When I Was Your Age, Volume Two: Original Stories about Growing Up

"Ehrlich offers more of a good thing in this second volume of memoirs of adolescence by renowned, contemporary YA authors." – Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"Tell me a story of when you were little," children everywhere love to ask. In this acclaimed collection, ten award-winning, well-known writers comply by reaching across their own childhoods to those of their readers. Whether telling of growing up in Japan or upstate New York or the California coast, recalling The Great Depression or World War II or the 1950s, describing children’s victories or heartaches, the writers of these stories make it clear that despite the difference between one childhood and another, all children share a complex humanity and a deep capacity for joy.

Ehrlich's second anthology of short childhood memoirs is as good as the first (1996). Once again, 10 fine writers for young people tell intimate stories about crucial childhood experiences and then add brief notes about how the episodes shaped their lives as writers. Norma Fox Mazer remembers herself as a nervy tomboy outside in the street (smoking butts from the gutter), but she's a crybaby at home, until a terrifying episode makes her stop crying. Paul Fleischman writes his story as an interview, in which he remembers how it felt to be the smallest boy in the class, a "shrimp" right through school; he doesn't downplay the pain of the teasing ("I would have traded another world war for six inches"), but he shows and tells how he developed the smart, vulnerable, witty persona that helped him make friends and become a writer. In Kyoko Mori's unforgettable story, metaphor grows right out of dramatic fact as she describes how her mother taught her to swim, saved her from drowning, but could not save herself from despair. Rita Williams-Garcia is a deadpan comic about family mealtimes when she and her siblings learned to deal with a strict mother who was "still refining her cooking skills." Jane Yolen's funny note following her suspenseful story is candid about the blurring of memory and fact--are storytellers the best liars? The other fine storytellers are Joseph Bruchac, Karen Hesse, E. L. Konigsburg, Howard Norman, and Michael J. Rosen. With a brief biography and a childhood photo of each writer, this will be a great readaloud to get YAs started on writing their own personal stories that speak to all of us. Hazel Rochman