CHIG AND THE SECOND SPREAD
by Gwenyth Swain
Delacorte Press
ISBN: 0385730659
Ages 8-12
208 pages

• Read an Excerpt

For Chig Kalpin, being small is just about the biggest trial there is. Her real name is Minerva but she has always been called Chig, short for Chigger. It was a name her father gave her, a name given to her with affection because she was such a tiny baby. Unfortunately, some of the boys in school latch on to her nickname and persecute her until she feels as small as small can be. She wishes she was big and tough and able to show those boys a thing or two. With every passing day, her lack of inches becomes more and more of a worry. Chig looks into whether or not she is eating the right types of food to encourage growth. She asks her teacher and family about her problem. Surely, she isn't going to stay under five feet tall for the rest of her life.

Chig gets so caught up in her own problem that she almost misses seeing what is happening to the people around her and to her town. It all begins when Chig realizes that some of the children in her class have only one spread on their sandwiches for lunch. It had always been the norm to have two. Clearly, things are getting very bad indeed if the children's parents can only afford one spread. She then notices that there are more and more men sitting and standing around the stove at the store. There is no work to be had. The Depression has come to her little town and the hollows around it. Chig decides that there has to be something she can do to help the people of Niplak put a second spread on their children's sandwiches.

What follows is an extraordinary, often funny, and quite delightful series of events that Chig uses to bring about her hopes and dreams for her town. In the process Chig realizes that there is much more to being big than she ever dreamed, and the people of Niplak discover that they have a truly remarkable person in the midst, a person with courage and conviction, despite the fact that she is very short of stature.

Gwenyth Swain has written a book packed with charm, lovable characters, and a real understanding of what it was like to live through the Depression. She gathered stories from family members and other sources and put them together in a way that shows us how she loved the telling of this marvelous tale and how much she enjoyed being able to honor those who lived the stories she used.

   --- Reviewed by Marya Jansen-Gruber (mjansengruber@mindspring.com)

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