A Taste of Blackberries
Encyclopedia
A Taste of Blackberries is an award-winning children's book by Doris Buchanan Smith
Doris Buchanan Smith
Doris Buchanan Smith was an award-winning author of children’s books distinguished for their realism.- Works :...

 about a boy whose best friend dies.

Background

In the early 1970's editors believed that because of its theme, involving the death of a child, the story was more suitable for adults than for children, and A Taste of Blackberries was rejected by at least three publishers before being accepted by Thomas Y. Crowell Company (now HarperCollins
HarperCollins
HarperCollins is a publishing company owned by News Corporation. It is the combination of the publishers William Collins, Sons and Co Ltd, a British company, and Harper & Row, an American company, itself the result of an earlier merger of Harper & Brothers and Row, Peterson & Company. The worldwide...

). Published in 1973, with illustrations by Charles Robinson, the book has never been out of print. Cynthia Westway wrote in The Atlanta Journal, 1973, "Smith deals honestly and emphatically with the range of emotions... the story is not, however, an elegy; but a celebration of the continuity of the life-death cycle." In the Times Literary Supplement, 1975, David Rees
David Rees (author)
David Bartlett Rees was a British author, lecturer and reviewer. Much of his work was written for children and young adults. His books included The Exeter Blitz, which won the Carnegie Medal for 1978.-Biography:...

, wrote "It will be difficult to find a children's book this autumn by a new author as good as Doris Buchanan Smith's A Taste of Blackberries . . . Smith’s success lies in knowing how to handle the theme with exactly the right balance of sensitivity, humour and open emotion." In her review of the Spanish language edition for the School Library Journal
School Library Journal
The School Library Journal is a monthly magazine with articles and reviews for school librarians, media specialists, and public librarians who work with young people. Articles cover a wide variety of topics, with a focus on technology and multimedia. Reviews are included for preschool to 4th grade,...

(2002), Ann Welton wrote that A Taste of Blackberries is "rightfully viewed, along with Katherine Paterson
Katherine Paterson
Katherine Paterson is an American author of children's novels. She wrote Bridge to Terabithia and has received several of the major international awards for children's literature.- Early life:...

's Bridge to Terabithia
Bridge to Terabithia
Bridge to Terabithia is a work of children's literature about two lonely children who create a magical forest kingdom. It was written by Katherine Paterson and was published in 1977 by HarperCollins. In 1978, it won the Newbery Medal...

, 1977, as one of the seminal children's books on the subject of death."

In a Publisher’s Weekly article in which children’s book editors were asked to share thoughts on books they wish they had published, former Executive Editor of Viking Penguin, Deborah Brodie, named A Taste of Blackberries as her choice. She recalled, "When A Taste of Blackberries was published in 1973, it was an act of courage. No one had ever written a middle-grade novel about the death of a child from the point of view of another child."

In an essay on Doris Buchanan Smith for the Dictionary of Literary Biography
Dictionary of Literary Biography
The Dictionary of Literary Biography is a specialist encyclopedia dedicated to literature. Published by Gale, the 375-volumes set covers a wide variety of literary topics, periods, and genres, with a focus on American and British literature....

, Hugh T. Keenan noted that the author had not intended to write about death. The idea had popped into her head while writing, and that, not wanting to pursue such a tragic turn of events, the author had set the book aside. When she returned later to complete it, the author utilized the theme to explore the differences in the ways in which children and adults respond to mortality.

Plot summary

As told from the point of view of the unnamed narrator
Narrator
A narrator is, within any story , the fictional or non-fictional, personal or impersonal entity who tells the story to the audience. When the narrator is also a character within the story, he or she is sometimes known as the viewpoint character. The narrator is one of three entities responsible for...

, the story begins as he and his best friend Jamie go blackberry picking. We follow the boys as they take part in a series of exploits - some told in current narrative time, some revealed in poignant flashbacks - allowing the reader to witness their world and shared experience. When one of the boys tragically dies as a result of an allergic reaction to bee stings, the narrator struggles to cope with denial, grief, guilt, and loneliness, before coming to terms with the loss. The setting for the story is a Maryland
Maryland
Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...

 suburb, near the author's childhood home in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....


Characters

  • Jamie is a "show-off and a clown". While he can be exasperating, his adventurous and

resourceful nature earns the admiration of his best friend.
  • The narrator, Jamie’s appreciative audience and partner in fun, enjoys their friendship,

even if, at times, Jamie can go too far.
  • Heather, with red-gold hair, is the closest friend of both Jamie and the narrator.
  • Jamie's mother cares for a family of three, including Jamie, four-year-old Martha, and an

infant son.
  • The narrator's mother and father care for the narrator and a college-age daughter who is

away at summer camp as a counselor. They also have a son who is grown and married.
  • Mrs. Houser, Jamie's next door neighbor, is tyrannical when it comes to her perfect lawn.

The children in the neighborhood avoid her, and her lawn, if they possibly can.
  • Mrs. Mullins' "secret garden" is off limits to most of the children in the neighborhood.

The narrator feels privileged to be an exception, mainly because Mrs. Mullins and his mother are
friends.

Literary significance

In the St. James Guide to Young Adult Writers, Hugh T. Keenan observed that "in dealing directly with the death of a child's playmate, it broke a taboo of twentieth-century American children's fiction."

Jim Trelease
Jim Trelease
Jim Trelease , also known as James Joseph Trelease, is an educator and author who stresses reading aloud to children as a way to instill in them the love of literature.-Life:...

 wrote in The Read-Aloud Handbook
Jim Trelease
Jim Trelease , also known as James Joseph Trelease, is an educator and author who stresses reading aloud to children as a way to instill in them the love of literature.-Life:...

(Penguin Books
Penguin Books
Penguin Books is a publisher founded in 1935 by Sir Allen Lane and V.K. Krishna Menon. Penguin revolutionised publishing in the 1930s through its high quality, inexpensive paperbacks, sold through Woolworths and other high street stores for sixpence. Penguin's success demonstrated that large...

, 2006), "The sensitivity with which the attendant sorrow and guilt are treated makes this an outstanding book. It blazed the way for the many other grief books that quickly followed, but few have approached the place of honor this one holds."

Prior to A Taste of Blackberries, only Charlotte's Web
Charlotte's Web
Charlotte's Web is an award-winning children's novel by acclaimed American author E. B. White, about a pig named Wilbur who is saved from being slaughtered by an intelligent spider named Charlotte. The book was first published in 1952, with illustrations by Garth Williams.The novel tells the story...

, 1952, by E. B. White
E. B. White
Elwyn Brooks White , usually known as E. B. White, was an American writer. A long-time contributor to The New Yorker magazine, he also wrote many famous books for both adults and children, such as the popular Charlotte's Web and Stuart Little, and co-authored a widely used writing guide, The...

, had as its main theme, the death of one of its principal characters. In The Marble in the Water: Essays on Contemporary Writers of Fiction for Children and Young Adults (1980), British author and essayist David Rees
David Rees (author)
David Bartlett Rees was a British author, lecturer and reviewer. Much of his work was written for children and young adults. His books included The Exeter Blitz, which won the Carnegie Medal for 1978.-Biography:...

 draws parallels between Charlotte's Web and A Taste of Blackberries. He writes that in the latter "we do have a story for young children in which death - sudden and inexplicable - is the main theme, and it is a book in which the characters are not talking animals." "The chief purpose of the book," he says, "is to write about death in a fashion that young readers can take, and in this Doris Buchanan Smith succeeds admirably." He goes on to praise the novel's pivotal scene between Jamie's mother and the narrator: "With this touching, delicately handled exchange the story ends. The pieces have been picked up and mended as far as is possible."

A Taste of Blackberries was nominated for the Newbery Medal
Newbery Medal
The John Newbery Medal is a literary award given by the Association for Library Service to Children, a division of the American Library Association . The award is given to the author of the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children. The award has been given since 1922. ...

, and won the Josette Frank Award
Josette Frank Award
The Josette Frank Award is an annual children's literary award for fiction that honors a book or books of "outstanding literary merit in which children or young people deal in a positive and realistic way with difficulties in their world and grow emotionally and morally".Known as the Children's...

, the Georgia Children’s Book Award, and the Children's Best Book Prize in Holland (Zilveren Griffel). It is an ALA Notable Children's Book
American Library Association
The American Library Association is a non-profit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with more than 62,000 members....

, and has been translated into Afrikaans, Dutch, Danish, French, Spanish and Japanese.

External links

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