Dr. MaryAnn Diorio

Homeschool.com’s Product Reviews

Dr. MaryAnn Diorio is a widely published, award-winning author of fiction and non-fiction for both adults and children.

To see a bibliography of her complete works, click here. A list of her children’s books/young adults’ books can be found here.

For this review, we reviewed her three Author Student Guides:

A Student’s Guide to Nathaniel Hawthorne
A Student’s Guide to Herman Melville

A Student’s Guide to Mark Twain

The three guides follow a similar format. Each has 120+ pages, and each includes:

An introduction to the life and works of the particular author
Chapters where Dr. Diorio examines the author’s different writings (books, stories, poems), including the plots, characters, themes, literary devices, etc. that were employed in each.
An author chronology
Chapter notes
A glossary
Suggestions for additional readings
An index
Definitions throughout (nice touch – one of my favorite things about these guides)
And more.

All guides can be purchased as paperback books or in iPad or Kindle format.

Specific info on each guide follows.
Interesting things I learned about Nathaniel Hawthorne include (I admit, most of the “interesting things” I’m including are of a personal nature – the literary info is EXCELLENT!):

His great-great grandfather was a judge in the Salem witch trials of 1692. Generations later, Nathaniel was still ashamed of this, and changed the spelling of his last name, to distance himself from this.
He used ancestral sin as a theme throughout many of his writings.
He used ambiguity extensively – leaving the ultimate meaning of a story up to the reader.
While attending college, he became friends with Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
He followed The Scarlet Letter with The House of the Seven Gables.
He also published children’s stories.

Interesting things I learned about Herman Melville:

He had to leave school at the age of 12.
He was friends with Nathaniel Hawthorne.
He died in relative obscurity, even though Moby Dick is now considered a classic piece of literature. In his lifetime, he was actually considered a “fifth-rate” author. Ouch!

Interesting things I learned about Mark Twain:

His pen name “mark twain” is actually a riverboat term – it indicates a safe depth of water for navigating river boats – meaning mark two fathoms (12 feet).
Many of the characters in his book were drawn from people he knew in his life. For example –
- Becky Thatcher was based on a girl that lived across the street from the Clemens family in Hannibal, MO.
- Huckleberry Finn was based on a real boy named Tom Blankenship.
- Aunt Polly was drawn from Twain’s mother.
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer was originally written for an adult audience.

What I like about these Student’s Guides:

The information is EXCELLENT! Info includes the different themes the authors used, literary devices, how their lives shaped their characters, and more. There is A LOT of important info included in each book.
These books can easily be used in homeschooling – for in-depth studies of the authors. In fact, as a result of this review, I’m going to add this to our homeschooling! (Not previously included – but really, I’m going to add it!)
I like how the material is presented/arranged. It’s well organized and I appreciate organization.
The highlighted definitions throughout are wonderful.
The books are of good quality – with wipe-able covers. That’s important in my house.
The price point is very good. Especially if you consider it to be the main cost of an ENTIRE course you’ll be teaching. What a deal! (Under $12! Actually, they’re presently $9.99 for a paperback book, but I realize prices can go up)
These are good books to have in your homeschooling library.

What don’t I like?

Honestly, I can’t think of a single thing!

Here is a link to Dr. Mary Ann’s bookstore.