Jip

Jip, a young boy who lives on the poor farm has no knowledge of his family or any clue about where he came from other than the oft-told story that he fell off the back of a gypsy wagon when he was three years old. Then one day a peculiar stranger comes to town and starts poking around and asking about Jip's history.

This book does not have a good beginning. It took me a solid three chapters to get totally into it, but once I was in, I was hooked. There are so many themes in Jip, I wanted to stop to write a lesson every few chapters. It promotes kindness, compassion, love of reading, and many other values. I am putting this on my list of books to potentially teach to young middle schoolers.