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Title: Very good novel and excellent for teaching Freshman English
Review: Ms. Smith's novel is written in first person; the narrator, Susan, is a young girl who is unknowingly witnessing the disintegration of her family and is just beginning to experience adolescence. As a Freshman English teacher, I have great luck with the novel because the students understand and sympathize with Susan. The biggest problem with the novel is that Ms. Smith's narrator jumps out of voice, but it happens seldomly and actually makes for interesting class discussion about the differences between writers, readers, and characters. Its principal asset is that Dogbushes deals intelligently and sympathetically with a young girl's emotional and physical growth. It is a short novel and I find that the students actually read it because they like it. I teach the novel because I liked it when I read it many years ago, and I enjoy sharing it with my classes.
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