The View From Saturday

Locations
Call Number: R Newbery Medal 1997, Y Fiction / Konigsburg, E. L., Kids Book / Fiction / General / Konigsburg, E. L.
On Shelf At: Downtown Library, Traverwood Branch

Location & Checkout Length	Call Number	Checkout Length	Item Status
Downtown Kids Reference 0-week checkout	R Newbery Medal 1997	0-week checkout	Library Use Only
Downtown Kids Books 4-week checkout	Y Fiction / Konigsburg, E. L.	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Downtown Kids Books 4-week checkout	Y Fiction / Konigsburg, E. L.	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Downtown Kids Books 4-week checkout	Y Fiction / Konigsburg, E. L.	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Downtown Kids Books 4-week checkout	Y Fiction / Konigsburg, E. L.	4-week checkout	Due 05-15-2024
Downtown Kids Books 4-week checkout	Y Fiction / Konigsburg, E. L.	4-week checkout	Due 05-12-2024
Downtown Kids Books 4-week checkout	Y Fiction / Konigsburg, E. L.	4-week checkout	Due 05-17-2024
Traverwood Kids Books 4-week checkout	Kids Book / Fiction / General / Konigsburg, E. L.	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Pittsfield Kids Books 4-week checkout	Kids Book / Fiction / General / Konigsburg, E. L.	4-week checkout	Due 05-13-2024

Four students, with their own individual stories, develop a special bond and attract the attention of their teacher, a paraplegic, who chooses them to represent their sixth-grade class in the Academic Bowl competition.

REVIEWS & SUMMARIES

School Library Journal Review
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Summary / Annotation
Fiction Profile
Excerpt
Author Notes

COMMUNITY REVIEWS

Good submitted by bluepapaya on June 14, 2014, 5:05pm This is a sweet story.

Wonderful and enchanting book submitted by glenna on June 20, 2016, 8:56pm A group of 4 students join a disabled teacher in an academic challenge game. They build friendships and support systems.

Lovely submitted by sydcha on August 4, 2019, 1:38pm The plot of this book jumps around a lot, but you can still easily follow it. I liked the unconventional flow of the story.

Disappointing & Problematic submitted by schriste on July 11, 2021, 7:56am I picked this up to read with my kids because we all enjoyed From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. Although both books were Newbery Medal winners, The View From Saturday falls far short.

I didn't enjoy the plot structure and the characters weren't believable as sixth graders, but that's not what prompted me to write this review. What really stuck out and what I couldn't look beyond were old attitudes about weight and race that were so tone deaf we stopped reading multiple times to discuss what we'd just read. One main character repeatedly comments about minor character's another's weight in unfavorable ways that didn't strike me as fat-shaming but was just--why? This isn't important. Why is the character making an issue about it? Why is Konigsburg making an issue of it?

But the biggest problems are about race. Mr. Singh is weirdly exoticized as some kind of mystic Indian guy who makes mysterious pronouncements like some kind of human 8 Ball. Julian Singh is described like this: "He didn't look British. His skin was the color of strong coffee with skim milk--no cream--added; the undertones were decidedly gray. His lips were the color of a day-old bruise. He had more hair than you would think a single skull could hold. His hair--blue-black of a Chinese of Japanese but had the soft look of fabric" (p. 66).

Where do I even start with that short description??

Later on the characters adopt a noose as a symbol for their team. That's right: a noose. And no one--not the characters or Konigsburg or anyone who gave it the Newbery--seem aware of the hatred for Black people and the violence perpetrated against them that this one symbol represents.

Konigsburg isn't fully oblivious or unaware about respectful representation. One character mistakes Julian for Indigenous when he says that he's Indian, and Konigsburg writes "everyone--even those who had not had diversity training at taxpayer expense--knew that even though it was correct to recognize a person's ethnicity, it was not correct to comment on it in public" (p.137).

Some might excuse the attitude in the quote above and say Konigsburg and her story are a product of their time (1996) -- but of course, there were people in 1996 who could have recognized the many problems in this book. So bottom line? In 2021 this book just doesn't hold up. It lacks the timelessness of From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler and if you're considering reading it because you loved Konigsburg's first Newbery medal: PASS.

Great Memories from Childhood in the 1990s submitted by Kitty4777 on August 8, 2022, 11:39pm Read a separate review that put the lens of today on this book- and I think all of their points are valid. Lots of problematic content.

My addition is that I loved this book growing up in the 90s. We are all a product of our own time, so ymmv!