At the Sign of the Sugared Plum by Mary Hooper 

This was one of two (at least that I can remember) historical fiction books that I've ever read. While this isn't typically a genre I am drawn towards and I was a little unsure as to what to expect, I did find it to be an enjoyable read. 

This book is set in London in the summer of 1665 during The Great Plague. Hannah, the protagonist, moves from the country into London to help her sister run her sweets shop. Little does she know that she's in for the summer of her life when she arrives and finds out about the newly spreading Plague. The story follows Hannah, her sister, and few of her friends and neighbors through out the scariest of times while they try their best to do everything within their power to survive the Plague.

Historical fiction is certainly the way I'd classify this book, as opposed to Period fiction. The definition of historical fiction from the article, Getting It Right: Historical Fiction or Not? written by Sharron L. McElmeel seems to align well with my thinking on this: 
Historical Fiction: A book set in a specific historical time period with a plot that uses significant historical characters or events as an integral element in the story. Narrative may
include invented characters and dialogue but all must be accurate to the time period.

I cannot remember if the book said how old Hannah is and have reread several sections and done some Google searches to try and figure it out, but all to no avail.  My educated guess, based on many details of the book, is somewhere between 16 and 19. She has a strong voice throughout the book and it is all written from her first-person perspective. Hannah's parents are absent in this book, only because she has moved away from their home to live with her sister. You get the impression that her parents were very involved and capable when Hannah lived with them. Of course, like any good YA book there is a thread of new relationships and first heart-throbs running throughout the story line, mind you it is 1665 so the most risque thing that the reader encounters is Hannah's wish to survive the Plague long enough to experience her first kiss from her first love.

The content of the book is heavy, but not inappropriately so. There are thousands, literally thousands, of deaths in the book and the author goes into great detail about the burial of the corpses, how they are collected, who treats them, the kinds of symptoms Plague victims have, etc. It leaves you feeling sad and a little hopeless in spots, but I did not find the content to be too graphic.

I would recommend this book to 7th graders on up, especially female students. Male students might enjoy it also, but I would be more likely to suggest this to female students due to the strong female protagonist. I would be cautious of giving it to a student who might be bothered by the gruesome aspects of the Plague, maybe just warning them ahead of time that it deals heavily with large quantities of death.


This book would be a great book to assign students to read when learning about The Great Plague, or even to use as a read aloud. Students would be able to experience some of that fear, unknown unrest, and hopelessness that the people of London were sure to have felt during the summer of 1665. I think that this book would also be a great book to use to help students build their critical thinking skills. As one assignment idea, students could read the book and then make a case for what they would have done to try and escape the Plague and have to defend their thinking to their classmates.

Lastly, the format of this book is novel in style. However, there are a couple of things that add to that a bit. The writing is done more so in proper English and feels a little unnatural to read at times. At the back of the book there is a glossary filled with terms and definitions that might be unfamiliar to most readers. The author also includes some notes about her research and facts she learned about The Great Plague. In addition to all that, a few recipes from the sweets shop are given. 

One of the most interesting formatting choices I noticed is that each chapter is started with a quote. The author's notes explain that these quotes were taken from Pepys's Diary, which she used to help gather information about the Plague. She mentions a few other book titles that helped her write this novel as well.