undeniably unique.

  

FTC Disclosure: I won Meg Goes to America in a giveaway, and received nothing from the writer or publisher in exchange for my honest review.  The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."  



Rebecca M. Douglass, 2025
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