I loved Lindgren’s Pippi books when I was young but I never knew about this book or its sequel The Children of Troublemaker Street.

I wish I’d known about this book when I was five. This is a wonderful introductory chapter book. The color cover picture and several black and white illustrations in the book are quite sweet.

Lindgren definitely captures what it feels like to be an angry child. The family and the neighbor are warm and appealing.

The only thing that didn’t ring completely true for me was Lotta confessing about the sweater in her note rather than continuing to hide what she’d done, but her doing so didn’t ring completely false either.

For me this wasn’t in the league of Pippi, but it’s a sweet story about a normal little girl.

I also loved the humor in the book. Even the street name is amusing.