Before she became a bestselling, award-winning children's author, Peg Schulze Kehret had an experience that would change her life forever.  In 1949, at 12 years old, she contracted polio.  Not just one kind, but all three types: respiratory, spinal, and bulbar.  For three weeks, the disease paralyzed her from the neck down.  Although the paralysis went away, Peg still had trouble swallowing, breathing problems, and constant, all-over pain.  Hospitalized for about six months in a Minneapolis facility 100 miles from her home in Austin, Minnesota, she also experienced frustration, fear, homesickness, and loneliness.  Eventually, Kehret beat the disease, but the memories of her days as a polio patient still loom large in her mind.  "Those months," she wrote, "more than any other time in my life, molded my personality" (10).

In 1996, Kehret published Small Steps: The Year I Got Polio.  The memoir is both heartbreaking and fascinating.  Kehret tells her story in a warm, compelling way that gives children an honest account of what happened to her, while making it clear that she was one of the luckier polio patients.  Unlike some of her roommates at the hospital, Kehret had parents who cared for her and made a point of visiting her often.  While the author describes the excruciating treatments she had to endure, she does so with self-deprecating humor and gratitude (gained in hindsight) for the lessons it taught her.  Even though the effects of polio have come back to haunt Kehret in her later life, she ends her memoir on a positive, hopeful note.  The overall message of Small Steps is one of triumph over difficulty and thankfulness for the things many of us take for granted every day—breathing easily, walking without assistance, moving painlessly, etc.  It's an excellent memoir, one kids should find accessible and interesting.  I certainly did.

(Readalikes:  Reminds me a little of All Better Now by Emily Wing Smith)

Grade:

Ever since polio broke out across the U.S., 11-year-old Georgie Mason's been fascinated with the disease. She's read up on its history, causes and treatment. New deaths are chronicled every day in the newspaper, statistics she carefully records in her notebook. As much as she blames polio for the incredible boredom fest that is the summer of 1952 (no swimming pools, no movie theaters, no public events, no nothing), Georgie's obsessed with the epidemic. So, when her family moves next door to a girl in an iron lung, she can hardly believe her luck. When the girl turns out to be a beautiful teenager who welcomes visits from Georgie and her brother, well, Georgie's pretty much over the moon with delight.

According to Georgie's good friend Noah (as in, Webster), an iron lung is "a device for artificial respiration in which rhythmic alternations in the air pressure in a chamber surrounding a patient's chest force air into and out of the lungs" (from Merriam-Webster online). To Georgie, it's a tentacled, glinty-eyed beast straight out of a sci fi film. Even though she knows the contraption is breathing for her new friend, Phyllis, it looks to all the world like the wheezing monster has swallowed her whole. Georgie's as intrigued with the machine as she is repulsed by it.

Georgie's teenage brother, who doesn't notice anything he can't find through a telescope or shoot through a hoop, is suddenly showing a whole lot of interest in not just the artificial lung, but its occupant. It's easy to see why - Phyllis is bright, pretty and as flirtatious as any high school girl. She may view the world only as reflected through the iron lung's mirrors, but she sees clearly enough, apparently, to know what she wants. Since Emmett's a lot smoother on the court than off, Georgie's all for this "starter kit" romance. That is, until the couple stops including her in their star-gazing sessions. Her jealousy makes her tune into things she never noticed before, like how Emmett's completely at Phyllis' beck and call; how, despite the girl's condition, she's got a chilling hold on the people around her; and how her seemingly innocent flirting has a decidedly sinister feel. Is it just the envy talking or is Phyllis up to something? The Kellers' give their daughter everything, so what is it that Phyllis wants from Emmett? Maybe it's just teenage lovey-dovey stuff, the kind of thing Georgie loves to read about in her Archie comics, or maybe it's something much, much more frightening ...

Polio's a disease about which I know very little, so Chasing Orion by Kathryn Lasky fascinated me from the get-go. Lasky's description of the panic that spread along with its outbreak is unnerving as is her depiction of the not-so-helpless Phyllis. As horrifying as the idea of living life in an iron lung is, it's Phyllis' calculating manipulation of the people around her that makes the story so disturbing. Although the book is recommended for ages 9 and up, I would never hand a tale so dark to someone that young. While the book discusses issues that are important for everyone to contemplate - What constitutes a life? Is it right to keep someone alive by artificial means, if all it means is prolonged suffering? Whose happiness is more important - the patient's or her family's? - they're questions that confound even the aged. So, while I recommend this book for the compelling subject matter and skilled writing, it's not something I would pass on to every reader. I'm not even sure how I felt about it. Riveted, yes, but horrified, too. And so very, very relieved to be living in 2010.

(Readalikes: A little like We Are All Welcome Here by Elizabeth Berg)

Grade: B-

If this were a movie, it would be rated: PG-13 for mild language, vague sexual innuendo, and mature topics (see discussion in last paragraph of review)

To the FTC, with love: I received a finished copy of Chasing Orion from the generous folks at Candlewick Press. Thank you!

Iron lung image from Wikipedia.