All-of-a-Kind Family

How do the age differences among the sisters shape their responsibilities and their relationships with one another?

What role does playacting and performance play in how the sisters interpret the adult world around them? Cite specific evidence from the text.

Characters frequently make use of cast-off or secondhand items, such as salvaged books, rag-bag costumes, and cardboard shoe inserts. How does the novel use repurposed materials to explore questions of wealth and necessity?

How does the romantic subplot between Charlie and Miss Allen affect the pacing and structure of an otherwise domestic chronicle?

During the scarlet-fever quarantine, the household is physically divided between the sick sisters in the bedroom and the healthy family members outside. How does this period of confinement alter the family’s domestic rhythms and the sisters’ interactions?

Taylor gives the novel’s omniscient narrator access to the parents’ thoughts as well as the children’s. How does this authorial decision impact the significance of key scenes as well as the story’s overall meaning?

Using specific evidence from the text, analyze how Taylor’s use of literary devices supports the novel’s depiction of the joys of childhood.

Compare and contrast the novel with another story that follows the daily adventures of a big family, such as Jeanne Birdsall’s The Penderwicks (2005). Consider the siblings’ relationships and the ways the authors express the importance of family.