Book Review
Meet Lina by Sally Rippen
(This is a book review for Middle Years school students aged about ten
to fourteen years of age. I have written the review using the language
and style that I would write for Year Levels 5 to 8 in a school library blog)
When did your family first come to Australia and where did they come
from? Lina (Carmelina) Gattuso’s
parents originally came from Italy and arrived in Melbourne not very long after the
end of the Second World War. In Australia today we celebrate the cultural diversity
of our nation and our people but when thousands of migrants came here in the 1940s and 1950s the
Australians living here at that time were not always so welcoming.
Meet Lina is the first book in one of the next episodes of the Our Australian
Girls series http://www.ouraustraliangirl.com.au/.
The Year is 1956 and Lina is trying desperately to fit into her new school, St
Brigid’s Ladies College, a rather posh
and expensive school in Ivanhoe, Melbourne, that she is only able to afford to go to because
she has won a scholarship. Lina’s parents are Italian, speak broken English and
work at rather menial jobs. The extended family includes her Nonna
(grandmother), Uncle Zio, little brother Enzo and older brothers, Pierino and Bruno. The family somehow all fit in to
small terrace cottage situated on a laneway off Lygon Street, Carlton. This is in
huge contrast to her best friend Mary Doveton. Mary lives in a large designer house just
around the corner from St. Brigid's with her mother (a former model) and businessman
father (who regularly travels overseas). Lina through various means (including
a few white lies … tsk, tsk) manages to keep her two worlds apart. However, her
nemesis, Sarah Buttersworth, will soon have her worlds colliding (or will she?).
Lina has a burning ambition to be a journalist but her idea to write a magazine
with her friend Mary will, after a number of twists and turns, mean she will soon
have to work with Sarah who thinks parmesan cheese smells like vomit (which it
does but it is delicious to eat) and that the suburb of Carlton is unsanitary
and a slum. 
This is a delightful story written in very easy to read language about
the struggles of a first generation Italian girl to be part of a new Australia.
We catch glimpses of her warm home life and how hard the whole family works to
make a success of their adopted country. We see Lina torn between love for her
family and shame for their differences. Will Lina learn to embrace her diversity?
Rippen, S. (2013). Meet Lina. Melbourne : Puffin Books (Penguin Group).
My daughter and I just looooove the whole series! thanks for posting your review, I enjoyed reading it. Do you also read the American Girl series? what do you mean by levels 5-8? is that a reading scheme? (sorry for my ignorance!)
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for your nice comments, I'm glad you enjoyed my review. In Victoria Year Levels are students' Grades or Form levels - Years 5 & 6 would be upper primary or elementary school and Years 7 & 8 would be the first two years of high school or junior high school in many places around the world. In schools that range from Prep or Kindergarten to Year 12 (P/K-12 schools) Years 5 to 8 are often referred to as the Middle School (sometimes Year 9 is also included). I didn't know there was an Our American Girl series - I must keep an eye out for books from the series.
Delete