Ramona and Her Father
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Ramona and Her Father is a juvenile fiction novel written by Beverly Cleary. It is the third installment in Cleary's acclaimed Ramona Quimby series. The book was first published in 1977 and is illustrated by Alan Tiegreen.
Ramona is well into her second grade year at Glenwood School and all is going well until one day her father comes home and announces that he has lost his job. The Quimbys must now cope with the breadwinner now searching for another job - filling out job applications and collecting unemployment insurance.
Many of the chapters in the book are of Ramona hilariously trying to keep things together despite all this. The Quimbys try to have a Halloween, only to have their cat Picky-Picky eat the jack o'lantern. Other subplots deal with the family's temperamental car; Beezus, the older sister, and her hangups about creative writing; and Ramona's crafty attempts to get her father to kick his smoking habit.
The final chapter finds Mr. Quimby finally getting a job, as a supermarket cashier, and of Beezus and Ramona participating in their church's annual Christmas pageant with Beezus' friend Henry Huggins. Ramona has the idea for her and her friends Howie Kemp and Davy to be sheep in the pageant, but Ramona's costume is incomplete because her mother had little time to sew. Nevertheless, the sheep steal the show.