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theresidentbookworm's review against another edition
3.0
This probably one of my favorite Who Was books for two reasons. The first reason is that I love Eleanor Roosevelt. I think she was a kick-ass lady, and I consider her one of my heroes. She had an interesting but hard life filled with both joy and sorrow. She was an orphan by ten with only her little brother left to take care of. Eleanor fell in love with her distant cousin Franklin, but that relationship was doomed from the start. With a mother in law like Sara Franklin, I'm surprised the marriage even lasted.
Which leads me to the second reason why I like this book: It was the first time I'd ever read about a president lying or being dishonest. When you're a kid, you look up to presidents as gods. You put them on a pedestal and then say that they surely couldn't have done anything too horrible. It's really a pivotal moment in your life when something pushes a president off the pedestal. Reading about FDR's affair with his secretary was my moment. Of course, this didn't go into nearly as much detail about that as it could've, but I guess we don't want to push the presidents off the pedestal too fast. We might scare the kids into thinking that they can't trust adults. *mock-gasps* And then maybe they'll think about all the lies they're told and realize that Santa's not real. *dramatic background music* Oh my god, how ever could we live in such a world? *rolls eyes*
I'd definitely recommend to younger kids learning about first ladies or who just like history. And yes, those kids do exist. Trust me, I was one of them. We're a rare species, but we still exist nonetheless
Which leads me to the second reason why I like this book: It was the first time I'd ever read about a president lying or being dishonest. When you're a kid, you look up to presidents as gods. You put them on a pedestal and then say that they surely couldn't have done anything too horrible. It's really a pivotal moment in your life when something pushes a president off the pedestal. Reading about FDR's affair with his secretary was my moment. Of course, this didn't go into nearly as much detail about that as it could've, but I guess we don't want to push the presidents off the pedestal too fast. We might scare the kids into thinking that they can't trust adults. *mock-gasps* And then maybe they'll think about all the lies they're told and realize that Santa's not real. *dramatic background music* Oh my god, how ever could we live in such a world? *rolls eyes*
I'd definitely recommend to younger kids learning about first ladies or who just like history. And yes, those kids do exist. Trust me, I was one of them. We're a rare species, but we still exist nonetheless