The Secret Sisters, by Avi, is a sequel to The Secret School. While I have read a number of Avi’s other books but not The Secret School, I never felt lost in the narrative. In 1925, Ida Bidson gets the opportunity to leave her rural one-room elementary school after she graduates and serves briefly as its teacher to go to high school in Steamboat Springs. She knows her destiny is to become a teacher, not to spend her life milking cows.
Miss Sedgewick, the Routt County inspector for one-room schoolhouses, sees promise in Ida and offers her the opportunity to board for free and attend the high school. New experiences await Ida far beyond the classroom. She soon becomes part of a group of friends who call themselves “The Secret Sisters.” There are movies, telephones, and a ride on the train for an overnight with her friend. Some of the new experiences threaten to spoil her attendance at the high school with its strict principal who seems to intimidate even Miss Sedgewick who worries about her reputation. When the group of friends learns to speak “flapper,” and the new young teacher shows them the moves to the Charleston, they feel copacetic and get a wiggle on. The principal becomes a killjoy and a flat tire, but Miss Sedgewick decides not to be an old fogie.
The book ends with a glossary of flapper definitions. Middle schoolers who read it will get a picture of another life – especially for women. The book is really the cat’s pajamas!