Susan Campbell Bartoletti

Fleeing her oppressive aunt and uncle after the untimely deaths of her parents, 14-year-old Pringle becomes a nanny for the children of labor activists before the Great Fire of Chicago threatens her survival. By the author of the Newbery Honor-winning Hitler's Youth.

The Diary of Pringle Rose

Down the Rabbit Hole

Christine

Meredith Rose

I didn't realize how much I disliked like this book until I started to review it. I wrote a long synopsis of the entire plot in order to explain why I found the main character hypocritical, ignorant, and selfish, but it turned out so negative that I didn't have the heart to post it.

I'm disappointed because I really enjoyed the other book by Bartoletti in the Dear America series, A Coal Miner's Bride. In that book, we saw the perspective of the miners and their families. In Down the Rabbit Hole, Bartoletti is bold enough to flip the coin and write from the other perspective, that of a colliery owner's daughter. This might have been intriguing if the main character, Pringle, had learned or grown from anything she experienced. However, she is a stagnant character that never confronts the sad truth that her father treated people unjustly and ultimately paid the price for it.

Other issues: this book reads like a novel, not a diary. Also, we are led to believe the focus of the diary will be the Great Chicago Fire, but it ends up being an afterthought to Pringle's personal drama. It felt like Bartoletti chose Chicago as the setting and included the fire only so she could publish under the Dear America title. The fire did nothing whatsoever to further the plot.

To conclude, I suppose this made-up diary is a realistic picture of how most people live their lives - consumed with themselves and stuck in their own shoes and ways. But it isn't one I think history would want to remember, and it definitely isn't one that I want to.

Jeni Enjaian

Unlike most of the other books that I have read in this series, I did not think highly of the book. For a book that is supposed to be a diary, the narrative tends towards novel rather than diary. Yes, I understand that it is supposed to be a comprehensive narrative with a plot that has a beginning, middle and end. However, many of the other books in the series manage to contain that sort of a narrative within the confines of the diary format. In this book, Bartoletti muddies the distinction between Pringle's recounted memories of the past and her narrative of present events. I found the ending unsatisfactory perhaps due to a lack of real and believable characters. In my opinion, this book is one of the worst in the series.

Emily C Peterson

This book isn't about the Chicago fire at all. It's only in the last 12 pages of Pringle's diary.

Down the Rabbit Hole The Diary of Pringle Rose

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