Ramona (novel series)

Ramona Quimby is the central character in a popular series of children's novels by Beverly Cleary. The books have been adapted for television as "Ramona".

The main action concerns Ramona Geraldine Quimby, her family including her sister Beatrice (known as Beezus), and various events around her Klickitat Street neighborhood in Portland, Oregon.

Book series

The Ramona books grew out of Cleary's earlier Henry Huggins books and take place in the same continuity and neighborhood. In the Henry Huggins books, Beezus was one of Henry's neighbors and Ramona was her younger sister and mostly a pest to Henry, Beezus and the other older children.

After three Henry Huggins books, Cleary wrote "Beezus and Ramona", a novel in which Beezus was the central character and in which the plot revolved around Beezus' frustrations with her little sister.

Later, after finishing the Henry Huggins series, Cleary wrote "Ramona the Pest", the first book proper in the Ramona series. It featured Ramona entering school for the first time as a kindergarten student. The succeeding books showed Ramona growing up and advancing through grades, usually at the rate of one grade over two books. One interesting plot device Cleary used was to write each book as if it took place during the current day at the time of writing, even though the books were published years apart. In this way, the later Ramona books appear to take place in the 1980s or later, even though the earlier Ramona books and the Henry Huggins books took place in the 1950s. This is never explicitly mentioned in the novels, however; dates are not given, and the children of the stories are designed to appeal to real children in any time period.

"Henry Huggins" was published in 1950. The last Ramona book, "Ramona's World", was published in 1999, after a 15 year hiatus from Ramona books.

The books have had three illustrators: Louis Darling, Alan Tiegreen and in 2006 the Ramona books came out with new illustrations by Tracy Dockray.

In 2006, Cleary was looking over a movie script to make "Ramona and Her Father" a movie. She also celebrated her 90th birthday.

Bibliography

"Beezus and Ramona" (4 years old) (HarperTrophy, 1955) ISBN 0-380-70918-X ISBN 978-0-380-70918-2

"Ramona the Pest" (kindergarten) (HarperTrophy, 1968) ISBN 0-380-70954-6 ISBN 978-0-380-70954-0

"Ramona the Brave" (1st grade) (HarperTrophy, 1975) ISBN 0-380-70959-7 ISBN 978-0-380-70959-5

"Ramona and Her Father" (2nd grade) (HarperTrophy, 1975, 1977) ISBN 0-380-70916-3 ISBN 978-0-380-70916-8

"Ramona and Her Mother" (2nd grade) (HarperTrophy, 1979) ISBN 0-380-70952-X ISBN 978-0-380-70952-6

"Ramona Quimby, Age 8" (3rd grade) (HarperTrophy, 1981) ISBN 0-380-70956-2 ISBN 978-0-380-70956-4

"Ramona Forever" (3rd grade) (HarperTrophy, 1984) ISBN 0-380-70960-0 ISBN 978-0-380-70960-1

"Ramona's World" (4th grade) (HarperTrophy, 1999) ISBN 0-380-73272-6 ISBN 978-0-380-73272-2

Characters

The Quimbys

*Ramona Geraldine Quimby: The main character. She has straight brown hair and an active imagination.
*Beatrice "Beezus" Quimby: Ramona's sensible big sister, whose nickname comes from Ramona's childhood mispronunciation of her name.
* Mr. Robert "Bob" Quimby: Ramona's father
*Mrs. Dorothy Quimby: Ramona's mother
*Picky-picky: The Quimbys' cat
*Aunt Beatrice Day-Kemp: Mrs. Quimby's sister
*Grandpa Day: Ramona and Beezus' maternal grandfather
*Roberta Quimby: Ramona's younger sister, who is born at the end of "Ramona Forever"

The Kemps

*Howie Kemp: Ramona's best friend next door
*Willa Jean Kemp: Howie's messy little sister
*Mrs. Kemp: Howie's mother
*Mr. Kemp: Howie's father
*Grandma Kemp: Howie's grandmother, who lives in the same house and watches after Ramona, Howie, and Willa Jean after school; like Howie's mother, his grandmother is also usually referred to as "Mrs. Kemp"; that means she is Mr. Kemp's mother.
*Uncle Hobart Kemp: Howie's uncle who marries Ramona's aunt, Beatrice. He is Mr. Kemp's younger brother.

The Hugginses

*Henry Huggins: Beezus' friend. The Ramona series of books are a spin-off of the Henry Huggins series of books
*Mr. Huggins: Henry's father
*Mrs. Huggins: Henry's mother

The Kidds

*Daisy Kidd: Ramona's friend in fourth grade
*Jeremy Kidd: Daisy's big brother
*Mrs. Kidd: Daisy and Jeremy's mother
*Mr. Kidd: Daisy and Jeremy's father
*Clawed: The Kidds' cat
*Mutley: The Kidds' dog

Klickitat Street

*The McCarthys
*Mrs. Swink: Elderly lady who wears pants suits and calls Ramona "Juanita"
*The Grumbies
*Mrs. Pitt: One of Ramona's neighbors, who doesn't like kids who throw trash in her yard

Glenwood School

*Danny "Yard Ape": A boy who always bickers with Ramona, whom she secretly likes
*Susan Kushner: Ramona's rival. A girl with curly reddish-brown hair. Ramona's mother always wants her to play with Susan.
*Davy: A timid skinny boy whom Ramona chases around the playground each day in kindergarten
*Miss Binney: Ramona's kindergarten teacher. She is Ramona's favorite teacher.
*Mrs. Griggs: Ramona's first grade teacher
*Mrs. Rudge: Ramona's second grade teacher
*Mrs. Whaley: Ramona's third grade teacher
*Mrs. Meacham: Ramona's fourth grade teacher
*Mr. Cardoza: Beezus' sixth grade teacher
*Mrs. Mester: Beezus' seventh grade teacher
*Mrs. Larson: The school secretary

Other Characters

*Mary Jane: Beezus' friend who spent her time playing jacks with Beezus.
*Dr. Perry: The woman who invite Mrs. Quimby to be a bookkeeper.
*Becky and Jack: Owners of a cat and a dog named Fluffy and Pal, respectively.
*Mandi
*Jay

External links

* [http://www.beverlycleary.com/index.html Official Beverly Cleary web site]