Cheaper by the Dozen (the book) by Frank B. Gilbreth, Jr., and  Ernestine Gilbreth Carey, ISBN:  006008460X (softcover) ISBN:  055347278X (audio book)

softcover  |  audio book

We really enjoyed this book!  I read it to the kids last year.  It is truly laugh-outloud funny.  We all laughed.  And we all wanted more!  We were disappointed when the book ended.  We loved this family.  They would have been the best kind of neighbors.

Cheaper by the Dozen is the story of a family with twelve children.  The parents are both motion study experts.  It was just after the turn of the century, and motion study was a new field of science.  Frank and Lilly were pioneers in this field.  Frank travelled nationally and internationally introducing factories to efficiency studies and teaching factory big whigs how they could apply the innovative methods of helping the factory workers to work smarter, not harder, by not wasting any motions on the job.  Frank Gilbreth practiced many of his theories on his family and got (usually hilarious, but effective) results.  Throughout the story, the whole family is constantly trying to do things faster, without wasting any motions.  This family even had the quickest way to take a bath figured out. 

The father is a boisterous character.  He is the center of the family and provides most of the laughs in the book.  He has all sorts of systems to teach his brood things like Morse code, foreign languages, typing, and even sailing.  His methods are innovative for the times they're living in (1910's).  Thinking outside of the box was Mr. Gilbreth's specialty.

One part of the story that had me in stitches was when the population control representative was looking for a new leader for their group.  Someone recommended Mrs. Gilbreth for the job, without mentioning that she had 12 children.  The conversation between the population control representative and Lilly is hilarious.

This book was such a pleasant surprise for us that I wish I hadn't put off reading it for so long.  I had it on our To Be Read list for a couple of years before I finally got around to reading it to the kids.  Possibly my youngest wouldn't have enjoyed it as much, though.  My children were 12 and 10 when I read it to them, and it felt like they were the perfect age for this book, but who knows?  All kids are different. 

I heartily recommend this Cheaper by the Dozen as a read-aloud.  Any family looking for a lighthearted, humorous story about a large family will most likely delight in this book.  We still, months later, use some of the little quips from the book like, "General interest!" and "Meased to pleet you" and "By jingo!"  It makes me smile just thinking back to the time when we enoyed this book together.

Okay, Amazon.com has reviews of Cheaper by the Dozen.  It has an average customer rating of 5 out of 5 with over 60 reviews.  Obviously, a lot of folks have enjoyed this book, too.  BUT if you read those reviews, it will spoil the ending for you, so don't do it!  We were not expecting the ending and were very glad that we didn't know the outcome of the story while we were reading it.

We hated to put Cheaper by the Dozen away, but we had Belles on Their Toes sitting on the shelf waiting to be read.  Belles on Their Toes is the sequel to Cheaper by the Dozen.  My kids liked it just as much as Cheaper by the Dozen, but I enjoyed Cheaper by the Dozen more.  Again, don't read the reviews of Belles on Their Toes at Amazon or the ending of Cheaper by the Dozen will be ruined for you.

We are currently (12/03) reading Innside Nantucket aloud which is another Gilbreth book. One of the Gilbreth children bought an inn out on Nantucket, and this book tells that amusing story. I don't think young children would enjoy this book, but my teen children and I did.