Where the Red Fern Grows

Rawls, Wilson. Where the Red Fern Grows

April 26th 1961 by Doubleday Books for Young Readers 
May 3rd 2016 by Penguin Random House

There is a new cover of this classic title being published today, and since it is a book that frequently gets worn out and needs to be replaced, I was glad that Penguin Random House asked me to mention it. 

When my daughter was in fifth grade (the year before our dog Sylvie joined our household), she was bound and determined to read this book in one night and take the Accelerated Reader test the next day. This is a 300 page book, and although she is a strong reader, I had enough doubts that I bet her a copy of the book that she couldn't finish it. 

The 1961 cover.

Guess what I had to buy the next day?

I'm not normally a fan of sad books, or books set in the Ozarks, and I have to admit that I deaccessioned my library copy of Summer of the Monkeys a few years ago, since it was a prebind and smelled really bad, but this is still a title that middle grade libraries definitely need to have!


There's a nice article on the celebration of 50 years in print of this title here. (Although I'm a little confused as to why they waited until 55 years to reissue!)