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Summary: A Strange Old World
Review: Matilda Bone is an interesting story about a girl who studies with a priest. The priest leaves Matilda with a bone setter before he leaves on a trip to London. Matilda is not happy being a bone setter's apprentice. Everything her new mistress does is a sin. But Matilda begins to understand her new life and starts to believe in herself. This is a well written story. Matilda's feelings are believable. I found this book a little too religous, strange and unusual but in the end Matilda came through. Matilda mentions in the book that she is a duck among chickens. In other words very different from the people surrounding her. But only a duck can lay a duck egg. Matilda strives for higher accomplishments but she doesn't know how to do the simplest of things, such as cook, sweep and shop for goods, nor does she try to learn them,which gets very dull after a while. Matilda knows a different world but soon she knows two.
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Summary: A book for all ages, set in the Middle Ages!
Review: Matilda Bone is one of those books that any person of any age can read and really enjoy. While the recommended age levels are 9 - 12, I enjoyed the book and I am not in that age group.
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Summary: Another great Karen Cushman book
Review: Matilda is used to a life of material pleasures. She lives in a manor with Father Leufredus. He has to go to London and Matilda is dropped off at Blood and Bone alley with Red Peg the bonesetter. She is there dubbed Matilda Bone. She instantly hates the new life, for Red Peg doesn't follow any of the rules that Father Leufredus taught her to always obey. She eventually comes to realize that life with Red Peg is better than the life she lived before, for she has friends and people to be with. She realizes that Father Leufredus' rules aren't always the law, and that made me really happy because she was getting really worked up over the fact that Red Peg wasn't perfect. I loved this book and the topic that it was based around: Medieval medicine. I think Karen Cushman is one of the best authors around, and since Medieval England is a subject that I find very interesting, I have loved all of her books on the subject. I'm currently 13, and this book was definitely below my reading level, but I loved it all the same. It's a book that I think could be read by 5th grade and up. Enjoy!
Rating: 
Summary: Not what I would call a "MUST READ"...
Review: Matilda lives in Blood and Bone Alley, where she serves Peg the bonesetter. Matilda is very unhappy in her new life as a bonesetters assistant. Before moving in with Peg, Matilda lived in a manor where her life was filled only with prayer and study. In Peg's home she is expected to go to the market, tend the fire, and help treat patients. Surrounded by people who laugh and joke instead of pray and study, Matilda feels alone and misunderstood. She longs for her former life at the manor. But she cannot return to that life, and thus Matilda struggles to find contentment in her new one. While I enjoyed reading about life in Blood and Bone Alley, I did not like Matilda as a character or a person at all. While the setting and story are interesting, the overall disgust I felt with Matilda often overshadowed my enjoyment of the novel. This is a good book for someone who is interested in medieval times, medieval medicine, or in historical fiction and has a few hours to while away.
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Summary: Matilda is not a whiner, just a fish out of water...
Review: One thing that I find commendable about fiction writers like Karen Cushman is that they bring history to life for young readers. It's one thing to study medieval times in the classroom, but when a young person can absorb that history through the fictional life of a character in a story, history becomes much more interesting. Karen Cushman has always succeeded on that level with her earlier books, and does so in this one also. I think that another reason this new book succeeds is because it offers the story of a character out of her own element. Matilda leaves all that she finds familiar and comfortable, to enter an existence where all her rules of life until now no longer apply. The culture clashes that follow provide the reader with humor, and encourage empathy for Matilda. I bet that each young person who reads this will wonder, "What would I do in that situation?". And with that question in mind, the reader will be hooked on the story of Matilda Bone. What more could an author (or reader) want than that?
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Summary: Annoying Main Character
Review: The theme of Matilda Bone is an interesting one, medieval medicine, but Matilda really got annoying and was not a very good portrayal of a spirited main character. Matilda is a girl who was sent to be the apprentice of Red Peg the Bonesetter. If Matilda had only been clumsy and not fitting in, she might have been appealing, lovable, even. However, she named approximately 30 different saints to pray to constantly (who none of them were any help to her) and does it so you really get annoyed if you want the book to progress! Altogether, I enjoyed almost everything except for the obnoxious Matilda. If you don't have a lot of time and are looking for a good Karen Cushman read, try The Ballad of Lucy Whipple instead.
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Summary: Great Book!
Review: This book is really wonderful, because you can really get inside her (Matilda's) head. In a vague way relates to modern life of a teen. Trying to find out what you believe in, reconsidering if what you have been told is what you think, finding your own voice, and feeling completely and utterly out of place. This story takes place in the middle ages, and stars a fourteen-year-old girl named Matilda. She has been sent to be an assistant to Red Peg, the Bonesetter in Blood and Bone Alley. She comes from a fancy manor where she was taught about reading, writing, saints, sins, Hell, God, demons and other things of learning by Father Leufredus. Blood and Bone Alley is a poor area lined with shops. She stays with the Bonesetter, sort of like a modern day chiropractor. Red Peg expects her to be basically a servant, which she was sent to do. Matilda has a bit of trouble grasping that concept, for the hardest thing she had to do back at the manor was find her way to the privy in the dark. She thinks she is above all of these people, and is meant for higher things. You will get really involved in this book. I remember times when I wanted to reach into the book and strangle Matilda's puny little neck because she is the most ignorant person in the world at times! Other times I wanted to hug her because of her huge heart that is hidden under that tough exterior. I really reccomend this book to anyone looking for some light reading.
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Summary: Great Book!
Review: This book is really wonderful, because you can really get inside her (Matilda's) head. In a vague way the book relates to the modern life of a teen: Trying to find out what you believe in, reconsidering if what you have been told is what you think, finding your own voice, and feeling completely and utterly out of place. This story takes place in the middle ages, and stars a fourteen-year-old girl named Matilda. She has been sent to be an assistant to Red Peg, the Bonesetter in Blood and Bone Alley. She comes from a fancy manor where she was taught about reading, writing, saints, sins, Hell, God, demons and other things of learning by Father Leufredus. Blood and Bone Alley is a poor area lined with shops. She stays with the Bonesetter, sort of like a modern day chiropractor. Red Peg expects her to be basically a servant, which she was sent to do. Matilda has a bit of trouble grasping that concept, for the hardest thing she had to do back at the manor was find her way to the privy in the dark. She thinks she is above all of these people, and is meant for higher things. You will get really involved in this book. I remember times when I wanted to reach into the book and strangle Matilda's puny little neck because she is the most ignorant person in the world at times! Other times I wanted to hug her because of her huge heart that is hidden under that tough exterior. I really reccomend this book to anyone looking for some light reading.
Rating:
Summary: A great book on medieval medicine.
Review: When (in Medieval England) 14-year-old Matilda is apprenticed to Red Peg, the bonesetter, she feels like a duck among chickens. Raised to read French and Latin, to pray often and mortify the flesh, she suddenly finds herself in a world where literacy is vanishingly rare and not appreciated, where prayer is ignored and the flesh taken seriously. She begins to learn that prayer and religion is not the answer, but down-to-earth action is. This book is a marvelous window into medieval medicine (if that is not too grand of a word to use for it) and life in general. In it we meet a pompous stargazing doctor, an ill trained but capable woman physician, a leech, a near-sighted apothecary, and a host of others. The author added an interesting appendix on her research into medieval medicine, complete with a short bibliography, should you wish to read more on the subject. I must confess myself to being somewhat uncomfortable with the author's treatment of medieval Christianity, but I do not believe that her characters acted at all out of character for medieval people. So, I do recommend this short, but fascinating book.
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