Classic story of redemption for a young boy stuck in poverty in an early 20th century mill town.

Enjoyed reading about the struggles of two hungry children as they lived through lean times during a mill strike. Have not read a story like this in a very long time.

Mostly listened to the audio, but finished with print. Good narration and nice to have Italian and Irish dialects. Jake not as good - a bit too Bart Simpson-as-a-juvenile-gangster.

When it comes to the fiction, Paterson's writing is superb. I felt her integration of the history wasn't as perfect. I never really got the feeling that I was living at the time. It had a modern slant to it.

I wish the book had given the year (1912) earlier on - I had a rough idea, but wasn't exactly sure whether this was pre- or post-WWI. While Paterson's historical note (which is shamefully NOT included in the audio book!) shows the accuracy of much of the book, I'm not sold on some of the details. The sumptuous feasts that were prepared for these stranger children seem excessive. Was every Vermont immigrant sympathetic to the IWW cause a millionaire? Elsewhere, Jake's obsession with Elizabeth Gurley Flynn seems overblown - and then it never comes up again. I suppose it was designed to be a mechanism to get him to bathe (leading to a significant episode), but it is clunky.

I'm also not buying that Jake knows not a single word of Italian. He apparently hangs out all the time with the Italian workers at the mill. I suspect he would have picked up quite a bit, being immersed in that setting.

The book is very one-sided, making out that the strikers are all good and anyone who opposed them even a little bit (including the Irish Catholic priest and the schoolteacher) was on the wrong side. While the socialists in 1912 weren't exactly the same as those in 1917 or later, I strongly suspect that kids reading this won't be able to get that subtlety and will have "socialism = good" in the back of their heads when they encounter it again with regard to Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Guevara, Castro, Chavez, et al.

There is a good amount of Catholic content in the book. It's not poorly presented and is fairly accurate, although it does often seem to be set in a less-than-positive light. Most of the time it seems to be viewed from the perspective of Jake, an outsider. So we get the somewhat offensive term "funny little pieces of dry crackers" and elsewhere, members of the Catholic family make their own judgments as to what constitutes breaking the required fast before receiving communion. Rosa is shocked, but we are led to believe that she is a weirdo who doesn't understand how the real world works. And there is none of the necessary rationale to explain why what Jake does is considered a sin or why the priests take particular positions that are unpopular with some.

I could see the ending coming a mile off, but it's nice and satisfying.

While this is a story about a worker's strike in 1912, the themes of exploitation, politics and immigrant rights are nearly identical to today's world. While some things had improved in the intervening 107 years, in many ways we have regressed, especially when it comes to "othering" recent immigrants. I thought that had improved, but in reading this story, it's clear that the shaming of people for their culture of origin and the rush/push to make them as American (essentially English) as possible has gone back to nearly 1912 levels.

I was amazed and disheartened to read the same rhetoric against unions, workers, strikers, immigrants, and poor people in this book that I'm also hearing and reading in today's world.

For example, Rosa's teacher is convinced that only violence will come from the strike and that any violence that occurs is caused solely by the strikers (even though it's well known that the mill owners are creating the violence to make the striking people look, well, violent).

Rosa internalizes the hate expressed towards her ethnicity (Italian) and their entire way of being. At one point she decides, "She would be an American, an educated, civilized, respected American, not a despised child of an immigrant race. When she grew up, she'd change her name and marry a real American and have real American children. She wouldn't go out to work in a mill and leave them in the care of someone's old granny who couldn't even speak English. She'd stay home herself and cook American food and read them American books and . . . "

It became clear in the book by 'real American' she meant someone native born (not a recent immigrant) and also English and thus 'high-class.' I found that perspective incredibly sad since she struggled to retain her joy and appreciation of her mother singing opera in Italian and cooking Italian food. She wanted to keep some parts of being who she is, but was afraid she wouldn't be American enough if she did. What awful decisions for a child to have to make.

One thing I loved about this book was the origin of the title; the people went on strike when wages were cut but work was expected to continue as usual. They had been paid barely subsistence wages and couldn't move forward economically. In fact hunger, homelessness, inadequate clothing, and being cold (not enough for fuel) were common prior to the strike because wages were so low. The wage cut condemned every worker to starvation and homelessness, so they literally had no choice.

But when they went on strike, the sign Rosa created said "Bread and roses, too" because they wanted beauty in their lives in addition to having basic necessities met. Roses represented having enough money to be warmly clothed, enough fuel to be comfortable, enough to interact as citizens within their community, enough to be able to have an occasional treat rather than being completely consumed by survival.

One paragraph that really caught my eye was, “All the big-city papers is there – Boston, New York, Philadelphia. They tell the whole country about shame of Lawrence, beating up women and little children, snatching babies from mamma’s breast, throwing innocent women in jail. Everybody in America’ll be mad, be mad as hornets by tomorrow morning.”

Yes, except when half of America is told the strikers are criminals and immigrants and trouble-makers. Americans will ask for justice, as long as people behind the cause are perceived as 100% justified and with 100% pure intentions and clean hands. If there’s anti-union propaganda that says differently, then Americans will turn their back on the suffering of others, clearly showing they feel it must be the victims’ fault. This is where it appears we stand today.

Overall, I really enjoyed reading the book – it’s a very well written, well told story with interesting characters and a very happy ending a la Dickens. In today’s world, we definitely need a happy ending.

I liked this book a lot. I really love the author, Katherine Paterson. One of my favorite books (Bridge to Terabithia) is also from her. This story is about a little girl and boy and the hardships they go through and the strike. I think it's a good book for kids to read to see the trials these people had.

This book should be required reading for students, for anybody pro-union and for anybody anti-union. So basically everyone.

This book is a fictional account of the 1912 labor strike in the US which we see through the eyes of two children Rosa and Jake. Had it not been for the strike these two would never have met.

This book is beautifully written. Each and every character in this book left an impression on me. It was such a touching story.

I picked up this book after watching Bridge to Terabithia, also written by this author. Sadly, I watched the movie not knowing it was based on a book. I look forward to reading that and anything else I can get my hands on by this author.

This gets five stars as a teacher book. It takes the reader into the Lawrence strike from the perspective of two children. It is a wonderful vehicle for teaching that part of American history. I would recommend this book for fifth grade and up. Lots of rich vocabulary and ideas, lots of discussions on the different immigrant cultures and the workers versus the mill owners. Great book too.

Jake and Rosa form an unlikely friendship as they try to survive and understand the 1912 Bread and Roses strike of mill workers in Lawrence, Massachusetts.


Reading Practice, Vocabulary Practice


Book Level: 4.9

Interest Level: Middle Grades (MG 4-8)

Fiction/Nonfiction: Fiction

Topic - Subtopic: Adventure-Survival; Historical Fiction-Historical Fiction (All); History-Emigration/Immigration; Interpersonal Relationships-Friendship; People-Children

I didn't know anything about the Bread and Roses Strike of 1912, so reading this book was a learning experience for me. I enjoyed the characters and the way the different ethnic groups were portrayed. The ending was a tad predictable, but that's OK.

Reading Level-6th grade

Genre- Historic fiction

Topic- Rosa's life during the strikes

Social- death, strikes for workers rights, poverty

Curricula Use- Independent reading

Literary elements- Internal conflicts

Text & Pictures- N/A

Summary- Rosa and Jake form an unexpected friendship during the 1912 Bread and Roses strike of mill workers. Together they learn to understand all about it.

I liked this book an awful lot. It's very heart warming and informational about the Strike for Bread and Roses at the same time. Rosa's mamma is my favorite character (apart from Rosa). She has a way of saying things that really makes you think, even if she isn't fluent in English (like when she said that she would rather fight and starve than work and starve, or when she said that she didn't just want bread, she wanted roses, too). She clearly loves her children and wants what's best for them. I liked Jake a lot, too (or Salvatore as Rosa calls him). he was just this abused, poor boy, but he had a personality to him. Lots of dignity and stubbornness, but he was also scared and always ran from his problems instead of facing them or he got someone else to deal with his problems for him.


(sorry about my reading progress and comments. it all got messed up. i finished this book on Sunday, Sept. 23)

This is another excellent book by Katherine Paterson, and one of the best pieces of historical fiction I've read in a while. I think it should have at least won a Newbery honor. It was MUCH more enjoyable and memorable than the winner for its year.

In 1912, the mill workers in Lawrence, Massachusetts went on a strike that lasted over two months and was marked by a great deal of police brutality, at women and children as well as at men. I have read about this strike before, and was eager to read Paterson’s new children’s novel on the same subject. Immigrants from many nations lived in squalid conditions and worked long hours in the mills; in order to earn enough money to feed their families, many workers had their children working in the mills as well.
Rosa’s father had been killed in a mill fire. Her mother and older sister Anna worked in the mill while Rosa attended school and a family who shared their cramped living quarters took care of the baby Ricci during the day. Sympathetic union workers in New York, Philadelphia, and Barre, Vermont helped arrange for the children of the strikers to live with families in those places where they could we well fed, clothed, and educated for the duration of the strike. Rosa has befriended a poor American orphan boy who is determined to travel with her to Barre, even though he doesn’t have the necessary permission papers to go with her. She tells the authorities that he is her brother, and that she wouldn’t leave home without him. Patterson and her husband live in Barre and her discovery that the citizens of Barre took in these children during this famous strike was the impetus for her writing this book. My great-grandfather Babb worked as an “operative” in one of the mills in Lowell before he enlisted in the Civil War.