Book Review: Warning: Some Questionable Language

As my 9 year old and I are conducting research for his Science Fair project, we have read oodles of books about floods. We were excited to happen upon a little book in the Once Upon America series entitled The Day It Rained Forever, by Virginia T. Gross.

We began the book with the 9 year old reading aloud to his younger brothers, and my little daycare charges. He got bored quickly. I wanted to finish the book to see if there was any value, so I continued reading it aloud.

It was a rather boring book, and I have to agree with the mostly negative reviews I have read online. But my biggest concern (and thank goodness I was reading it and little eyes were not following along), was the phrase on page 40 " It's all the fault of the greedy rich," ..... "Damn them all to hell!"

Oh my goodness! Now, I know it may have been possible for the young character in the story to have realistically said those words. But I would have been appalled had my nine year old read them. I do not think they added anything to the story. The author could have easily shown the character's distress without the use of such foul language.

Therefore, do I want to read more of the historical fiction series, Once Upon America? I know this; I will definitely have to pre-read them all!