Annie Barrows: Saying Goodbye to My Girls

Annie Barrows

In the grocery store a few days ago, I inadvertently climbed aboard the following train of thought:

Wouldn't it be great if bean sprouts cured Covid-19?
The person who discovered that would get a lot of glory.
Ivy and Bean love glory.
Ivy and Bean would definitely try to discover the cure for Covid-19.
They'd start with bean sprouts.
Nah. Too plain.
Bean sprout/almond milk paste? Yeah.
Flower-petal-and-tree-bark poultices? Yeah!
Something involving earwax? Sure!

But wait--I already wrote the last Ivy and Bean book.

Seventeen years of Ivy and Bean are coming to an end, and I miss them already. I don't mean just writing about them. I mean having these two girls as my constant companions, my imaginary friends and my own squeaky little Greek chorus. Even as my own kids grew up, Ivy and Bean stood by to give me the proper perspective on the world: to urge me to look under rocks, to hope for magic solutions and to suggest that bean sprouts might work. Ivy and Bean have been my escape hatch from adulthood.

The final book is Ivy and Bean Get to Work! Does the title indicate that Ivy and Bean are buckling down, preparing themselves to face the challenges of adult life, progressing toward responsible and serious futures?

No!

I don't want anyone to get serious, especially not Ivy and Bean. I want them to have fun. I want them to be seven forever. I want them to know that they have never once been wrong in their desires. I want them to congratulate themselves on their resourceful and inspiring solutions to problems. And I want to thank them for giving me 17 years of their company. --Annie Barrows

In addition to her many children's books, Barrows is the co-author, with her aunt Mary Ann Shaffer, of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.

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