Although I am well over the suggested reading age for this book, I'm one of those who never got over "Harriet the Spy" or "From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler." So I started to read it as a light book with a strong female character. I ended reading it with a renewed appreciation of spatial memory and the need for coexistence of those who are there, and those who will come. As a neighborhood organizer dealing with just these issues, "The Outcasts of 19 Schuyler Place" has a permanent place on my bookshelf to remind me why I do what I do.

Margaret Rose Kane's Uncle Alex said that "you couldn't stop history from happening because the entire past tense is history." But Margaret Rose had a plan. ad she was ready to change history.
Twelve year-old Margaret Rose Kane "prefered not to" go to summer camp, and so when her uncle Alex comes and saves her from the dreaded Camp Taquela, her real summer adventures begin.
This book is full of wit. I have read From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, also written by E.L. Konigsburg and The Outcasts of 19 Schuyler Place is the better one by far. This book has a very difficult vocabulary, so I recommend it mostlly for girls 12 and older. If you love an interesting and suspenseful book, then GO FOR IT!

I was going to begin this review with some snarky remark somewhere along the lines of, "As E.L. Konigsburg gets older, the children in her novels become less recognizably childlike and more increasingly adult". Then I rethought that little statement. It's unfair to say that Konigsburg has only recently made her children miniature adults. After all, she's been doing it from the start. Pick up, "From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler", and you'll note that even back in 1967 Konigsburg's characters were more inclined to sigh and utter striking notes of middle-class ennui than do something particularly childlike like read comic books or chew bubble gum. "The Outcasts of 19 Schuyler Place" is just the latest in a long line of adult-like kids in adult situations acting like adults (but short ones with fewer rights and no driving licenses). It's a fun book. An amusing adventure that draws on several different storylines and brings them all together effortlessly by the story's close. And it is undoubtedly the most grown-up of Konigsburg's books to date. Whether that hurts the story or not is up to you.

Margaret Rose has suffered a nasty shock. Her beloved Hungerian uncles have not, to her amazement, offered to take her in for the summer while her parents go on an archeological dig. That means she's stuck at summer camp in a cabin with some particularly malicious girls. In a normal children's book, this would mean that our heroine would spend the rest of the novel either outwitting her enemies or avoiding them. Instead, Margaret is saved after a mere two weeks of camp by her aforementioned uncles. Ensconced at their home on 19 Schuyler Place the girl usually takes a great deal of pleasure in viewing and painting her uncles' three magnificent ridiculous towers of glass and steel. Soon, however, it becomes clear why the uncles didn't offer to take in Margaret Rose from the start. It seems the local neighborhood association has insisted that the towers are unsafe, gaudy, and lower property values. Soon they will be coming down and unless Margaret Rose can come up with a plan, three beautiful things may soon be destroyed.

The book is set in the 1980s, making it perhaps one of the first works of historical 1980s children's fiction I've ever encountered. Characters in the story are smart and well-formed. Konigsburg's ear for dialogue stands her in good stead here with the amusing running arguments between the two uncles. Other characters include Mrs. Kaplan who rules the camp at which Margaret Rose briefly stays and is simultaneously pitiable and (not to put too fine a point on it) a spiritual twin of Nurse Ratchet in "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest". Mrs. Kaplan's son, Jake, is a fellow who previously gave up on his dreams and is only now slowly coming around to living his own life, via the towers. And then there's Margaret Rose.

Alas poor Margaret Rose. This is a twelve-year-old girl prone to making statements along the lines of, "I prefer not to" ala Bartleby the Scrivener. When asked why she has rejected the camp's half-hearted attempts to befriend her, Margaret Rose replies, "Because you are destroying my self-image". Please... please anyone... please locate the twelve-year-old out there that bandies about the phrase, "self-image" when they're talking about their problems. I'm not saying that there isn't a rare child here and there who might take an odd pleasure in such terms, but in Konigsburg's books they're a dime a dozen. Which makes Margaret Rose a weak carbon copy of many of the characters Konigsburg has written about before.

None of this is to say that the book doesn't make for good reading. I'm just not certain how interested kids would be in Home Owner Associations and the recorded public records of city council meetings. The author is at her best when she talks about the uncles and their towers. Like the towers in fellow children's book, "The Wind Singer" by William Nicholson (a great and under-read book), these structures create an eerie beautiful music when the time is right. Like the towers in J.R.R. Tolkein's, "The Two Towers" they conjure up majesty and great power. They are the focal point of this book, and a wonderful one at that.

As you've undoubtedly caught on to, I'm not exactly running for the Greatest Konigsburg Fan nomination at this time. I like her work in general, but her specific books sometimes rub me the wrong way. "The Outcasts of 19 Schuyler Place" has a lot going for it. And if you get around the political elements (and some odd moments regarding Margeret Rose's mom's childhood friends) the book is a fairly fun read for your average 6th grader. It's not going to knock your socks off, but it's enjoyable. Mildly, vaguely, oh-so-slightly enjoyable

I absolutely loved this book! Margaret Rose's uncles were so unique and funny! And Jake was the quintessential older male crush that everyone (well any female) who reads this book will fall in love with. A must read for any Konigsburg aficionado.

My 30 year old sister gave it to me (her significantly older sister) and our mother...we all loved it. I started reading and couldn't put it down. Love a book that doesn't dumb down because the target audience is younger than college age...E.L.K. uses great vocabulary and refers to interesting places and things in the world without pulling us out of the story.
The story is the thing...funny, touching, and suspenseful.
Colorful writing is nothing without a good story and characters you care about and I was in love with Margaret Rose Kane and her uncles right off the bat.
Went out and bought two other E.L.K. books - hoping for a similarly pleasant experience.