[LISTENED TO: December 2015] From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler
I was sure that I had read this book. I have a copy of it and I knew the premise, but clearly, after listening to this audio book (at Sarah’s suggestion) I learned that I had not. And the book was awesome. All four of us enjoyed it a lot.
The story was great, but it may have had to do with Jill Clayburgh’s reading. I don’t really know anything about her and at first I wasn’t convinced that two kids from suburban Connecticut would have such strong New York accents, but they really worked. Especially when the kids started fighting and she had subtle distinctions between Claudia and Jaime.
Of course, the book itself is masterful. But there’s some really unusual choices in the book, which made me wonder how good it would be. It begins with a letter from Mrs Frankweiler to her lawyer, Saxonberg, (a rip-roaring intro to a kids book, eh?). This introductory device sets up the story in which Mrs Frankweiler tells the story of Claudia and Kincaid’s adventures in New York City. And it works wonderfully.
Claudia is feeling unappreciated so she decides to run away. She plans it for quite some time–how to do it, where to go and most importantly, what day to go (their band class day so they can use their instrument cases for storage). She needs an accomplice Of course two of her brothers are the reason she wants to run away, so she chooses the least offensive brother Jamie. It helps that Jamie is really good at saving money (and playing cards) and has amassed a small fortune.
Claudia has decided to hide in the The Metropolitan Museum of Art (Jamie wishes it was outside in the wilderness, but when she tells him they can sleep in a King’s bed, he’s pretty excited). They have a surprising amount of fun, hiding from the guards, eating at the automat and bathing in the fountain. Claude has planned this all very well. But she has no sense of when to go back. She’s not even sure if she misses home yet.
And then a mystery perks Claude’s interest. The Met begins displaying a statue that is causing all kinds of commotion. They learn that it might be a Michelangelo sculpture called Angel. The museum curators don’t know if it is indeed a Michelangelo, and now Claude has a mission (and a secret) to find out for sure the provenance of this statue.
Their research leads them to the person who donated the sculpture–Mrs Basil E. Frankweiler, and that is how the story comes full circle.
There are so many excellent parts to this story. The mystery is a good one, as is watching the kids try to figure it out. The fancifulness of hiding out in the Met is outstanding (and implausible in 2015). And Claude and Jamie are hilarious characters. Claude is constantly correcting Jamie’s grammar and he keeps getting mad at her for it. Our favorite of the bunch comes just as they are trying to find out the answer to the mystery of Angel. Jamie finds a major clue, but Claude has to correct him first:
“The rings the beer cans made would have crushed the plush of the velvet down. . . and the plush of this velvet is crushed up”
“What kind of a sentence is that? Crushed up!”
“Oh, boloney! You just go ahead and pick on my grammar. Go ahead pick on my grammar. But you can’t pick on my logic.”
And there was something about Clayburgh’s exasperated reading of Jamie that had us all cracking up. We now try to say boloney as often as possible
This book was a real delight. There’s something so wonderful about this story being set in 1968 with a ton of period details. And yet all the while, the story is largely timeless. And the ending is also a delight–there’s no big production, no over the top string swelling return, it’s just a great ending. And a great book.
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