Name: Ida B
ISBN: 9780060730253

. . . and Her Plans to Maximize Fun, Avoid Disaster, and (Possibly) Save the World

Ida B

Katherine Hannigan

Ida B.

Sarah Sammis

Ida B. by Katherine Hannigan is about a girl who has to come to terms with some huge changes in her life. First and foremost, her mother has been diagnosed with cancer. Second, she can no longer be home schooled. Third, and perhaps, worst, for her, her parents have sold off a portion of their apple orchard.

Ida B. spends most of her free time in the orchard. She has names and personalities for each of the trees. Ida B. has her way of doing things. Being a precocious, only child, she has until now, gotten her way. Now, though, to her dismay, she has to adjust. It takes her nearly the full year at school to finally warm to her teacher.

I listened to the audio, a short three discs, performed by Lili Taylor. She just brought Ida B. to life. The things Ida B. goes through are just heart breaking and Taylor brings all that emotion to her performance.

Bambi Ard

Actual rating 2.5 stars. 

I picked up this book out of nostalgia— all my life I’ve had very fond, whimsical half-memories of reading this in the library at my elementary school, so when my coworker (shout-out to Randi!!) helped me finally find it again I was ecstatic to read it as an adult.

The first quarter of the book was lovely, and lived up to my memories— Ida B is a stubborn, ridiculous character that would have been very entertaining to me as a child, with a love for nature that rivaled my own. In fact, the memory that stuck out to me the most about this book was Ida B talking to the trees in her family’s orchard, and the trees talking back. At the age I was when I first read this book I use to do the exact same thing, so I was delighted finding a character in a book I could relate to in that way.

Ida B’s connection with and attitude towards nature is still my favorite thing about this book as an adult. Katherine Hannigan fit so many beautiful, delicately-worded lines about Ida B’s connection with nature into this book, lines that I’m happy young kids who read this will absorb into their psyche. An example of such a line, and one of my favorites, is: “I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and filled myself up with the breeze from the valley. Then I let it out slow so it could get back to its travels, with a little bit of me added to it.”

Where this book lost me, and why I gave it such a low rating, is everything after the first quarter. Now, when I first read this book as a child I either stopped reading once I got to this point, or I did read it and just totally forgot about it. As an adult, I can see why— Ida B’s life and personality undergo a dramatic change for the worse. I’m reluctant to call a fictional child “unbearable”, especially one going through the hardships Ida B is going through, but good god. And having to suffer through Ida B’s foul attitude and annoying antics would have been one thing if it had resolved at a normal pace, but Katherine Hannigan seemed determined to drag it out beyond all possible limits, and make it as overdramatic as possible at that. I see what she was going for, but it really soured my reading experience. I just feel it could’ve been done better, or at least condensed.

But whatever. I’m not the target audience anyway. As long as the kids enjoy it! And considering the lasting impression it made on me, it’s safe to say this is a great book for kids.

Ida B . . . and Her Plans to Maximize Fun, Avoid Disaster, and (Possibly) Save the World

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