Borrowed Names is a very unique book in many ways. First it is written in verse. I loved that. Many of my students have learned that they like books written in verse. There are three biographies of three women and their children. The first is of Laura Ingalls Wilder and her daughter. The second is Madam C.J. Walker and her daughter A’Lelia Walker. Finally we learn about Marie Curie and her daughter Irene Joliet-Curie. Each of these biographies shoes how their relationships with their daughters were formed and developed over time. I found in all three, there was usually one particular thing that drew them together. They inspired each other in so many ways. I loved learning so much about all of them and will definitely recommend this book to my students. ( )

I am wrestling with how to review this book. I think there is valuable information here, albeit presented in an inexplicably popular, but to my eye unnecessary, format. I think that I can't get past the format to accurately assess the merits of this book, but I can tell you that I hated it.

I think I hated it because poetry means so much to me, poetry is the beat of my heart and the solace of my days. Real poetry has power like no other words have power. It can topple governments, inspire impossible acts or just make one walk out into the ocean, never to return. Real poetry is made of gunpowder, it's made of dreams, and it is the sacred incense of my secular life. Real poetry has picked me up out of my quotidian life, spun me around and slammed me into the sand so hard my sternum ached for weeks and I was unable to turn around without my eyes filling with tears when I heard a loved one's voice.

When my heart is sore, I turn to poetry. When I am lost and bereft, there's a book of verse in my hand and another in my pocket. When everything is exquisitely right, there is a poem singing about that rightness just under my clavicle. Poetry moves in my blood and stiffens my bones. Poetry informs every breath I take.

Perhaps you might say I'm a little too close to the topic to be objective.

Novels in free verse are the Catholic Mass in English. Novels in free verse are Bowdler's Shakespeare for women and children. Novels in free verse are weak, puling things, neither fish nor fowl nor good red meat, and the list of the ones that are not is very, very short.

Cynthia Rylant made it work, but she made it work by shoehorning real poetry into the form, rather than the opposite.

This book has a straightforward story to tell, or rather, three straightforward stories to tell. Casting them in free verse was gratuitous. There are three distinct books here, books that could be rich and nourishing, but what's served up instead is the thin broth of free verse, or of words

arranged on pages in

sort of a poetical looking fashion

which helps one speed through

and adds nothing to the story. ( )

Prose poems bring to life three mother/daughter pairs and the work they did together. Three famous women were born in 1867 - Laura Ingalls Wilder, Madam CJ Walker, and Marie Curie. This book is divided up into three parts, each part featuring one of these women and her daughter. These are fascinating snapshots into history and the verse format adds appeal for teens. These verses will likely inspire teens to look further into the lives of these women and the back matter provided (timeline and bibliography) is helpful in directing readers to additional material and information. ( )

The book is broken into three sections, each using poetry to explore the life events of a mother and daughter. I learned quite a bit as a read about the lives of Laura Ingalls Wilder, Madam C.J. Walker, and Marie Curie. The verse was more utilitarian than beautiful, but it was the content that interested me most. ( )

Tells the life story of three mother-daughter pairs, Laura Ingalls Wilder and Rose Wilder Lane, Madam C.J. Walker and A'Leila Walker, and Marie Curie and Irene Curie.