My Friend John

By Charlotte Zolotow

Book Overview

John knows everything about me, and I know everything about him. So begins the heartwarming story of two young boys who together experience fun times, sad times, happy times, hard times, secret times,... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0385326513
• ISBN13: 9780385326513
• Release Date: May 2000
• Publisher: Doubleday Books for Young Readers
• Length: 32 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 10.2" x 0.3" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

Friendship across the years.

Good friends are hard to find and John is the narrator's best friend. He tells why John is his best friend, and tells the ways they are friends, even the secret fears they share. My best friend for the last 40 years is also named John. This book reminds me of him. I think I'll call him this week-end.

The light shines through

Charlotte Zolotow describes the friendship between two boys, John and an unnamed other, by a series of quiet statements which carry an increasing sense of the power of the relationship. The quiet incantation of the text - each page is very nearly a couplet of verse - shows how the two friends make up for each other's failings, stick up for each other when the going gets rough, and also have a sense of the separate individuality of the companion with secret fears and pleasures.The two boys are working on a project - to construct a den and organize a midnight feast. Because this project is completed in spare moments between school and meals and homework, and is also shown in the pictures rather than the text, it conveys very clearly the privacy of the secret world which children sometimes collaborate to build. Amanda Harvey's pictures support this by expressing strong affection untainted by sentimentality. My favourite picture is of a boy in the grip of panic and despair, probably brought on by fractions, being helped by John who radiates concern and patience. The pictures seem to be illuminated as if from behind the page - and this seems in keeping with the constancy of their relationship which shines through all the trouble, routine and fun of childhood.