I saw this post on the National Museum of American History’s blog when it first came out. Entitled “My Tweenage Historical Bookshelf,” I got all excited. And then I read the post and I was no longer as excited.
My roommate sent me a link to the post earlier this week and we had the following conversation via e-mail:
L: A short blog post from the Smithsonian – seemed like a subject you might enjoy. I haven’t read any of the books she lists, but I didn’t scroll through the comments – there may be some there that were my favorites too.
Me: I saw this back when it was first posted. In my opinion, the entire quality of the post is diminished when she mentions the American Girl books. Those books are terrible!
L: I have to admit, I can be pretty snobby about them too. But they’re SO popular. Sigh.
Me: They’re like a gate-way drug to real historical fiction.
L: This made me laugh. But I think maybe they’re just bad like drugs – real historical fiction is good-for-you/rehab, maybe?
So, what are your thoughts? Are we complete book/history snobs?
And a note: I’m just talking about the American Girl books, not the dolls. As a kid, I would have killed for one of those dolls but thought the books were incredibly boring. Heck, as an adult, I would probably still kill for a one of the dolls.
Leave a Reply