The Secret Order of the Gumm Street Girls

The Secret Order of the Gumm Street Girls
Elise Primavera
HarperCollins Publishers
2006
Audio Read By: Colleen Delaney

Dedication: For my father, who is gone but will never leave me.

Target Age Group: Girls between 8 and 12.

Must Read
Good Read
Could Read

Best Experienced: This book can best be experience by either reading the book or listening to the CD.

Benefits of Reading the Book – The book has numerous illustrations throughout, so you get the author’s visualization as well as her textual description of the characters and the scenes.

Benefits of Listening to the CD – The CD is performed by .Colleen Delaney. It’s a very good interpretation of all of the characters in the book. She brings life to the characters.

Synopsis

This is the story of 4 girls, Franny Muggs, Cat Lemmonjello, Prudence (Pru) Gumm, and Ivy Diamond, all around 10 or 11, who live on the same block and attend the same school. You would expect them to be life-long friends, wouldn’t you? They are not. In fact, they don’t even like each other.

The story starts in early April in the whimsical town of Sherbet when Ivy moves into #5 Gumm Street, a ramshackled old house left to her mother by her late Aunt Viola. Ivy’s had a jinx following her for the past 6 years and 10 months because of a broken mirror, and she’s looking forward to a new start in Sherbet, a chance to live a normal life. Ha! Normal lives are for normal girls, and Ivy is anything but normal – she’s special. No, she doesn’t have magic, and she’s not a secret princess -- she is tenacious. When school ends and summer vacation starts, Ivy is in for the adventure of her life, tenacious or not, ready or not. And the other Gumm Street girls are there to help.

Book Review

The first part of the book sets up the town, its inhabitants, and the relationship between all of the girls. But the action really gets started on June 15th – that’s Chapter 11 – with Mr. Staccato’s Piano recital. But don’t skip straight to Chapter 11. The journey to Chapter 11 and afterwards is worth it.

This book weaves in elements from the Wizard of Oz. I generally don’t like stories that are steeped with other stories, as I think it shows a lack of creativity on the part of the author. However, in this case, the characters and the storyline are original enough that the inclusion of the Wizard of Oz enhanced the story rather than detracted from it.

Audio Review

Because this book is about 4 girls, it makes sense to have a woman reading it. Ms. Delaney does a very good job most of the time. The distinction between Pru’s and Cat’s voices was clear. Ivy and Frannie’s voices were not so distinct, particularly Frannie. Ivy had a slight accent, but Frannie’s voice was almost never that distinct.

Amazon Links

The Secret Order of the Gumm Street Girls Paperback

The Secret Order of the Gumm Street Girls CD


Characters

Prudence (Pru) Gumm – Pru lives at #1 Gumm Street. She has round glasses, long dark hair that she twirls in her fingers, or tosses over her shoulders, and she is ultra cautious. She has numerous safety rules that she can quote by number and verse and doesn’t hesitate to do so. She used to be best friends with Cat, but now she thinks Cat is stuck up.

Cat Lemonjello – Cat lives across the street on #2 Gumm Street. She is a tomboy (being the only girl in 11 children), has beautiful blond, shoulder length hair, is good at just about everything, and she has a pony. She likes being better than Pru, no matter what it is, and feels a little guilty about it at the same time. Being the 11th daughter of an 11th daughter, she is said to have ESP and has recently started consulting The Groovy I Ching, a hippie translation of the ancient Chinese I Ching by Cat’s mother. It seems to be like right-on, dude.

Franny Muggs – Franny lives at #3 Gumm Street, next door to Pru and across the street from Cat. Franny can’t play the piano, she can’t do a cartwheel…to be blunt, she’s a klutz. But this doesn’t stop her from wanting to reach the top. Her heroes are Sir Edmund Hillary (the first to climb Mt. Everest) and Amelia Earhart (the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic). She is never short of ideas, and most importantly, she knows the value of friendship.

Ivy Diamond moves into #5 Gumm Street, the house next door to Franny, at the start of the story, and she is the catalyst for the events that follow. The daughter of a beauty queen, she is thin as a twig with dirty blond hair, a gap in her teeth and ears that poke out. Sadly, she also has a jinx attached to her from a broken mirror. But her 7 years is almost up, and she’s looking forward to a normal life as a normal girl. She couldn’t be more wrong about this – she is very special, with or without the jinx.

Pearl Diamond – Ivy’s mother, a southern belle whose crowning glory was winning the Miss Venus Constellation of Stars beauty pageant, complete with a champagne colored Cadillac. But then the mirror broke, and Ivy got the jinx. Pearl lost everything, including her husband and the Cadillac. The last seven years had been very hard, but Pearl always had a smile and optimistic attitude.

Mr. Staccato – Mr. Staccato lives at #7 Gumm street, next door to Cat and across the street from Pru, Franny and Ivy. He is the piano teacher, who found his way to Sherbet 7 years earlier. I’d like to tell you more, but that would be telling.

Fred and Ginger – Two white, fat little terriers who have an amazing grasp of the English language and frequently mutter to themselves, “Did you ever?” “Never!”

Cha Cha Staccato – She is Mr. Staccato’s sister, no wait, his niece. Actually, she’s probably not related to him at all, but no one in Sherbet needs to know that. Everyone loves Cha Cha, everyone except the Gumm Street girls. And they have a very good reason for not liking her.

Aunt Viola – Aunt Viola was Pearl’s only living relative and the prior owner of #5 Gumm Street. She left the house to Pearl when she passed away.

Hieronymous Gumm – Founder of the Sherbet Academy, he believed every child had a special talent and the God-given right to develop it. That was the basis for Sherbet Academy. Sadly, he died long ago…he did, didn’t he?

Coco and Bling Bling – These are Cha Cha’s nieces, and they’re like, totally mean to the Gumm Street girls. They live in Spoz, more specifically, in the O of Spoz.

Maz – A very tall, very old potato. That’s not an insult, she’s actually a potato! In fact, she’s the oldest potato in Spudz, and as wise as can be. Her knowledge of Spoz and Spudz and