Amelia Bedelia has an appointment at the doctor's office. The doctor is at the hospital, and the staff ask Amelia Bedelia to help out. (Why of all people would they ask her.) She answers the phones and treats everything literally creating all sorts of issues. By the time the doctor comes back, everyone has come to the office. Amelia Bedelia ends up "treating them" with goodies at the end and all ends up well. The derivative Amelia Bedelia get old.
Amelia Bedelia shows up at the school and ends up directing the Thanksgiving play because others are sick. She makes a ton of literal misunderstandings, and then ends up accidentally putting together a funny play. Things that go wrong end up being entertaining. It felt felt like there was too much text with the same old misunderstandings.
Amelia Bedelia (1963)
Thank You, Amelia Bedelia (1964)
Amelia Bedelia and the Surprise Shower (1966)
These are the first Amelia Bedelia book. She takes everything literally and gets in all sorts of trouble because of it. However, she is also a great cook, and the delicious food always manages to save her. The third book is a bit different. Here, it is the literal understanding of "shower" and the spray with water that helps cure a headache. The food is incidental. These originals are better than the derivatives.
Amelia Bedelia Under Construction by Herman Parish, illustrated by Lynn Sweat
Amelia Bedelia is babysitting for a family so the mother can go to a prenatal appointment. She gets confused about the talk of an "addition" to the family. Some is also thinks the husbands trip to a "board" meeting may be with real boards. Later when construction workers show up looking for a house, she flips the address over and realizes there is an "addition" needed here. While they work on that, she tries to do some of the chore list such as "sanding" the deck with sand. Later there is confusion about twins being born. Everything ends happily ever after with food. The book is filled with Amelia Bedelia thinking things are very literal. However, here there is a bit too much forcing situations and relying on coincidence.
Amelia Bedelia is a kid. She doesn't get figures of speech. They find a cat. It gets stuck in a tree. The fire department helps get it down from the tree. They try to find a home for the cat and the fire department wants a cat. However, the cat disappears. It turns out the cat went home. They then get a cat from the pound for the fire department. These Amelia Bedelia books lack the charm of the earlier books.
