This series is part of the American Girl Books franchise.
Samantha Parkington is an orphan who is being raised by her grandmother in a town called Mount Bedford in the Hudson Valley in New York when the series begins. The year is 1904, and she is nine years old. Her parents died a few years earlier, when Samantha was five years old, accidentally drowning in a lake where the family liked to spend their summers. Samantha’s memories of her parents are limited, but she feels their loss.
Her grandmother is often strict with her, trying to turn her into a proper young lady. Her Uncle Gard, her mother’s brother, is more fun. Uncle Gard (short for Gardner) loves Samantha like she is his own daughter. Samantha is initially somewhat jealous when Uncle Gard falls in love with a woman named Cornelia and marries her. The worst parts is how Grandmary pressures Samantha to be on her best behavior and how the adults focus more on trying to impress Cornelia than paying attention to how Samantha feels and what she wants. However, Cornelia also loves Samantha and does care about how she feels and what would make her happy, and Samantha comes to love her as her aunt. Aunt Cornelia is more modern and less formal sometimes than Grandmary, and she has room for new ideas. Samantha also becomes friends with Cornelia’s younger sisters, a set of twins named Agnes and Agatha.
Partway through the series, Samantha moves to New York City to live with Uncle Gard and Aunt Cornelia full time. Aunt Cornelia is a women’s suffragist and supports many good causes. Samantha comes to identify with Aunt Cornelia’s ideals, and even Samantha’s grandmother, who is more old-fashioned, becomes interested in the movement.
Samantha’s grandmother, a widow, marries Admiral Archibald Beemis. He is from England, and they have been friends for a long time. He was a friend of Samantha’s grandfather before he died and has been visiting Grandmary every summer for years.
Samantha’s best friend is a poor girl named Nellie. In the first book in the series, Nellie comes to work as a maid for a family who lives near Samantha’s grandmother. Because her family is poor, Nellie has not been able to attend school regularly, like Samantha has, and she has had to work to help earn money for her family from an early age. Samantha helps Nellie to learn to read and continue her studies. Samantha and Nellie are separated for a time when Nellie is sent back to her family in New York City. When Nellie’s father dies, she and her sisters are taken to an orphanage. When Samantha finds her, Nellie is afraid that she will be separated from her sisters and sent west on one of the Orphan Trains. However, in the last book in the series, Uncle Gard and Aunt Cornelia adopt Nellie and her sisters, making them family with Samantha.
Books in the Series:
Meet Samantha (1986)
Samantha meets Nellie, a girl her own age who has recently come to be a maid in a neighbor’s house. Nellie helps Samantha to figure out why one of her grandmother’s servant, Jessie, wants to leave her job.
Samantha Learns a Lesson (1986)
Samantha helps Nellie with her reading and lesson because she cannot attend school. In return, Nellie helps Samantha to understand the lives of working children and what factories are really like for the children who work there.
Samantha’s Surprise (1986)
Uncle Gard’s girlfriend, Cornelia, is spending Christmas with them. Samantha is annoyed because the servants are fussing to make the house perfect for Cornelia, and they act like Samantha is in the way. Samantha is also jealous about Uncle Gard’s feelings toward Cornelia. As they spend more time together, having fun, Samantha’s feelings toward Cornelia improve, and Cornelia turns out to be the only person who guesses what Samantha’s secret Christmas wish is.
Happy Birthday, Samantha (1987)
Samantha’s birthday party is ruined because of a trick played by the boy next door. However, Samantha gets a special trip to New York City that changes her life.
Samantha Saves the Day (1988)
Samantha takes a summer trip with her family to their summer home at Piney Point, returning to the lake where her parents drowned years before. When she finds her mother’s old sketch book, Samantha is surprised to realize that she has actually been to the island in the middle of the lake before, with her parents before they died. Visiting the island helps her make peace with her parents’ accident, although she almost suffers the same disaster.
Changes for Samantha (1988)
Samantha discovers that Nellie and her sisters are now orphans and have been sent to an orphanage. What can she do to make sure that Nellie is not sent out west on the Orphan Train?
Nellie Books:
Nellie’s Promise (2004)
Nellie’s Uncle Mike, who abandoned Nellie and her sisters after their father’s death, shows up and threatens to ruin Uncle Gard’s adoption of the girls.
Mystery Stories:
The Curse Of Ravenscourt (2005)
Samantha and her family are staying at a fancy apartment house, but strange things are happening there.
The Stolen Sapphire (2006)
Samantha and Nellie are traveling to Europe, and a valuable jewel is stolen on their ship.
The Cry of the Loon (2009)
Samantha takes Nellie to Piney Point for the first time, but a series of strange accidents make her grandmother wonder if she should sell their house there.
Clue in the Castle Tower (2011)
Samantha and Nellie are visiting a friend of the Admiral’s in England whose manor house is near castle ruins that may be haunted.
Danger in Paris (2015)
While visiting Paris with their grandmother and the Admiral, Samantha and Nellie learn that the Admiral may be there on a secret mission.
Supplemental Books:
This book has recipes like the kind that Samantha might have made in the early 1900s.
Jestress's Forgotten Books and Stories 