Lion’s Lair

Set in the year 1953, this story immediately made many connections for me.  I was 11 in 1953 as well.  Penny’s mother would not let her go swimming for fear of contracting polio in the public pool.  I remember those fears. 

But the story is not about me.  It is about the growing up a young girl who lives with her mother and grandparents.  Her mother is in the extreme protection mode when it comes to her daughter.  Her grandmother needs some help in the cooking department but love is a binding factor in the household.  Penny’s other part of the family, her father’s family is a large Italian conglomerate of interesting characters over flowing with love and family identity.  Penny learns and lives with both sides of her family.  While the story is not a high adventure, fast paced, and earth moving, it is a tender story of a girl growing and learning about “life” in the fascinating world we have been placed in.  She learns about secrets and boys, she feels for the strange and familiar, she learns to love and forgive. 

If you choose to read Penny, and I hope you do, be ready for some moments of self reflection.  It is through looking at oneself that one will gain the most from this little gold nugget of fiction wrought by Jennifer L. Holm