CCBC (Cooperative Children's Book Center Choices, 2000)
May Amelia Jackson is the youngest and only daughter born to a Finnish American family with eight children living on a farm near a logging camp in Washington state at the end of the 19th Century. At age 12, May is spirited, spunky and downright sassy at times. She enjoys dressing and talking like her older brothers and wants to be a pirate when she grows up. She has absolutely no interest in being the "proper little lady" her Pappa would like her to be. Aside from May's engaging character, what makes his novel especially outstanding is the detailed description of everyday rural family life 100 years ago and the novel's distinctive voice: funny, colloquial and pure May Amelia, it reads almost like an oral history. CCBC categories: Fiction for Teenagers. 1999, HarperCollins, 251 pages, $15.95. Ages 12 and older.

Kirkus (Kirkus Reviews, 1999)
May Amelia, the feisty lovable heroine of Helm's fetching novel, "ain't no proper young lady." A 12-year-old girl with an adventurous spirit and "a nose for trouble," May Amelia is the youngest of eight children and the only girl. Life in the rough world of logging camps and farming in the wilderness of the state of Washington in 1899 is not easy, and May Amelia and her brothers have to work hard to keep farm and family going. May Amelia dreams of being a sailor and traveling to China, but is hampered by everyone, especially her strict Finnish-born father, who is always yelling at her for "doing what the boys are doing." The book chronicles May Amelia's adventures with her brothers, a brush with a wild bear, conflicts with her mean-tempered grandmother, and the long-awaited birth of a baby sister who later dies in her sleep. The story, which is episodic and somewhat shapeless, careens along before stopping without much resolution. Still, the robust characterizations captivate, the lilting dialogue twangs, and the sharply individual first-person narrative gives the material authority and polish. 1999, HarperCollins, $15.95; PLB $15.89. © 1999 Kirkus Reviews/VNU eMedia, Inc. All rights reserved.

Janice M. Del Negro (The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, September 1999 (Vol. 53, No. 1))
A Finnish-American community in Washington State in 1899 is the setting for this story of twelve-year-old May Amelia, the only girl in a family of seven older brothers. May Amelia chafes against being a “Proper Young Lady” and longs for the freedom of her brothers, so much so that she is constantly getting into trouble. Narrated by May Amelia, each chapter relates an incident in her young life, from boating on the Nasel River, to being chased up a tree by a bear, to taking care of her newborn baby sister. May Amelia tells her story in a conspiratorial style, with dialogue absorbed into the main narrative instead of being set off by quotation marks. While this gives a casual, family-storytelling feel to the text, stylistically it lacks emotional differentiation; the result is a sequence of incidents without emphasis or high points. Because of the discrete nature of the chapters, however, the novel lends itself to reading aloud, which mitigates the somewhat measured pace and tonal sameness of the text. May Amelia is an admirable, often humorous character, and the picture she provides of life in her community is a vibrant one. Her impressions of her neighbors, her relationships with her parents and brothers, and her descriptions of daily life on this not-often-seen terrain contain involving details and realistic emotions. Give this to your readers who have outgrown the Little House books and are seeking new frontiers. Review Code: Ad -- Additional book of acceptable quality for collections needing more material in the area. (c) Copyright 1999, The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois. 1999, HarperCollins, 253p, $15.95 and $15.89. Grades 5-8.

Horn Book (The Horn Book Guide, Fall 1999)
Twelve-year-old May Amelia Jackson describes life as the only girl among seven boys in her Finnish-American family. The voice of the colloquial first-person narrative rings true and provides a vivid picture of frontier and pioneer life in Washington State in 1899. An afterword discusses Holm's research into her own family's history and that of other Finnish immigrants. Category: Intermediate Fiction. 1999, HarperCollins, 253pp, $15.95, $15.89. Ages 9 to 12. Rating: 3: Recommended, satisfactory in style, content, and/or illustration.