Summary:               
A Year Down Yonder is about a girl named Mary who moves from Chicago to her grandmother’s house. Her grandmother lives in the country. Mary’s grandmother was known to be trigger happy and kind of wild. They have all kinds of stuff happen to them over the course of the year. One of the most exciting situations is when Royce was going to be her tutor for Math because she’s wasn’t doing to well in Math and they heard a loud noise and a scream and then a girl came running down the stairs and she had a snake on her neck. Then a painter ran down the stairs and said, “I was painting a picture of her and it fell out of the rafters on her.” The painter had came to painta  picture earlier in the book. Also,  “grandma told everyone that I keep it up there to scare birds away from the house.” For the other adventures in the book you’ll have to read it to find out what they are!
 
Review:
         Do you like books about a crazy grandmother raising a kid? If you do then you will love A Year Down Yonder by Richard Peck. Mary and her grandmother have lots of adventures with crashing tractors, choking snakes, and falling fruit. Of course then there’s the grandmother who’s really trigger happy. The grandmother also has a sense of humor, and she doesn’t like animals in the house.   She thinks it’s just another mouth to feed. Mary’s grandmother is basically a country girl.
            In the story Mary comes from the city and moves to the country. She was used to an apartment but now she lives in an old house. She’s also not used to the rule in her grandmother’s house that animals live outside so Mary is forced to leave her cat Bootsie out in the barn. Her cat also had to get used to her surroundings because at first Bootsie was confused.   She was used to a cat food but Mary’s grandmother didn’t want to feed the cat  so Mary had to sneak Bootsie food.  Bootsie eventually got used the surroundings and began catching her own food. Mary and Bootsie had to get used the the new surroundings they were in.
            One day, Mary’s grandmother was baking a pie and she needed some fruit to make this pie. So her grandmother thought of a plan; she told it to Mary then they went to work. They went to Old Man Niquox’s house to get some peaches and Mary’s grandmother knew she could get all the peaches that are on the ground so she gets the Old Man’s tractor and crashes it into the tree. The peaches fall from the tree and Mary and her grandmother begin collecting the peaches. Old Man Niquox didn’t even hear them.
            If you enjoy a good book with some action then you should read A Year Down Yonder.  If you need to go to a new environment , you could learn a lot of things. It makes you think twice when you think a book is going to be boring. It is not full of action, but enough to keep you interested. So if have liked what you’ve heard, please read A Year Down Yonder.           

Reviewer: Justin C
House:      Androscoggin
Teacher:   Ms. Deshambeault
Date:        January 10, 2005