Oooh. I have mixed feelings about this story. It's been sitting on my shelf for years, when it was first recommended to me as a perfect family read-aloud. So, I finally read it. In short, it's a jolly tale of rompin', rollickin' hilarity with just enough negative thrown in to keep it from being the perfect family read-aloud. The essentials. Meet Jay Berry. It's the late 1800s, and his family is farming on Oklahoma land, poor enough to make a fly weep. They're always struggling to make one end meet the other. Jay Berry is a twin, and his twin sister was born with a crippled leg. Papa and Mama have been saving every penny they possibly can since the twins were born to pay for the operation Daisy needs to make her leg straight so she can walk. Jay Berry's sole ambition in life is to own his own pony and a .22 rifle. This particular summer a circus train wrecks, and 29 trained monkeys escape into the woods next to Jay Berry's family farm. The circus owners are paying $2 a monkey, and $100 for the leader - a large, brilliant specimen of a primate. That's enough for a pony AND a .22. But they have to be caught alive. And Jay Berry decides that he's gonna catch 'em. So the entertainment begins. And, boy, does it ever.The good. Jay Berry loves his Dad & Grandpa and relies on their advice to help him catch the monkeys. They work with him when it gets too difficult for him to do by himself. He tries his best, and he is determined to accomplish his mission, no matter how hard. Everything goes wrong ...really, it is quite hilarious... but he keeps trying. Through a conversation with Grandpa Jay Berry finally realizes that he is focused on satisfying his own dreams instead of devoting himself to the good of his whole family. At the conclusion of the book he makes a sacrifice - a really hard one. I don't ever remember tearing up while reading a book before. Movies, yes. Books, no. But I'll admit that I had misty eyes on this one. It was just so, so sweet.The not-so-good. Well, when it rains, it pours. And I guess when it's not-so-good it can get pretty bad. Okay, here goes.- The siblings squabbled the e.n.t.i.r.e. time. Making fun of each other for this, getting back at each other for that... Pointless, unnecessary, useless, and all of those other synonyms. - The author portrayed women as strictly-practical creatures who have no desire or tolerance for adventure or fun of any kind and who get out-of-their-mind worried over anything involving risk. (Like panicking over a 14-year old boy walking near the riverbed...) Sometimes this manifested itself by Moma getting in a fluster and scolding Papa over something she didn't like. Other times it meant Jay Berry being disrespectful and "knowing just what to say to wear her down." when she didn't want him to do something she thought was dangerous. Other times, it's comments like "Women! I'll never understand them.", "You can't tell them anything.", "Women can't see things like men do.", and "They don't mean half of what they say, anyhow." In short, this one dynamic put a major damper on the fun and sweetness of the story.- There isn't any cursing, but there is quite a bit of slang language substitutions.- Daisy claims to see an invisible individual who she calls "Old Man of the Mountain". He "watches you all the time" and "gives you good luck or bad luck when you please or displease hime". When Jay Berry balks about it, Dad tells him that he thinks it might be Jesus who visits Daisy regularly as an act of mercy, since she's crippled. Come, come, now, dears...- Finally, there's a fairy ring. And this fairy ring has magical powers. When you step inside the ring and make a wish, it comes true. So each one of them makes a wish inside the ring, and each one of their wishes come true. After all of the wonderful things happen, the book closes with Jay Berry saying that he'll always believe in the fairy ring. *sigh* *and growl* I would say more about this point, except it would give away the outcome of the plot... But remember that sweet conclusion of the story I mentioned? It was totally ruined because the fairy ring gets the credit. Conclusion. So like I said, I have mixed feelings about the book. The meat of the story - the plot itself - was wonderful. Completely charming and quite hilarious in every way. It even had a strong moral point. But those extra elements really took away from the positive essence. And the sad thing is that they were all completely unnecessary. They didn't add a single anything to the story.Now that you have the evidence before you, my dear Watson, you may examine the case yourself. ;)P.S. Summer of the Monkeys is written by the author of the Where the Red Fern Grows.
Summer of the Monkeys is one of my all time favorite books. The time period is in the late 1800's. It is about a 14 year old boy named Jay Berry who lives in the Ozark mountains. His life is full of adventure exploring in the river bottoms. His life is flipped upside down when he finds monkeys in the river bottoms. A train wreck allowed the monkeys to escape from the circus. There is a very large reward for the capture of the monkeys. Jay Berry sets out to capture these monkeys and get enough to buy a pony and a 22 rifle, his lifelong dream. His adventures are hilarious as he goes about trying to catch these monkeys. Daisy, Jay Berry's twin sister who has a crippled leg from birth is one of the main characters. She is kind and loving. She loves all the animals in the woods and doctors anyting that need is, including Jay Berry and his dog, Rowdy. Jay Berry's parents are poor people and don't have the money to get Daisy's leg fixed. One of my favorite passages from the book is right after Daisy finds a fairy ring and they all make a wish. Jay Berry asks his dad if he believes the wishes they made at the fairy ring will come true. His dad says:" Son, that's a pretty hard question to answer. But I do beleive that any wish you make can come true if you help the wish. I don't think that the Lord meant for our lives to be so simple and easy that every time we wanted something, all we had to do was wish for it and we'd get it. I don't beleive that at all. If that were true, there would be alot of lazy people in this old world. No one would be working. Everyone would be wishing for what they needed or wanted."Papa," I asked, "how can you help a wish?""Oh, there are alot of ways," Papa said. "Hard work, faith, patience, and determination. I think prayer and really believing in your wish can help more than anything else."This book is filled with endearing characters. Jay Berry's Grandpa, Daisy and his mother and father and Rowdy, Jay berry's dog.This book is about family and what matters most in this life. I would highly recommend this book to all ages. I am kind of sad that I just finished reading this book to my youngest child. They all have loved it!
What do You think about Summer Of The Monkeys (1998)?
I read this book to our sons, 12 & 10 years old. We all really enjoyed the story and the boys asked for me to read on to find out what would happen next to John Barry. I also LOVED hearing my boys laugh out loud through out our reading. Not only did it do my heart good, but it also confirmed that they not only were listening, but that they understood the story and the humor. Very rich text, great imagery and grateful for the underlying Christian theme with the "Old Man of the Mountains" character. I would NOT recommend watching the movie; however, this was a great experience for our youngest son. He started watching the movie after we had finished the book and was shocked at the different story line, characters and other scenes in the movie that were not in the book. He stopped watching the movie. Now he understands why I argue that I will NEVER watch a movie either before I have read the book (if it is on my wish list) or after I have read and loved a book. I tell him that my imagination always, always is so much better than anything they can put on a movie screen :-)
—Beth Hallmark
I really enjoyed this book. I read this to my 3 boys before bed (ages 7, 5, and 2). The 2 youngest went to sleep pretty quick, but the oldest couldn't get enough of it. One night while reading it, my oldest told me "I love this book, it has everything boys love in it!"I am currently reading Where the Red Fern Grows to the boys, and I really think so far this is a superior book. The writing is tighter, the story is better, and the general feel is just a more polished work. I'm surprised that Where the Red Fern Grows is so much more popular than this one.A word to the wise, I hunted down a copy of the Disney Movie from the late 90's so my boys could watch it once we finished the book and it was nigh unwatchable. If I had watched the movie first, I would never have read the book (it's almost like Disney wrote the script off of a dust jacket synopsis of the book, so much changed and added for no good reason). Wish this book had a better movie treatment, but oh well, the book is still fantastic. I bet girls would like it too, but probably not as much as boys.
—Mark Stevenson
The genre of this book is fiction. I choose this book because it sounded pretty good. Jay Berry Lee lives with his Mom, Dad, and sister in Oklahoma Cherokee Ozark. It takes place during the 1800's. His Grandma and Grandpa live there too. His Grandpa owns a store in Cherokee Ozark. Jay lives on a farm and has a dog named Rowdy. One day he was in the bottoms and Rowdy treed a monkey which Jay had never seen a monkey in the bottoms before. Jay told his family about the monkey. His grandpa told him that there was a reward for the monkey. There were small monkeys that are worth two dollars and a big monkey that was worth a hundred dollars. This made Jay very excited to capture the monkeys and he had his grandpa and dad helped him out. Jay want to capture the monkeys because he wants to get a pony and a .22 gun. The monkeys were trained monkeys that got away from a circus train. The big monkey was really smart and kept getting away from Jay and Rowdy. The central conflict of this book is man vs nature because Jay is trying to capture the monkeys. The theme is that you should never give up and keep trying. Jay does not capture the monkeys but he keeps trying because he wants the money so he can get a pony and a .22. The writing style of the author is funny because he makes the monkeys laugh at Jay. I would recomend this book to others because it was a good book that will keep you wondering if Jay will capture the monkeys or not.
—Brandon Willard
