Judy Moody Declares Independence by Megan McDonald is a bright, bossy story for 7 year olds about a girl who visits Boston and comes home with ideas.<\/p>\n
She is in Boston with her mum, her dad and her brother. The Freedom Trail, the Boston Tea Party ship, Paul Revere’s house, a graveyard with genuinely famous people in it.<\/p>\n
She is having the time of her life. Her brother Stink is not.<\/p>\n
Stink wants the frog pond. Stink wants to know when they can stop looking at old things that are not even there any more. Stink gets pooed on by a pigeon outside a church and immediately makes up a song about it.<\/p>\n
Judy’s three best things about Boston are all freedoms. No school. No sitting next to Stink in the car. No brushing her hair.<\/p>\n
Which is the joke the whole book runs on. Judy discovers the word independence and starts using it on her own family within the hour.<\/p>\n
Hear ye! Hear ye! she announces, before declaring freedom from ever brushing her hair again. Stink immediately declares freedom from brushing his teeth.<\/p>\n
The history is properly done. Mum and Dad explain the unfair taxes, the Stamp Act, why the tea went into the harbour, and Judy gets to heave a bale of it off the side of the ship herself.<\/p>\n
There is a lovely moment when an English girl on the same deck is offered a turn and politely says no, she quite likes tea. Stink calls her a Redcoat. Judy has never met anybody from another country before and is thrilled.<\/p>\n
Then the two of them insult each other with historical words all the way to the gift shop. Lobsterback. Chowder Head. Blue Belly.<\/p>\n
What makes Judy such good company is that she is never even slightly calm. Everything is either RARE or NO FAIR. The book is full of her lists, her capitals and, at one point, her own sketch of Mother Goose’s grave.<\/p>\n
One thing to know before you start. This is American history taught by American parents, and a British child will be meeting Paul Revere and John Hancock for the first time. It is explained clearly as it goes, so it works, but it is a history lesson as well as a story.<\/p>\n
Stink has earned a series of his own after being the punchline all the way through this one. Stink and the Incredible Shrinking Kid opens with him making Judy measure him every single morning and getting exactly the same answer, three feet eight inches, every single time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Judy Moody Declares Independence by Megan McDonald is a bright, bossy story for 7 year olds about a girl who visits Boston and comes home with ideas. She is in Boston with her mum, her dad and her brother. The Freedom Trail, the Boston Tea Party ship, Paul Revere’s house, a graveyard with genuinely famous […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":11013,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"lr_next_read_post_id":8737,"lr_next_read_anchor":"Stink and the Incredible Shrinking Kid","lr_seo_hook":"A girl learns the word independence in Boston and uses it on her family."},"book_tag":[23],"age_group":[19],"book_type":[1044],"book_author":[706],"class_list":["post-7820","our-books","type-our-books","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","book_tag-funny-books","age_group-books-for-7-year-olds","book_type-paid","book_author-megan-mcdonald"],"yoast_title":"Judy Moody Declares Independence by Megan McDonald | Little Reads","yoast_metadesc":"A girl learns the word independence in Boston and uses it on her family. For ages 7+. 3,000+ books in the Little Reads app. 7-day free trial.","acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n