That wise Latina Sonia Sotomayor recently acknowledged that she, like many women of a certain age was influenced by the Nancy Drew mysteries, the seminal book series for young girls. I was thinking about Nancy Drew the other day when my middle school-age son and I were searching his recommended summer reading list for at least one book that wasn’t about vapid vampires or suicidal citizens.
Reading YA books used to be the equivalent of being given a moral compass. Peril loomed, the plucky hero or heroine figured out right from wrong, and soon all was well with the world. Not so today’s young adult literature. Two popular choices on my son’s suggested list are written from beyond the grave. I’m not referring to Twilight although that is also on there. I’m talking about Elsewhere in which the female protagonist, an accident victim, is dead and Thirteen Reasons Why in which the female protagonist, a suicide is of course, dead. Add to these uplifting choices, several others wherein the main characters are all coming of age as they grapple with problems that would make President Obama throw up his hands in surrender. I know it’s a changed world and that kids today were weaned on Disney films wherein adversity is established at the outset in the form of a dead parent but c’mon, there’s a limit. Even my son will stop in the middle of his required reading to sigh aloud and say, “Mom, this book is so depressing!”
What would Nancy do? She’d probably toss these books into the back of her roadster and drive them to the nearest dump. That’s why in this era of fashion dolls dressed like little hookers, I’ve been known to pump my fist in the air at the advent of Word Girl and other redeeming influences. I recently read a book not aimed at young adults but it surely could’ve been. In The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, the plucky heroine Flavia de Luce is a strong, smart, savvy 11 year old with a passion for chemistry and a penchant for sleuthing. The author, Alan Bradley is already writing a sequel which I hope will become a regular series. One that would make Nancy Drew proud.
