About this title: Written with powerful understatement and suffused with the painful rapture of growing up, this harrowing debut novel from a contributor to the influential radio program "This American Life" is the story of a 13-year-old girl who must face choices she is not ready to make.
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Description: Good. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Good. 0060875070 Former library item may have library binding and show stamps, stickers or other marks. Items not meeting quality expectations may be returned. Due to the large scale of our operation, we do not have access to the specific contents/condition of our items. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Date Published: 2006-10-01
ISBN-13:9780060875077ISBN:0060875070
Description: Good. Binding is tight and square. Text is clean, bright and unmarked. Has some light edge and corner wear. We recommend EXPEDITED MAIL for even faster delivery! read more
Description: Good. 0060875070 This book is in Good Used Condition. The Book shows some signs of wear. There may be some markings inside the book. 100% Money Back Guarantee! ! ! read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Date Published: 10/17/2006
ISBN-13:9780060875077ISBN:0060875070
Description: New. 0060875070 NEW and UNREAD Book which may have Remainder Mark. May Have Slight Shelf Wear. In-Stock Now For Immediate Secure Packaging & Delivey. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Date Published: 10/17/2006
ISBN-13:9780060875077ISBN:0060875070
Description: Fine. 0060875070 Brand New Book With Remainder Mark. May Have Slight Shelf Wear. In-Stock Now For Immediate Secure Packaging & Delivery wear on DJ. read more
Edition: 1st Edition
Binding: Trade Paperback
Publisher: Harper Perennial/ A Division of Harper Collins Publishers, New York, London, et al.
Date Published: 2006
Description: Robin Billardello (Cover Design); Derek Erdman (Cover Painting); Michael Couser (Author Photograph); Jamie Kerner-Scott... Like New. 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall. 330 pp. Flawless copy. read more
Binding: Trade Paperback
Publisher: HarperCollins Books
Date Published: 2006
ISBN-13:9780060875077ISBN:0060875070
Description: Good + Cover has marks, bumping, chipping-Marks on edge-Bumped / dogeared pgs-Few marks on pgs-Dents & creases on few pgs-Edgewear to few pgs-Spine slant. read more
Binding: Trade Paperback
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Canada, Limited, Scarborough, ON, Canada
Date Published: 2006
ISBN-13:9780060875077ISBN:0060875070
Description: Fair. Cover has edgewear, bumping, marks, chipping-Bumped / dogeared pgs-POS on FPD-Lots of water damage causing creased and rippled pgs-Dents-Few marks on pgs-Quite worn-Light dent gouges to first few pgs-Spine slant-Quite worn. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Quercus Publishing Plc
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9781847242334ISBN:1847242332
Description: Good. Bumping to corners Internally Clean This book is in good all round condition which means that it will show signs of wear and having been read. Any questions please e-mail, only too happy to help. No quibble refund if not completely satisfied. We aim to ship within one working day. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Quercus Publishing Plc
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9781847243935ISBN:1847243932
Description: Good. This book is in GOOD overall condition. It shows signs of having been read and has general light wear to the cover, spine and pages. read more
Description: Good. Ships from the UK. Former Library book. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Your purchase also supports literacy charities. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Quercus Publishing Plc
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9781847243935ISBN:1847243932
Description: Good. **SHIPPED FROM UK** We believe you will be completely satisfied with our quick and reliable service. All orders are dispatched as swiftly as possible! Buy with confidence! read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Quercus Publishing Plc
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9781847243935ISBN:1847243932
Description: Good. This book is in GOOD overall condition. It shows signs of having been read and has general light wear to the cover, spine and pages. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Date Published: 2006
ISBN-13:9780060875077ISBN:0060875070
Description: New. Brand New! Buy with confidence-your satisfaction is guaranteed at B-Logistics! Due to the large scale of our operation, we do not have access to the specific contents/condition of our items. Please note that Expedited shipping is not available at this time. read more
""Lullabies for Little Criminals" by Heather O'Neill is the light side to a dark tale. I started book with the recommendation of a fellow bookworm and friend. Narrated by Baby, a preteen girl growing up in the red-light district of Montreal, her story captures the pivoting point of her youth. The mind of a child is far more complex than one gives credit because it has yet to follow a prescribed understanding; the unconscious limitations we place on ourselves as we start to become aware of the world. Each page is laced with allegorical images and small humor, binding together a strange and compelling language that which could only be a child's.
As an adolescent descending on the bridge between adulthood temptations and childhood innocence, Baby still clings to her constants as she attempts to make her way. Without guidance, she stumbles to grasp the meaning of growing up: "Suddenly I realized that I wanted everything to be as it was when I was younger...It never occurs to you when you are very young to need something other than what your parents have to offer you" (184). Appealing the concept was, I found myself disliking the book. It wasn't the raw and shady world that Baby lived that made me turn away, but rather the way she thrown into it and how she saw her life.
Baby knew of other lifestyles that were different, better, yet she remained oblivious; to her, this life that she lived was still "normal". She took words and gave them her own definition as she desperately struggled to find love. She was naturally drawn to Xavier: "I liked that he was immature and that he seemed naïve, as if he was actually acting his age" (232), because he resembled the childish antics she longed to hold on to. At the same time, she admired the prostitutes who walked around on the streets because she saw them as independent women who wore certain clothes.
Every page disgusted me, but I couldn't walk away from Baby's tale. She made it seems so "light" that you don't realized just how truly dark and depressing the subject could really be until you've sat down with the book for a long while. Like a drug, it slowly captivates its readers before they are aware of it. I truly recommend this book, because although I didn't like her story, I still enjoyed it thoroughly and felt for her."
"First off I will admit that I did not finish this book and it had to go back to the library. Part of me was glad that i had an excuse to put it down and part of me realized that if I would have stuck with it I would have liked it more.
This was my in person book club choice and I was the only one who did not finish it and the only one who did not REALLY like it. I have been assured that I woudl have liked it much more having completed it and one other admited that if she had been given a good opportunity to put it down half way through she would have as well.
The first half of the book (as far as I got) is a series of vignettes as remembered by Baby the main character. The side characters are all transient, they appear and disappear in the book and in her life - just as you would expect from a life lived out in poverty bordering on homeless. The metaphors where interesting but sometimes piled up on each other. There was a fair amount of repitition and I was assured that this is because it is the voice of the 12/13 year old character. (I thought it was an older adult remembering her childhood). So, parts worked for me if it is a young narrator and parts worked for me if it is an adult narrator but it didn't work as a total fluent voice for me.
This is a sad and tender story that does have love and light moments and I am told that ends with rays of hope. (I am glad for that).
It is not a waste of time and if I did not have to return it to the library I would have finished it. So, my advice to anyone picking it up is to stick with it once you start."
"When I first began Lullabies for Little Criminals, I kept asking myself why I was reading this shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction 2008 novel. It's different, to say the least, because the story follows twelve-year-old Baby - yes, that's her real name - through foster homes, her drug addict, widowed father, Jules, reforming his ways and relapsing, her time in prostitution, and her first love, Xavier. Lullabies for Little Criminals is also - according to the author questionnaire in the back of my copy - based on O'Neill's own childhood experiences.
Baby, though, doesn't want your sympathy, doesn't need your sympathy. She tells her a story in a straight-foreword, removed manner that eventually made me stop caring about her, which the exact opposite of what O'Neill should have accomplished. The first hundred and forty pages I thought the novel was ingenious, but once Baby distances herself from her story, I distanced myself from her.
And I have to wonder how old Baby is. It's never really clear if she's recalling her experiences after the end of book or when she's forty-five, but she certainly doesn't sound like and rarely acts like the twelve-soon-to-be-thirteen-year-old she is supposed to be. She uses analogies and similes I don't think even a girl growing up the red-light district of Montreal would use, and it's quite distracting. She has a strong voice, but by the end it becomes nails on a chalkboard."
"I started reading this almost a year ago and put it down halfway through because I was too depressed by the child prostitution in it, but I braved it again recently. One of the things I like most about this is that even while terrible things are happening, there is a determination to represent lightness and whimsy in the midst of squalor. The character's father, Jules, is a sympathetic, idiosyncratic character despite being a recklessly negligent junkie, and there is a sweetness in their connection that rang true to me. I wanted to scoop up both the characters and put them at a tea table and serve them scones and let them live happily ever after in a blooming garden."
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