A very leisurely book to read. The storyline is cute and it warms your heart to read about the little pepper children in there small brown house. Very comfortable.

A sweet, wholesome story of five children meeting poverty with cheerfulness and creativity. Probably a bit saccharine to modern eyes, but I loved it as a child and still do.

Refreshingly delightful walk down memory lane for me. I remember my Mother reading this to me as a child. It’s perfect innocence is still so engaging. A real pleasure to revisit.

I am taking a walk down memory lane, and this little path is so sweet. My mother first read me this gem when I was very little. I read it myself a few times and put it away over 58 years ago. It still brings me comfort and joy as it did so long ago. It is still as sweet as it was then. A nice little place to hide in this chaotic world.

This was my all time favorite book when I was a child. I must of read it four or five times. I just wanted to be part of the Pepper family.

We all loved this book! It follows the story of a sweet family who had nothing but each other. The sibling relationships were precious- great character development role models!

A sweet story of the Pepper family - five children and their mother who live in the Little Brown House living in cheerful poverty. Through a series of unlikely situations, assisted by their own pleasant attitudes, the charming family finds themselves in greatly improved circumstances.

It's a little Pollyanna at times (SO upbeat!) but I feel the children are written very well. They are well rounded characters. Although the circumstances are unlikely, they aren't SO much so as to come across inauthentic. I'm looking forward to reading the rest of this series at some point, especially with my children.

An idyllic family facing poverty mucks through together and their sweetness brings good back to them.

My 8 year old son said he “loved everything” about it.

I'm going do some children's classics in 2022.

I will start by saying that I am an Alcott enthusiast, from her short stories to Little Women and everything in between. This book has been compared to An Old-Fashioned Girl, one of my least favorite Alcott books. Except that book is good, and I don't feel that The Five Little Peppers is a good book.

It's dripping with sentiment. The impoverished children decide to bake a cake for their poor widowed mother ("Mamsie dear"). And I quote: "Oh, dear; of all things in the world! The beautiful cake over which so many hopes had been formed, that was to have given so much happiness on the morrow to the dear mother, presented a forlorn appearance as it stood there in anything but holiday attire. It was quite black on the top, in the center of which was a depressing little dump, as if to say, 'My feelings wouldn't allow me to rise to the occasion.'" The rest of the book is equally sentimental, and the plot is worse between the poor family and the rich new friends who just about adopt them, and the "dear me" mother who is overworked and so grateful.

Alcott's An Old-Fashioned Girl was a little like this, and occasionally I wanted to slap that Polly around, just because she was too good, but she was interested in doing more than pleasing her poor family. I felt like smacking "Pollyanna" around in that novel too. Maybe it has to do with the name "Polly" for the main character.

Bottom line: This book is long, dull, totally cheesy. Alcott is better.

By the way, I listened to the Bernadette Dunne recording. I'll never listen to another book read by her again. Perhaps she's very good most of the time, but like the name Sophronia, I fear it is forever ruined for me.

When I was little I was known as the kid who read. People in our town would give me books just because I was the kid who read. (I've read since I was three). This was one such book--a neighbor woman gave the book to me. I never liked it very much because it's like a honey, chocolate, and jam sandwich. Hooo-boy!

First in another great orphan series - Ben, Polly, Joel, Davie, and Phronsie actually have a mother, who is bravely bringing them up on virtually nothing. If only their deceased father's family hadn't turned their backs on the young Pepper family!