Sapphire Battersea (Hetty Feather)

Sapphire Battersea by Jacqueline Wilson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is the second book in the Hetty Feather series.  Hetty has met her mother enjoyed being with her, but the secret was to come out sooner or later.  Life at the foundling home home comes to an end when she was 14 and her dear friend, Miss Smith, arranged for her to be a servant.  Hetty doesn't want to be a servant, but there seems little hope of anything else.  While she has learned to control some of her temper, it is still there and leads Hetty into some difficulties.

Hetty reminds me of Little Orphan Annie and Anne of Green Gables.  She has the same red hair and spunk that makes her a favorite of girls young and old.  All three of the books also have good vocabulary and paint an accurate picture of life for children, and especially young girls who don't have a proper home. In this part of the series, we see what a life of servitude was like and the precarious life servants had if they were turned out without a reference.

It also exposes the class distinctions of the age and the indifference that the middle and upper class had for the poor.  In the Hetty stories, the children are much more on their own.  While Annie and Anne went from the orphanage to their new homes, Hetty and Diamond have to fend for themselves.                                                    


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