Hooray for Anna Hibiscus!
Recommended. Age: 7+. A Catholic review of this book for parents.
Our review
A warm, gentle book about a girl inside a loving extended family where elders are honored and children are taught by patience. Anna learns courage, and the visit to a poor neighborhood plants real compassion. It never names God, but it builds charity and hope through natural virtue. The reservation: readers call the poverty chapter dark, and it can frighten small listeners.
For parents
Read aloud from 5, independent reading from 7. Kirkus puts it at 5 to 9. Preview the poverty chapter, with its beggar girl and garbage heap, before reading it to a small child. Ask how Anna's grandparents teach her without shouting. Then ask what Jesus asks us to do for people who have little.