The Franks' Literary Legacy

It's Christmas break and I have loaded the girls up with lots of reading material.  Today marks a new milestone, equivalent to a lunar moon landing, in the Franks' household:  Roxy is reading her first novel.

I do not recall Darby's first novel - it came very early and out of my control and my immediate reaction was, "You read what?  And when?"  Which explains a lot about Darby.  The reading spirit moves her in ways that cannot be understood or predicted.  She has always possessed a depth of knowledge and interest that she has never allowed to surface.  Finding out what Darby knows is serendipity - a happy and shocking accident.  Just this morning, while reading my daily quotes that come up on my google homepage, she immediately recognized a passage by Ray Bradbury, whom she informed me wrote Fahrenheit 451.  And she remembers all the details of said novel, even though she read it five months ago.  Did I know she had already read that iconic novel?  Hmm.  Maybe I did, but it just bleeds into the two novels a week she consumes like a man dying in a desert.

Roxy is different.  Roxy is led to books by her parents, her teachers, her advisors.  She does what she is coached to do, not by the act of a whimsical spirit to whom Darby responds.  Roxy is cautious about not reading something that she thinks will not appeal to her.  Her favorite writer is Mo Willems and she loves the Baby Mouse graphic novels - all cute, sweet books with animals that act like people.  Just like Roxy - the person who acts like a cute, sweet animal.

But today, Decemer the 19th, Roxy is reading The Boxcar Children.  She wants to read this book because she plays Boxcar Children with her cousin and her sister in the overstuffed garage.  She wants to read a book that does not feature animals.  She wants a real book with chapters.  And she has plowed through 50 pages in a very short time.

I wish I could remember what Darby's first novel was.  I bet Darby might remember, although she was probably 4 or 5 when she read it.  But for my little Roxy, I have the picture to mark the occasion.