Childhood Treasure

First day walking home from school, and the treasures we find!

My daughters noticed this little guy,

along with a trove of bottlecaps, beads, and broken zipper.  The shark cap and rare blue bead were exciting finds.  Not pictured is the wild artichoke seed that, sadly, fell out of my pocket.

My son found a duck made of Eucalyptus bark,

and I found a Duck Rabbit.  My rabbit doesn’t just sniff, it sings!

What a great day to read Duck! Rabbit! written by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and illustrated by Tom Lichtenheld.

Wait.  Listen.  Did you hear that?

I hear duck sounds.

That’s funny.  I distinctly

heard rabbit sounds.

And what is a child to do with a collection of beads and bottle caps, besides making temporary dioramas like this one,

filling them in various toys to cart around the house, and lining them up along the couch?

Here’s a favorite book of ours that offers up some gentle and playful solutions:  The Button Box, written by Margarette S. Reid, illustrated by Sarah Chamberlain.

Swirl them, sort them, pretend play with them and use some for sock puppet eyes.  I love that, in the end, all the unattached buttons go back in the box.

 

What, an earlier MORE SPAGHETTI, I SAY! ?

This early reader by Rita Golden Gelman has been a favorite in our family.  More Spaghetti, I Say! (1993) is a silly, laugh out-loud story, with superb rhyme and with fun, positively exuberant illustrations.

“Play with me, Minnie.

Play with me, please.

We can stand on our heads.

We can hang by our knees.”

“Oh, no.

I can’t play.

I can’t play with you, Freddy.

Not now.

Can’t you see?

I am eating spaghetti.”

I did a double take when I came across this earlier edition from 1987 which notes an original copyright from 1977.  Same story, but…

pictures by Jack Kent!  The Kent of Just Only John, Joey Runs Away, There’s No Such Thing as a Dragon?  I love his books.  But…well…take a look and compare a page from both editions.

Here’s the first page by Kent:

And here’s Gerberg’s.

Gerberg expands the image to a double spread and shows Minnie with her back to us.  There’s only a hint of what’s in the bowl in her lap, saving the big surprise for the next page.  The last image in his edition beautifully harks back to this one.

There are subtle improvements on every page, with the text layout and image variation.  Really, it’s a night and day improvement.  I guess even the greats have their disappointments.

The Gelman and Gerberg pairing is awesome.  Check out another of theirs, Stop Those Painters! (1989).

Painters painting grass and trees.

Painters painting birds and bees.

Stop those painters.

Please! Please! Please!

Similarly silly and fantastic.

Now just who is Mort Gerberg?  Well, turns out he’s been a contributor to the The New Yorker since 1965!  Wow, I even remember some of these cartoons.  Ha, maybe I just couldn’t read his signature!  I love this guy.

And Rita Golden Gelman?  What an unusual life.  Since 1987 she’s had no permanent home, travelling the world as a “modern day nomad.”  She also sponsors an organization called Let’s Get Global that encourages graduating high school kids to explore other countries before going off to college.

 

Hot Books

Finally, it’s begun to feel like summer down here in Southern California.  We’ve had such mild weather (global warming hasn’t come our way yet, it seems), I was wondering if we would get any hot days before school started up again.  Now there’s a topic you think there would be a lot of books on — the heat, the summer, escaping to the beach…the need to get cool.  Got to be a plethora of that in picture books, right?  Well, not so much.  At least I can only come up with two in my home!  I love these two, but I’m wondering what I’m missing…

Here are my two hot day reads, great to look at when you’re cold in the winter or when you’re hot and irritable and need something to distract the little ones from beating each other up…

1. A recent purchase, The Hot Day by Sheila Greenwald (The Bobbs-Merrill Company – 1972).

Funny and old-world charming.  Only three colors in this book.  A schoolbus yellow for the hot, some grey for neutral, and light blue for the cool.  Blue comes from a fan.  It’s the only one in the house and belongs to the boarder who has a room in the family’s home.  On that hot, hot day, that fan and its room become a source of envy by all those youngsters.  When evening comes and Momma and Poppa go out to dinner and the boarder goes out to the theater, you can guess where all those youngsters go.  Yes, they delightfully and wickedly get their cool.

2.Hotter Than a Hot Dog by Stephanie Calmenson, illustrated by Elivia (Little, Brown & Company – 1994)

This one uses lots of yellow and pink to make you feel hot and sticky and blues and white when you finally get the cool.  Grandma and her granddaughter flee to the beach to escape the city’s heat.  Great back and forth playing with words between the grandma and child.  ”I’m hotter than a salamander in the sun,” says Grandma.  The child responds with, “I’m hotter than a turkey in the oven!”  All the sensory details and descriptions  – the iron dragon of the hot train, the ouch of the hot sand, the ouch of the cold water — like “jumping into a bowl of ice cubes,” she says — allow you to feel it all and return with them happily at night when it’s cool.

 

20 Picture Books to Love About Love

I thought I would have this list up in time for Valentine’s Day.  But craft goodies for the kids’ Valentine’s Day sharing,

along with baking distractions,

prevented me from finishing.

First, to get Valentine’s Day themed books out of the way.  Last year’s post highlighted a couple of my favorites.

I’m adding the following mini book by Kevin Henkes to that list. 

Lilly’s Chocolate Heart by Kevin Henkes

It’s Henkes, it’s Lilly, and she’s got a perfect little chocolate heart she can’t find a good place to put.  Need I say more? 

And here we go, 20 more books from my shelves that have a whole lot of heart. 

Children helping their mama’s is the topic for the first three.

  

1. A Chair For My Mother (1982) by Vera B. Williams

Mother is on her feet all day working in a diner.  When she comes home at night, there’s no soft chair to rest in.  The daughter, along with Grandmother and Mother, gradually collect their spare coins into a jar.  And when the jar is full, they buy the chair of their dreams. 

2. Arandi’s Braids (2001) by Antonio Hernandez Madrigal, Illustrated by Tomi dePaola

Set in an old village in Mexico where a hair buyer has come to purchase hair for wigs.  Arandi’s mother needs money for a new fishing net and a new dress for Arandi’s birthday.  Told by the barber that her mother’s hair is too short to buy, Arandi, whose hair is the most beautiful in the village, sacrifices her own.  Some of my favorite illustrations by dePaola. 

3. Brave Irene (1988) by William Steig

Young Irene braves the elements to deliver a dress made by her mother when Mother is too sick to deliver it herself.  Much pain, worry and misery, with a very Steig-like happy reunion at the end.        

And now for a book where Mama helps her little girl:

   

4. A New Coat for Anna by Harriet Ziefert, Illustrated by Anita Lobel

It’s the end of WWII and Anna’s mother has no money to buy her a new coat.  Mother finds a way through trading some of their possessions to those involved in the making of a coat — from the sheep farmer to the tailor.  After a whole lot of patience, Anna gets her coat.  To show their appreciation, the family shares their Christmas with all who took part.    

The previous four were mother and daughter books.  Not many endearing father and son books in my collection.  Unless, that is, they happen to be bears.  I wonder why that is? 

5. If I Were Your Father by Margaret Park Bridges, Illustrated by Kady MacDonald Denton

I’m including this one mostly for the last line of  the book — it gets me every time. 

And here’s a bear father and son that ranks up there with Barbara Firth’s Little Bear and Big Bear as one of my favorite bear families. 

6. I Love You Just the Way You Are by Virginia Miller

Just get passed the sappy title — all the Bartholomew and George stories are irresistable.

And now that were’s speaking of animals, here’s an endearing koala mother and daughter:

7. Koala Lou (1988) by Mem Fox, illustrated by Pamela Lofts

Koala Mama has many more children now and young Koala Lou misses hearing “Koala Lou, I DO love you!”  So she enters the bush olympics, thinking if she wins her mama will say it again.  She gets her wish, even though she comes in second.   

 

8. Monster Mama (1993) by Liz Rosenberg, Illustrated by Stephan Gammell

Even monsters have ways of showing their love.  And there are few better at drawing scary monsters than Gammell!   

9. Rotten Ralph (1980) by Jack Gantos, illustrated by Nicole Rubel

The supreme example of unconditional love.  Sarah’s love for the cat who knows no end to awful is unwavering.

10. Fox In Love (1982) by James Marshall, written by his alter ego Edward Marshall

Fox gets in over his head with too many girls.  The one he ends up appreciating (well, maybe) more in the end is his little sister.

11. Joey Runs Away (1985) by Jack Kent

Told to clean his room (his mother’s pouch, that is), Joey would rather look for another home.  After a scary ride in a pelican’s beak and a mailman’s bag, he’s happy to be delivered home to an overjoyed mother.  Mother has had her own share of troubles with other animals trying out her son’s room while she cries, “It’s not for rent!”  Fun, fun book.

12. A Mother For Choco (1992) by Keiko Kasza

Little bird goes looking for a mother a la Are You My Mother? , but is told he doesn’t look like them — they don’t have wings, big cheeks, or stripes like him, etc.  Until he meets up with a mother bear who asks him, “If you had a mommy, what would she do?”  She shows him she can do all of those things.  A fun surprise awaits — Mother Bear’s other children are not what you expect.

And for love misunderstood:

13. Katie Loves the Kittens (2008) by John Himmelman

Katie is so exuberant in her love for the kittens that she scares them!  You empathise with her inability to control herself and her utter grief when she fails.  Happiness abounds when Katie succeeds.  I love the drawings of Katie’s owner holding her in order to scold her.  Katie is being prevented from apologetically licking the girl despite an enormous stretch of her tongue.   

14. Baby, Come Out (1971) by Fran Munushkin, illustrated by Ronald Himler

A unique book.  Here you’ve got a babe still in utero who looks like a little girl and talks.  Trust me, this is the sweetest little book imaginable.  Baby says she likes it where she is, her mama treats her well, why come out?  Not until Father comes home and gives a kiss to everyone, and baby wants to feel one too, does she change her mind.   

Most mushy parent and child love books don’t seem to last the test of time, or at least the test of reading them to subsequent children.  But here’s one that we didn’t tire of reading with each one:  

15. Mama Loves You (2005) by Caroline Stutson, illustrated by John Segal

This is one of the first books my children memorized.  Each page features a different animal or insect.  “Who’s that nibbling/ In my house?/  Mama loves you,/  Little mouse.”

And for the most endearing love story between a bird and a mountain, search no further than this title:

16. The Mountain That Loved a Bird (1985) by Alice Mc Lerran, illustrated by Eric Carle

Text heavy picture book, but gloriously so.   A lonely, barren mountain rejoices when a bird stops on her way to find a place to nest.  He begs her to stay, she says she cannot.  But she returns once a year to sing to him.  Before her short life ends, she instructs a daughter to carry on this tradition.  The daughters begin to carry seeds with them and eventually the mountain becomes green and full of life and its stream of tears becomes a stream of happiness.  Dare you to read the last line without crying. 

Books about love between a grandparent and grandchild often fail by being overly sentimental.  But not the following three:

17. Not So Fast Songololo (1985) by Niki Daly

This story takes place in South Africa.  Shepherd is asked to help his Grandmother go shopping.  They don’t have a lot of money and she notices him eying a pair of bright red tennis shoes in a store window.  After she finishes her shopping she goes back to the store, buys him the shoes, and makes him “feel so happy that it hurts him to sit still.”  I ramble more about my admiration for this book here.

18. Coco Can’t Wait by Taro Gomi

Both Grandma and Coco feel the need to visit each other at the same moment.  What follows is a series of mishaps in just missing or passing by one another on the way to each other’s house.  It ends with a meeting in the middle, under a tree, with a basket of apples — a very sweet and satisfying conclusion. 

19. A Secret For Grandmother’s Birthday (1975) by Franz Brandenberg , Illustrated by Aliki

When baking cookies, Elizabeth comments that she loves grandmother’s apple cookies.  Edward asks, “Are you making potholders for her birthday?”  But Elizabeth always replies that it’s a secret.   And so it goes as they enjoy many more things at Grandma’s house.  The birthday ending is a surprise for the reader as Elizabeth makes every item that her brother guessed she was making and Edward writes a poem of all the things Elizabeth has said she likes about Grandma.  This book also has one of the sweetest illustrations of a character sitting on a toilet you’ll ever come across.

And I end with a fantastically funny book filled with nostalgia and romantic love:

20. Buttons (2000) by Brock Cole

A hilarious tale in which three sisters find love during their quest to find buttons for their father’s britches.  I did an earlier post on this book here.

So, those are mine, what are your favorite books with love?

 

Vintage Chicken Little + Chicken Licken News

Recently found this gem of a golden book from 1960, illustrated by none other than Richard Scarry.  The story is by Vivienne Benstead. 

Foxy Loxy promises to show the birds the way to the castle.  As he walks with each one in turn, he eats them!  Here you need to imagine a picture of Foxy Loxy walking behind little chicken little while he shakes salt down on him.  Shocking fun, I say! 

The story ends with a fabulous,

And there was no one left to tell the King but Foxy Loxy himself.

But Foxy Loxy was much too full to move.

So the King never knew that the sky was falling.

…………………………………………………………..

And, in other news, the announcement for the winner of the Tomie dePaola Award for the Chicken Licken illustration was postponed until next Monday, the 9th. 

If you want to see some of the submissions, the illustrator Diandra Mae has set up a nifty blog to showcase them.  A little subversive perhaps, but I’m proud to have taken part.  There are many excellent drawings.  I would not want to be the one to have to choose the winner!  There are about 100 illustrations in there so far.  See them here.  

 

Updated Christmas Picture Book List: Now We’re Up to 11

I’ve acquired a few books to add to my favorite Christmas book list.

I was pleased to find two illustrated by Barbara Cooney, who I adore.  Both are these are text-heavy picture books, and pleasantly so!  Although they take place in very different locals, both center around a young girl and have a super happy ending that leaves you in tears.  The stories themselves are wonderful, but it’s Cooney’s homely, sincere illustrations that make them magical.     

1. The Story of Holly and Ivy (text 1957 / illustrations 1985) by Rumer Godden, illustrated by Barbara Cooney.

 

We jump between the story of a doll named Holly who wishes for a little girl, an orphan named Ivy who wishes for a grandmother and a doll, and a policeman’s wife who wishes for a child to share Christmas with.  You care so deeply for little Ivy, wishing so much that her dogged insistence that she is going to her grandmother’s house (even though she has none) comes true and for all these players to cross paths.  Like the author tells you at both the beginning and the end, “This is a story about wishing.”  It’s beautiful.

2. The Year of the Perfect Christmas Tree: An Appalachian Story (1988) by Gloria Houston, illustrated by Barbara Cooney.

 

It’s Ruthie’s family’s turn to supply the church’s Christmas tree and for Ruthie to be the angel in the Christmas pageant.  But her father is sent overseas for war and still hasn’t returned before Christmas eve as promised.  With no money to buy material to make a costume, Ruthie’s mother sacrifices her wedding dress and new stockings.  And Ruthie helps her mother find and fell the tree that she helped her father pick out in early spring.  With a satisfying and happy conclusion.      

3. A Christmas Story (1956) by Mary Chalmers.  

For the wee ones who don’t have the attention spans required of the first two, this one by Mary Chalmers is sure to please.  It’s quiet, innocent, and sweet.  The little girl Elizabeth and friend Harry Dog bring home a christmas tree.  With the help of Alice Rabbit and Hilary Cat, they set about decorating it.  “It isn’t every little girl and dog and cat and rabbit who can do it.”  Problem is, there’s no star to put on the top to finish it, so Elizabeth sets out to find one.  The book ends with a most satisfying “There!“ 

4. Angela and the Baby Jesus (2007) by Frank McCourt, illustrated by Raul Colon.

I admit that I normally shy away from books that have the word Jesus right there on the cover.  Fortunately this one had Raul Colon’s signature swirly-scratched artwork on the cover.  The author is Frank McCourt of Angela’s Ashes fame.  McCourt retells the story his mother told him of stealing Baby Jesus from the nativity scene at church when she was a young girl because she thought he was cold and needed warming up at home.  It’s rather funny.  And if you can muster a good Irish accent in your read-aloud, all the better — especially for when Mammy finds Baby Jesus tucked into her daughter’s bed:  ”Mother ‘o God!”

5. Harold at the North Pole (1957) by Crockett Johnson. 

Don’t let the cover fool you, the inside is just like the original with a sepia-toned Harold and purple line drawings.  In this story, it’s up to Harold to save Christmas by helping a snowed-in Santa.  With the aid of his trusty purple crayon, Harold comes to the rescue!  My favorite lines, after Harold starts to draw Santa’s team of reindeer:

Soon Prancer and Dancer were pawing at the snow, eager to be off around the world.  Harold wasn’t quite certain of the names of the other reindeer.  But he made sure there were eight of them. 

That beautifully captures the mix of young naiveté and Harold’s imaginative superpower. 

6. Henry and Mudge in the Sparkle Days (1988) by Cynthia Rylant, illustrated by Sucie Stevenson.  

This is a book that makes you keep a smile on your face the entire read.  Rylant and Stevenson are a match made in heaven.  The smily, childlike drawings emphasize Rylant’s gentle humor and support the cozy, warm feel that all the Henry and Mudge books have.  This one captures the winter cold, a family’s Christmas dinner celebration (complete with Mudge sneezing turkey all over Henry), and the warm fireside. 

7. The Twelve Days of Christmas (1986) by Jan Brett.

A true Jan Brett book with story within a story by the use of her signature frames at the sides of the pages.  Each day of the song gets a double-spread image with its matching christmas ornament in a banner at the top.  The side story is of a young man coming to his love’s house, going out together to cut down a Christmas tree, and bringing it back to her home to decorate.  The lovely last page is where you can spot all the ornament’s from the song on the full decked-out tree.

8. The Christmas Day Kitten (1986), by James Herriot, illustrated by Ruth Brown.

A Christmas Day miracle book to give you some misty eyes.  A stray cat that often visits the home of Mrs. Pickering (and her three lazy bloodhounds) to get food goes missing for several weeks.  She comes back, thin and dirty, on Christmas Day.  It’s bittersweet because the stray cat dies, but what she leaves behind warms the heart of Mrs. Pickering and will enliven their home for many Christmases to come.  

9. The Night Before Christmas (1975) by Clement C. Moore, illustrated by Douglas Gorsline. 

An old-fashioned feel with pretty colored pen and ink illustrations.  Many cute details such as the antics of the house cat throughout the story — find her bristling as Santa comes down the chimney and later rubbing against his toy bag.  Gorsline does a great job portraying Santa coming down the chimney – in a double-spread image of the fireplace he’s drawn a sequential series of Santas — first you see just boots, then the pants, then a bit of torso, then full Santa in the room.

10. The Night Before Christmas (1985) by Clement C. Moore, illustrated by James Marshall.  

If you’re lucky enough to find this out-of-print, you’ll get to watch Santa in Marshall’s Texas cowboy boots and a house full of bulldogs, cats, rats and chickens!

11. Baby’s Christmas, (1959) by Esther Wilkin, illustrated by Eloise Wilkin. 

I’m a sucker for Wilkin’s chubby-cheeked children.  I’m a big fan of her cheek-endowed little ones in Hansel and Gretel, and the baby is this book is no exception.  Here is rhyming text about all the presents a little baby finds on Christmas morn – Santa really spoils the bejesus out of this one.   Find all the chokeable parts on the gifts baby receives!

 

6 Great Thanksgiving Day Picture Books

Here’s some books from our collection that we’ve been enjoying.

1. Cranberry Thanksgiving (1971) by Wende and Harry Devlin.

“Ah, it’s a Cranberry book!”  That’s what we say after we see the Devlins’ holiday-themed books that we’ve grown fond of.  They’re all slightly comical and sweet.  In this book, someone is after Grandmother’s secret cranberry bread recipe.  Grandmother suspects Mr. Whisker’s, the very man Maggie invited to their Thanksgiving dinner!   

2. Thanksgiving Is Here! (2003) by Diane Goode.

Here’s a feast for the eyes.  Such marvelously engaging  pictures – find the incessantly crying baby, the mystery dog, the toupee-stealing child and so forth.  It’s so lively and boisterous.  “At Grandma’s house the chairs don’t match…but we don’t mind.”     

3. Hardscrabble Harvest (1976) by Dahlov Ipcar.

From Spring to harvest time, the farmer deals with ducks in the strawberries, pigs in the clover, and a host of other animals eating his crops.  It’s narrated throughout in a bouncy rhyme:  “Chickens in the garden/ scratching up the row./ Run, farmer, run!/ Chase them with a hoe!”  All ends happily with the Thanksgiving dinner.  Lovely greens, browns, and pinks in the folksy illustrations.   

4. Thanksgiving Day (1983) by Gail Gibbons.

Here’s a Thanksgiving 101 book.  I adore Gail Gibbons.  I dig all those simple shapes and rich colors.  Just try not to laugh at the dated 70′s-style puff vests the family plays football in!

5. A Thanksgiving Wish (1999) by Michael J. Rosen, illustrated by John Thompson.  

The strength of this book is the story, a beautiful tear-jerker.  It will make you want to save all your wishbones for the night of Thanksgiving.  A Jewish family celebrates Thanksgiving for the first time after their beloved Bubbe’s death.  Dinner preparations become a disaster when the power goes out, but kind neighbors come to their rescue. 

6. Over the River and Through the Wood (1974) by Lydia Maria Child, illustrated by Brinton Turkle.

And we end with a song with this beautiful little masterpiece by Brinton Turkle.  Illustrated in an old-fashioned watercolor style, Turkle even structures his book the old-fashioned way — color spread followed by black and white (with an one-color orange border).

Over the river and through the wood –

Now grandmother’s cap I spy!

Hurrah for the fun!

Is the pudding done?

Hurrah for the pumpkin-pie!

 

10 Halloween Books (Or Stories On a Spooky Theme)

Since we are now organized enough to have a shelf devoted to holiday books (and feel compelled to brag about it — the organization, not the holiday-themed collection) and said shelf is sagging under the weight of many Halloween books, I thought I’d take out a few to share.

1. First up, The Ghost’s Dinner (1994) by Jacques Duquennoy. 

Henry the ghost invites all his friends over for a multi-course dinner.  The fun is in the affect the food has — the ghosts change color and sometimes even in shape according to the food they eat.  Picture seven ghosts in varying shades of orange with the text, “Henry’s guests love the [pumpkin] soup.  Some have seconds.”  Entertaining pictures with sparse text.  Funny and sweet. 

2. This ones not a scary book per se, but one with a scary chapter.  It’s the one titled “Shivers” found in Arnold Lobel’s Days With Frog and Toad (1979). 

As with all of Lobel’s Frog and Toad stories, even this fireside fright-tale told by Frog to Toad leaves the reader smiling.  At the end, “They were scared.  The teacups shook in their hands.  They were having the shivers.  It was a good, warm feeling.” 

3. Dorrie and the Screebit Ghost (1979) by Patricia Coombs. 

Here’s a series I was unaware of until recently.  All the books begin with, “This is Dorrie.  She is a witch.  A little witch.  Her hat is always on crooked and her socks never match.”  Cute, eh?  And all with black and white pencil sketches with a touch of yellow and spec of light blue.   

In this book, Dorrie is told to stay upstairs and clean her room while her mother witch gets to go out to a séance to conjure up a ghost.  Dorrie manages to conjure up a mischievous ghost of her own who gives her no end of trouble. 

4. Speaking of ghosts, here’s my absolute favorite little ghost, Georgie (1944) by Robert Bright.

Georgie is the friendly little ghost that creaks the stairs and squeaks the doors of the home of Mr. & Mrs. Whittaker.  This reminds the Whittakers it was time for bed, the cat it was time to prowl and the owl it was time to hoot.  Until Mr. Whittaker nails the loose floor board and oils the door hinges.  Poor little Georgie goes searching for a new home.  But all ends happilly and everyone is reunited.  Sweet, sweet book.   

5. The Legend of Spookley the Square Pumpkin (2001) written by Joe Triano and illustrated by Susan Banta.

A square-shaped pumpkin is teased for being different.  In a raging storm he saves the day and people end up wanting all kinds of funny-shaped pumpkins.  Basically a story of acceptance using a pumpkin and told in rhyme that somehow doesn’t end up sounding cheesy.  The lovely illustrations help.  Great use throughout the book of the vine framing like you see on the cover.  It was actually made into an animated film in 2005 (which my son just saw in his first grade classroom). 

6. Arthur’s Halloween Costume (1984) by Lilian Hoban.   

I think Hoban is at her best when she draws animal characters (think Francis the badger or Harvey the muskrat).  So I love the chimps Arthur and his sister Violet.  Here Arthur has trouble finding a scary Halloween costume, but succeeds almost by accident. 

7. Two Little Witches: A Halloween Counting Story (1996) by Harriet Ziefert and illustrated by Simms Taback.

I like Taback’s illustrations and the bright colors on a black background seem especially suited to a Halloween story.

8. The Spooky Old Tree (1978) & Bears in the Night (1971) by Jan and Stan Berenstain.

 

“Do they dare go [up, into,or over...]?  Yes.  They dare.”  “Out the window/ Down the tree/ Over the wall/Under the bridge…” You can read these two books 100 times and not tire of them.  True classics.  Plus the bears have the old-school longer snouts which I prefer. :) 

Rounding out my list are a couple of Halloween themed books I have yet to read, but already wish I had on my shelf!  

  

9. Bone Dog (2011) by Eric Rohmann.  I hear that Rohmann’s newest book is both touching and funny and addresses the loss of a pet in a novel way.

10. The Soup Bone (1991) by Tony Johnston and illustrated by Margot Tomes.  I adore Margot Tomes and try to get everything I can that she illustrated.  This one looks like fun.

Happy Halloween reading!

11/3/11 Update: Here’s another, a recent library check-out, that we were just tickled with.

That Terrible Halloween Night by James Stevenson.   Little Louie and Mary Ann try to scare Grandpa — unsuccssfully.  And then it Grandpa’s turn!  Stevenson takes the familiar “kid trick-or-treating, enters a spooky house” and twists it into a hilarious tall tale.

 

Vintage Book Find of the Month: SONGS FOR THE NURSERY SCHOOL

I haven’t done one of these posts in a while.  It hasn’t been from the lack of collecting, as there are plenty piles of new books on the floor to trip on.  I’m simply trying to focus more time on story creation and drawing.  But I must share this one. 

I  picked up this cheerful cover last week during one my hunts at my local library book nook.  

This one is a genuine oldie, published in 1937 and printed in Holland. 

It wasn’t until last night however, on the eve of 9/11, that I opened it up to sing some of the songs with my youngest child before bedtime.  As we flipped through the book, we fell upon this page.

What touched me in addition to the song were these little words at the bottom.

“Probably few children of nursery school age outside of N.Y. know the Empire State building but the song seems worth including…”

When this was written, the Empire State Building was completed just a handful of years earlier in 1931.  It was, of course, destined to become a famous emblem from New York City that all children would know.  It remained the tallest building until the World Trade Center’s North Tower went up some 40 years later.  On 9/11/2001, the Empire State building took back its claim to tallest building in New York.  

The last line of the song reads,

“Empire State, do you want to reach the sky?”

On a day of remembrance, when people across our nation (and the globe) speak to their children about what happened to two very tall towers that tried to reach the sky, this, to me, is a bittersweet song.

 

Library Book of the Week: NOT SO FAST SONGOLOLO

I’m soooo bad about judging a book by its white cover.  I had a pile of 30 or so library books waiting to be read this past week.  This small paperback, a generic looking white cover with red type and a little black boy walking, I kept passing over.  Of course, when I finally got around to reading it, I fell in love with it halfway through page one!

South African Niki Daly is new to me.  Not So Fast Songololo, published back in 1985, is the first children’s book I can recall reading that is set in his South African homeland.  It’s wonderful to hear the local terminology – “rands” for currency, “tackies” for sneakers, “gogo” for grandma. 

The boy, Songololo, is asked to help his grandmother navigate the buses and crosswalks so she can do her shopping in the city.  Songololo watches out for his Gogo as best as he’s able, and she watches out for him, rewarding him with a purchase of something new (overlooking her own need for the same item).  This act means all the more for a family that doesn’t have a whole lot of money.  It’s a touching tale. 

I can attest to the universal appeal of this story as, worlds apart, it reminded me of my own grandmothers.  Gogo utters “Shu!”, “Hai”, and ”Haai!” when she’s tired or disgusted with all the unstoppable hustle of the city.  I could hear my Babas saying “Ptew!” “Oye,” and “Aych!”  The story also reminded me of how one Baba would cut up a precious ripe mango (which she loved) and give all of it to me.  She’d then go to the kitchen and eat the remaining bits over the sink by scraping off what was left clinging to the husk.  Everything for a grandchild!

This book exemplifies voice.  Daly employs the present tense and an informal way of telling the reader to listen to this and look at that, making the narration feel as if it’s told partly through Songololo’s and Gogo’s eyes.  “Here is a shoe shop.  See, tackies!  Shepard looks down at his old tackies and then at the ones in the window.” 

In that same scene, both the boy and his grandma stop together to look at the shoes in the window.  In the foreground of the illustration, a man on a motorcycle speads by – ”Quicko” is the advertisement on the back end.  A woman is passing on the sidewalk.  Gogo, a little hunched over, is looking down thoughtfully at Songololo’s old, ratty shoes while Songololo is brightly looking up at the new ones.  This quiet scene of both grandma and grandson pausing together speaks volumes.  It’s a wonderful juxtaposition of the young and the elderly, the new and the old, the fast and the slow, the hope and the despair.

Some of Daly’s written descriptions are irresistible as well.  “Gogo is old, but her face shines like new school shoes,” he writes.  And the line I enjoyed the best, with the boy in the shoe store, ”Shepherd feels so happy that it hurts him just to sit still.”

This is my library pick of the week.

 

Library Book of the Week: BUTTONS

This book is pleasurable on so many levels.  For one, the story is hilarious.  Two, the illustrations are fabulous.  And three, this book will always have a special place in my heart because it’s the first book I’ve read by this author/ illustrator and I always get a kick out of discovering someone new to me that’s great.  Also, for some God only knows reason, the library was getting rid of this copy (one IN PERFECT CONDITION) and I was able to buy it!  So hurrah for me (and I hope it was just an extra copy so library patrons can still see it). 

The book is Buttons by Brock Cole. 

The fairy-tale book setup is a father eats too much and pops 3 buttons from his “britches” in the fire.  Everything is super exaggerated in this story, so the father acts like his world has fallen to pieces.  His wife enlists the help of his three daughters; the eldest — the beauty, the middle — the strong and tall one,  and the youngest — the ditz.  One by one they think of the most difficult way in which to procure buttons for their grieving father that employs their natural talents.  The description of the youngest, by the way, is a hoot — “She was young and rabbity and still picked her nose when no one was looking.”   Her plan is the least likely to succeed and her own mother privately “had her doubts, but since the older girls had such marvelous ideas, it hardly seemed to matter what the youngest did.” 

One of the girls miraculously succeeds, and the way she does and the way the others fail is wonderful stuff.  It’s all very fun silliness, plus it  includes elements of romance and love (each girl manages to procure a husband in this tale, if not a button) and is told in a very serious sort of old-fashioned tone that matches the 1800′s period of the book. 

The watercolor and ink illustrations of the gloriously long ago setting in some non-specific land are so wonderfully expressive and full of life.  One of my favorite scenes occurs after the set-up of the story where the three girls are about to put their plans to action.  The double spread image draws the eldest walking along a bridge in costume, the middle one signing up for the army, and the youngest heading out a doorway away from the bustling courtyard.  And is it ever bustling!  Cole is great at capturing multitudes of people.  The single line of text for this illustration reads, “And now we shall hear what happened to them all.”  Even before you get to that cute line, you really want to hear what happens. 

This is my library pick of the week.

And if you like this one, check out the wonderful book George Washington’s Teeth, also illustrated by Cole.  It’s another recent discovery.

 

 

Vintage Book Find of the Month: ERIC AND THE LITTLE CANAL BOAT

So sad to fall in love with yet another book that’s out of print.  But at least I’ve got my own copy of this one!  Eric and the Little Canal Boat is a charmer that was published by Parent’s Magazine Press in 1967.  It’s an early Anne Rockwell that was written by Lilian Bason.

I absolutely adore the illustrations by Rockwell in this book.   They’re so simple, quiet, and sweet.  A limited palette of colors – primarily pinks, light blues, grey, yellow, orange, brown and greens fill in thin line drawings with a lot of white for the sky.  Spots of detail appear here are there with these wonderful abstracts of flowers dotting the hillsides. 

Rockwell’s illustrations work wonderfully well with the story about a little boy striving to please his boss on his first day of work.  The setting is Sweden.  Here canal boats ride through channel locks that connect series of lakes at different elevations.  Little Eric’s job is to help the boat cast off, to open and close the channel gates for the boat, and to help the cook.  Most importantly, Eric must remember the captain’s instructions, ”The boat must always be on time, and the passengers must always be happy.” 

What’s charming is that little Eric fumbles many tasks, but he always strives his hardest.  You’re very happy indeed when Eric’s hard work is rewarded.  

I found some YouTube videos of the canal to play to the kids to give them more understanding of how these gates work.  I was really amazed at just how narrow they are!

This book also has one of the few white book covers that really works well.  And isn’t that rope font just adorable?

 

Library Book of the Week: GARTH PIG and the ICECREAM LADY

Garth Pig and the Icecream Lady is the second book by Mary Rayner featuring a large pig family that my kids and I have fallen in love with.  The first one being Mr. and Mrs. Pig’s Evening Out.  

I can’t comprehend why these books are out of print.  Aside from the rather boring white cover on this one, these books have got it all – beautiful pen and watercolor illustrations, suspense, rolling action, humor, a villan, and sweet child heroes.  They’ve got this sweet appeal at having the empowered child and siblings overcoming the most awful situations, and all in a funny way.  I describe her style as David McPhail meets William Steig, tender and story driven.

In this story, the 10 pig children want to get “Whooshes” (I absolutely love saying that word) from the Lupino’s Icecream ”Volfwagon” parked down the street.  Garth is foolish enough to enter her truck and get abducted by the wolf in disguise.  In the great scene that follows the wolf drives along singing “Fried or boiled, baked or roast,/Or minced with mushey-rooms on toast?”  At the bottom of this page is a puzzled and innocent little Garth with the dry words underneath, ”Garth Pig heard her.  It was not a song about icecream.”  That’s so great. 

It’s up to Garth’s brothers and sisters and their ten-pig bicycle to save him.  They of course succeed.  And they don’t forget to get all their Wooshes!

This is my library pick of the week. 

 

 

My Valentine’s Day Book Picks

Here are two of my favorites:

The Valentine Bears (1983) is a sweet book by the prolific Eve Bunting, illustrated with mostly black and white illustrations by Jan Brett.  Shocked?  Yes, this is an early Brett!  I absolutely love the restrained palette – just a spot of red, straw color, and pink here and there and lots of white backgrounds.  Although I adore all of Jan Brett’s highly detailed illustrations, it’s pleasing to see her lovely drawings on simple, white backgrounds.

The story is about a Mrs. Bear who strives to celebrate Valentine’s Day for the first time.  This is a time normally occurring in the middle of their hibernation.  She succeeds in sharing her special day with Mr. Bear, a day filled with playful teasing, exchanging their favorite snacks and sweets (like chocolate covered ants) and reading Mrs. Bear’s loving, hand-made Valentines.

The Day It Rained Hearts (1983) is by Felicia Bond (best known as the illustrator of If You Give a Mouse a Cookie).  One day it rains different sized hearts.  A girl catches them.  She then thoughtfully tailors Valentines out of them for her animal friends.  It’s simple, sweet, and with a funny, unexpected ending.

 

Library Book of the Week: BALANCING ACT

This book belongs to those groups of books with recognizable characters that you love.  In this case, it’s Ellen Stoll Walsh’s furry little mice and frogs.  Think Mouse Paint and Hop, Jump. 

In her latest book, Balancing Act, two mice find a stick and balance with it on a rock.  A salamander joins in and suddenly they’re put off-kilter.  “Luckily, a friend stepped in to help.”  And so it goes with more animals.  When a large bird swoops down to join the fun, problem ensues.  A hilarious spread shows the bird squashing them on one end and the fellows on the other side being thrown into the air.  A solution to balance with all is happily achieved — until the stick breaks!  Everyone then goes off to do something else.  The mice, not the least bit upset, carry off part of the broken stick to find another rock and continue their fun.

Apart from the educational weights and balancing instruction and the fun in predicting the outcome , I enjoyed the other subtle messages;  like letting everyone — no matter size or shape —  join in the fun, about using invention to create a game, and about making the most out of misfortune.     

It’s so deceptively simple, but so beautifully perfect.  Walsh’s cut collages are lovely – clean colored paper and colorful little splotches.   

This is my library pick of the week.

 

Vintage Book Find of the Month: THE LAST PUPPY

I may by stretching the definition of vintage here.  My book says it was published in 1980.  Doesn’t seem so long ago, the 80′s, does it?  But that was over 30 years ago!  So, hey, I’m calling it vintage.  I gleefully found this one at a library bookstore while we were visiting relatives over the holidays, so it qualifies as my find for the month of December.

I love Frank Ash’s Bear series.  And his Milk and Cookies ranks as one of my kids’ all time favorites.  But it’s The Last Puppy that has my heart.  

A repeated motif in many of Asch’s books is to have a sequential series of small vignettes running along the bottom of the copyright and dedication page.  For example, in Happy Birthday, Moon, the moon slowly rises from behind the mountains.  In The Last Puppy you see all the puppies (up to eight) being born!  Number nine is shown in what has got to be one of the greatest first page images ever in a picture book – a little head and front paws emerging from Mama’s rear, with Mama watching on with a smile.  The text: “I was the last of Momma’s nine puppies.”     

Poor little thing is last to open his eyes, last to nurse and to learn to drink from a saucer, and always last when he tries to keep up with the others.  While the other puppies are happily playing in the background (like tugging on the laundry hanging from a line), the last puppy looks worried as a “Puppies for Sale” sign is put in.  When the puppies start being sold, he asks, “Will I be the last puppy again?”  He is last, but there’s a happy ending for the little guy.  It’s unexpected, smart, and heartwarming.

Asch, a master of minimalism, is at his finest here.  I also love the variety of illustration layouts in this book.  There are rectangular framed images, circle framed, images on white backgrounds, and my personal favorite, images breaking free of their frames.  One great one is where the puppies are running to the doghouse.  The puppies are running out of the rectangular framed image on the left side of the page and into a doghouse on the right side that’s illustrated with a white background.      

See it for yourself – Frank Asch himself reads and shows you the entire book here!

 

My Christmas Book Picks – an Addendum

I was going through my large stash of books recently in order to cull my collection — really, it was getting difficult to walk through some corridors will all the bookshelf spillage on the floor.  I managed to collect enough to fill three large paper bags for a library donation.  This took me a while because I had to do this stealthily while my son didn’t see in order to avoid the drama of, “No, I still want that one!”  So, yay, room for more new books!  Now, as I was rummaging, I came across two Christmas themed books that I had forgotten about.

The first one’s a Harold of the purple crayon adventure, Harold at the North Pole (1957).  Don’t let the cover fool you, the inside is just like the original with a sepia-toned Harold and purple line drawings.  In this story, it’s up to Harold to save Christmas by helping a snowed-in Santa.  With the aid of his trusty purple crayon, Harold comes to the rescue!  My favorite lines, after Harold starts to draw Santa’s team of reindeer:

Soon Prancer and Dancer were pawing at the snow, eager to be off around the world.  Harold wasn’t quite certain of the names of the other reindeer.  But he made sure there were eight of them. 

That beautifully captures the mix of young naiveté and Harold’s imaginative superpower. 

The second is Henry and Mudge in the Sparkle Days (1988).  This is a book that makes you keep a smile on your face the entire read.  Rylant and Stevenson are a match made in heaven.  The smily, childlike drawings emphasize Rylant’s gentle humor and support the cozy, warm feel that all Rylant’s Henry and Mudge books have.  This one captures the winter cold, a family’s Christmas dinner celebration (complete with Mudge sneezing turkey all over Henry), and the warm fireside.  It’s wonderful.

 

My Christmas Book Picks

The Twelve Days of Christmas (1986) by Jan Brett is complete with story within a story by the use of her signature frames at the sides of the pages.  Each day of the song gets a double-spread image with its matching christmas ornament in a banner at the top.  The side story is of a young man coming to his love’s house, going out together to cut down a Christmas tree, and bringing it back to her home to decorate.  The lovely last page is where you can spot all the ornament’s from the song on the full decked-out tree.

The Christmas Day Kitten (1986), by James Herriot and wonderfully illustrated by Ruth Brown, is a Christmas Day miracle book to give you some misty eyes.  A stray cat that often visits the home of Mrs. Pickering (and her three lazy bloodhounds) to get food goes missing for several weeks.  She comes back, thin and dirty, on Christmas Day.  It’s bittersweet because the stray cat dies, but what she leaves behind warms the heart of Mrs. Pickering and will enliven their home for many Christmases to come. 

You can’t go wrong with the classic and lovely ”The Night Before Christmas” by Clemont C. Moore.  But you can go wrong with the illustrations!  There are, however, several nice interpretations.  Here are my two. 

The first one, illustrated by Douglas Gorsline (1975), has an old fashioned feel.  Pretty colored pen and ink illustrations feature many cute details such as the antics of the house cat throughout the story — find her bristling as Santa comes down the chimney and later rubbing against his toy bag.  Gorsline does a great job portraying Santa coming down the chimney – in a double-spread image of the fireplace he’s drawn a sequential series of Santas — first you see just boots, then the pants, then a bit of torso, then full Santa in the room.

My second The Night Before Christmas (1985) is a James Marshall.  If you’re lucky enough to find this out-of-print, you’ll get to watch Santa in Marshall’s Texas cowboy boots and a house full of bulldogs, cats, rats and chickens!

Here’s another oldie.  It’s Baby’s Christmas, (1959) a Golden Book by Esther Wilkin, and illustrated by Eloise Wilkin.  Wilkin has a sweet way of painting chubby cheeked children (I’m a big fan of her Hansel and Gretel), and the baby is this book is no exception.  The book features rhyming text about all the presents the little baby finds on Christmas morn – Santa really spoils the bejesus out of this little babe.   Find all the chokeable parts on the gifts baby receives! 

 

Library Book of the Week: TWENTY HEARTBEATS

This is an old world tale created by Dennis Haseley about a wealthy man in The Far East who commissions a well-regarded artist to create a painting of his favorite horse.  The rich man pays the artist and brings his horse to him as requested.   The artist touches the horse from top to bottom, then promises to contact the man when his painting is ready.  The man waits, and waits, and waits.  Years go by.  He grows impatient and writes to him.  “‘I am progressing, well,’” is the response he receives. 

More years go by.  In anger, the wealthy man goes to the artist’s house, demanding his painting.  The artist says, “It is almost ready.”  He leaves and returns with a blank sheet of paper.  And that’s all I’ll say without giving away the unexpected ending! 

This beautiful story speaks of patience, of trust, and of working endlessly to master a skill.  Anyone who has ever worked hard and long at something is going to end up teary-eyed like myself.

Ed Young is a master of drawing the dark and mysterious and it works superbly here in capturing the mood in the artist’s home and the zen-like quality of this tale.  His earthy-toned collages (think rice papers and lots of textural browns) are gorgeous and his layouts are fantastic.  Here are a couple of my favorites that I’ve sketched (if I’m allowed?)…

In my top sketch of Young’s double-spread illustration, check out how he emphasizes the largeness of the angry man, all big in the foreground, confronting the smaller, humble artist.  The reddish-brown background is so dark the text has to be in white, the man is so red his eyes are practically breathing fire! 

My bottom sketch is drawn from the illustration where the rich man, holding the painting he’s yet to look at, follows the artist to his studio.  The figures are drawn at such an extreme angle that we’re almost falling into the black opening.  It’s like the man doesn’t want to follow, but he’s compelled to.  Just beautiful.

This is my library pick of the week.

 

Library Picks of the Week: SALTY DOG & LIGHTSHIP

I’m in a seafaring mood! 

The first book, Salty Dog, was a recent library book nook find that we had once, long ago, checked out.  It’s one of those books you see and say with an excited, warm familiarity, “Salty dog!”  It’s a Ted Rand, so I’m going to like it no matter what the story, but this has a warm element of a dog who grows up alongside a ship being hand-built. 

The woodworker in me is drawn to the craft of hand building anything and in this story by Gloria Rand three pages of double-spread images are wonderfully devoted to showing the little pup in a growing box beside the developing vessel. 

They say this tale is inspired by a true story, and in it, poor Salty is left at home after a box will no longer contain him.  That doesn’t stop Salty — he escapes his yard and amazingly finds his way across ferry to the boatyard.  He continues to visit his owner each day and make friends with all aboard the ferry, becoming a helper at the boatyard and an integral part in the preparations for the ship’s test sail and launch for their trip around the world.  Go Salty!  

 

Lightship is by an author/illustrator I’ve recently become enamored with because of his wonderful books and also this.   Brian Floca, in few words that read like a gentle poem, tells us the story of floating lighthouses, that in days gone by aided ships through the fog.  

The writing itself echoes “…the slow/ slap, slap, slap / of water on the hull.”  The lovely alliterative “she holds to one sure spot as other ships sail by” is often repeated and the book both starts and finishes with telling the reader that the lightship “holds her place”.  In performing their duty of making sure others returned home safe, the lightship crew had to withstand poor weather, heavy waves, and many of those near collisions.  The lightship, like a mother who will always be there, will endure anything for the safety of her charges.  The book actually had my husband choking up at the end.  

There’s humor in this tale too – in one page Floca has us imagine using the toilet during rough seas.  My two-year-old actually insists we start reading the book from the bathroom scene, as it’s her favorite part!  And in another full-spread illustration, a lightship crewman swears, comic strip-style ( “#@*%&” ), at a large vessel that steers too close — its crewman simply replies, ”Sorry!”  In the book’s informative endnote, you read that collisions and fatalities actually did occur. 

The ship’s cat is featured in almost every illustration — we see her waiting at the kitchen door, noseying around with us as we tour the vessel, and jumping up scared as the foghorns loudly blare.  Floca employs porthole-shaped images interspersed with full-spreads.  The pretty watercolor drawings are muted in tone, and intentional or not, emphasize the modesty of the crew in their nobel mission.  Floca sings praise to some of America’s unsung heroes.

These are my library picks of the week.

 

My Hanukkah Book Picks

These are my favorites for this time of year. 

The Magic Dreidels by Eric Kimmel and beautifully illustrated by Katya Krenina is a wonderfully entertaining story about a boy named Jacob who loses his dreidel in a well.  The goblin who lives at the bottom helpfully offers up magic ones in its place, but Fruma Sarah, the neighborhood busy body, keeps tricking Jacob and keeping them for herself.  The first night of  Hanukkah has a happy ending for all, even Fruma Sarah!   

Another engaging story by Eric Kimmel is When Mindy Saved Hanukkah, illustrated to the smallest detail by Barbara McClintock.  When a group of little people (the size of mice) need candles for Hanukkah, little Mindy braves the “fierce Antiochus of a cat” in the synagogue to retrieve the forgotten extra candle.  This book has lots of very natural inclusion of Jewish terminology, lovely suspense, and much emphasis that even the littlest can defeat the mighty. 

And for when you feel bummed that everyone around you is celebrating something entirely different, you’ve got Lemony Snicket to make you laugh with The Latke Who Couldn’t Stop Screaming: A Christmas Story.  The premise: a latke, born from a home that was “the only place not decorated with flashing colored lights at this time of year” jumps out of the frying pan and runs through the village encountering nothing but christmas symbols — lights, a candycane, and a pine tree, who don’t understand what he is.  After history lessons from the Latke, they still offer up remarks such as, ”‘So you’re basically hash browns…Maybe you can be served alongside a Christmas ham.’” 

Say it with me, “‘AAAHHHHHHHH!!!’”    

And for a more serious discussion of feeling different and fitting in, read the tender There’s No Such Thing as a Chanukah Bush, Sandy Goldstein by Susan Sussman. 

 

Library Pick of the Week: CIRCUS CAPS FOR SALE

Everyone knows the classic Caps for Sale.  How many people know that Esphyr Slobodkina made a sequel?  Until recently, not I. 

The story, like the first one, is simple enough.  But this time it’s a circus elephant in a parade that steals the peddlar’s hats.  Under this theatrical backdrop, Slobodkina gave herself liberty to create a visual feast.   

I think the story stretches a bit too long in this one — this is a 40-some pager, not 32 — but it’s the illustrations that I find so marvelous.  Caps for Sale was your old-school text on one page, full-page framed illustration on the other.  Circus Caps, however, is a graphic tour de force. 

Here Slobodkina employs rectangular frames where parts of the image break free of the frame (click here for some views inside the book from her website), split images where the text occupies the middle (used to great effect when the marching band parades by), and several images on a single page (like showing the various elephant tricks).  Then she plays with these L-shaped scenes to frame the left side and top, pairing it with an L-shaped visual on the opposite right side and bottom.  I just love these.

Pay attention to the last image in the book.  She ends with the happy peddler holding a balloon.  The peddlar is framed in an oval, echoing the round balloon shape which floats free of the frame.  The opposite page proceeding is framed with a L-like matching concave shape.  Plus there’s a tag hanging from the bottom of the balloon string that says “The End.” 

And it’s all done in those lovely greens, oranges, and muted blues.   

This is my library pick of the week.

 

Library Pick of the Week: MRS. CRUMP’S CAT

Since my last fav. book review was a book about a dog, it is only fitting that this week’s pick should be a book about a cat!  This one features an old lady that happens upon a wet stray on her doorstep.  She tells it to shoo, but of course it does not.  She invites the cat into her home and little by little into her heart. 

There’s a lot of humor in both the writing and the illustrations.  The woman gives it a sliced of bread but the cat walks away from it.  “‘Just as I suspected,’  Mrs. Crumps said.  ‘Cats are finicky as well.’”    In the three frame panel that accompanies the text you first see hopeful kitty, then disappointed kitty, and finally, tail turned straight up half walked out of the panel kitty.

I love the writing in this book.  Mrs. Crump dries the cat and plans to send it on its way, but ”…it curled itself around Mrs. Crump’s ankles like a soft velvet ribbon and mewed hungrily.”  Next she plans to rid herself of the cat after it’s fed.  She sees the night sky is clear of rain and carries the cat out to the porch.   She looks down at the cat in her arms and “The cat looked up and purred magnificently.”  I love that word choice, magnificently. 

Well, poor Mrs. Crump is doomed to fall for this cat and keep going to town to buy things for it.  There you get interaction between her and the man who runs the shop. Somehow Mrs. Crump’s whole view of things is opening up — here she replies to the man’s greeting, which surprises her.  ”It was the strangest thing, Mrs. Crump thought, but somehow the way back home seemed far shorter than the way there.”  With that one beautiful line you understand that Mrs. Crump is a changed person, she is now one who has something to look forward to.   

More about the illustrations.  I couldn’t help but laugh hysterically at just how low Mrs. Crumps bosom is drawn!  My favorite is where Mrs. Crump, taking the shop keeper’s advice on posting a sign for the found cat in order to get rid of it, places her small sign that describes the cat laughably in the most negative way (I don’t want to reveal too much by telling you what) in a dusty corner of the shop.  You again get a three panel spread (what can I say, I love those multiple panels) of Mrs. Crump entering, then the little sign with its funny and odd companions, and then Mrs. Crump happily leaving.  On the facing page is a full bleed drawing of the sign’s view of Mrs. Crump smiling back at it from the cashier’s counter.  Pure genius, I tell you.

This is my library pick of the week.

 

Vintage Book Find of the Month: BABY, COME OUT!

Here are some lines from early on in Baby, Come Out! (1972) by Fran Manushkin and Ronald Himler, illustrator. 

For breakfast she gave the baby milk, soft-boiled eggs, and good raisin toast.  ‘Do you like your food?’ she asked.  And from deep inside her, Baby would say, ‘Ummm.’ 

Mommy treats Baby so well that Baby doesn’t want to leave!  That saddens Mother greatly.  The whole family — brother, sister, grandpa and grandma – try talking to Baby to convince her to come out; to no avail, Baby tells them she likes it where she is.  Daddy’s the one who holds the loving secret to getting Baby to want to come out.   

I struggle to describe this book in any other words than too cute!

Since this unborn baby the reader can see and the others in the story can hear, it’s very appropriate (although odd at first glance!) for the little babe to be drawn looking like a miniature girl with a head full of hair.  Rest assured, when Baby comes out, you see it’s really a normal looking newborn. 

I’ve always been a fan of the framing of images in rectangular boxes and Himler employs them expertly, helping to pace the story and providing moments of rest with blank space. 

From Fran Manushkin’s web site she tells you that this book, which has been internationally loved and translated into seven languages, was voted as worst book of the year when it came out.  Perhaps people get alarmed when they see something different, for this truly is a one of a kind book.  I also discovered that the book has been lately reissued with color (mine is just pen-and-ink drawings inside).  I don’t miss the color — that’s the charm of the writing.  Sweet, family book.   

 

Library Book of the Week #6: ANGUS AND THE DUCKS

This one’s an oldie, and had I found it in the book nook this would be my next posting for vintage book of the month.  Angus and the Ducks by Marjorie Flack is an honest-to-goodness library book and it originally debuted in 1930. 

Angus is a young Scottish terrier who is curious about everything including “…Things-Which-Come-Apart and those Things-Which-Don’t-Come-Apart; such as SLIPPERS and gentlemen’s SUSPENDERS and things like that.”  In this one line you get all the doggie’s inquisitiveness and the wonderful use of CAPS to underscore the important things in a puppy’s eyes. 

In the story that follows, little Angus in turn investigates, irritates, and then runs from a pair of scheming ducks.  It’s quite funny.  I love it when an author/ illustrator can portray the small quirks of an animal so well they come alive in all their antics — you can laugh just by reading Flacks description of Angus’ bark: “WOO-OO-OOF!!!” .  

Flack paints with only a few colors over her black linework, but it’s a bold, art deco inspired palette (alternating with black and white spreads – this is an oldie, remember).  Just look at that gorgeous cover.  I so wish I had the license to show you the interiors…

This book came out just 2 years after Wanda Gág’s Millions of Cats, a book which is regarded as the first true picture book by an American.  I respect Gag’s work, but you have to admit there is a dated quality to it.  The text, the layout, and the full-spread drawings in Angus and the Ducks emit an amazingly modern feel. 

This is my library pick of the week.

 

Library Book of the Week #5: ABUELA’S WEAVE

I fell in love with this book before I read any of the words.  That’s the power of the artwork.  Abuela’s Weave (1993), by Omar S. Castañeda and illustrated by Enrique O. Sanchez shows a slice of village life in Guatemala.  It’s a simple tale – the girl and her grandmother together weave cloth in the traditional way and prepare to sell their goods at market. 

The grandmother’s facial birthmark may frighten away customers so she disguises herself with a shawl around her body and face and keeps her distance from her granddaughter on the way to the bus, traveling, on the walk to the market and while the girl spreads out the colorful tapestries, skirts, traditional blouses, and tablecloths.  

The girl fears she and her grandmother can’t compete against all the goods made by machine the other people are selling.  How can she compete against zippered bags and colorful plastic handles?  They of course have nothing to fear, for their cloth is not only beautiful but laden with tradition, folklore, and speak of the loving hands that worked from early morning until late at night in their creation. 

I struggle to describe the loveliness of the illustrations.  Sanchez’ artwork is acrylic on canvas, but has the soft feel of pastel.  The girl’s face is simply beautiful — the large, almond-shaped eyes that tilt toward the wide nose and full lips.  She and her grandmother echo the Mayan stone carvings not only in their work but in their faces. 

Both the girl’s loom and her grandmother’s are tied to the same tree and they work side by side.  The Mayan motifs appear in the canopy of this tree while they work at night to complete their weaves.  That is a wonderful metaphor added by Sanchez showing their strong bond not only to each other, but to the ancient traditions that surround them.

This is my library pick of the week.

 

Library Book of the Week #4: THE QUARRELING BOOK & NOT IN ROOM 204

I pick 2 books because I enjoyed both of these tremendously and they could not be more different in type and tone.  One of these books touches upon a “sensitive matter” and for those of you who would rather not deal with that (I have a particular someone in mind), I’ll let you know when you can stop reading.

First up, the light-hearted one.  The Quarreling Book (1963) by Charlotte Zolotow (best known for William’s Doll) and illustrated by a favorite of mine, Arnold Lobel.  It starts with a rainy, grey morning in which disgruntled Mr. James forgets to kiss Mrs. James on his way out the door.  Mrs. James is miffed by that and the grey, rainy day and says something not so kind to her son, who says something nasty to sister, who says something mean to her best friend.  So it goes till her best friend’s little brother Eddie shoves the dog off his bed. 

The dog, however, doesn’t mind the gloomy day’s rain and “…thought Eddie was playing so she put her front paws down and her hindquarters up and her tail began wagging.”  I love that description of a playful doggie.  And so goes the spread of happiness, but in reverse order.  It’s a simple concept, but it’s executed beautifully.  I was delightfully caught off guard by the dog’s response, so I hope I’m not giving away too much of the book!

The other nice thing about The Quarreling Book is its size.  It’s a bittie book of about 6″ wide.  Little books (good ones anyway) almost always illicit a warm and cozy “let’s read this close together feel”.  And even with not one color illustration (Lobel’s drawing are all ink pen), this one certainly does just that.    

Okay, sensitive souls that want to stick your heads in the sand, no need to click the more link.

 

Wannabe Library Book of the Week: 2 Books by Bob Staake

Bob’s rhymes dance from tongue to ear,

They flow!  No sticky rhyme-s’ghetti —

They simply fly from the page

Like sparkling confetti.

- A poem in praise of good picture book poetry by Ella

I’m in a rhyming mood after reading both The Red Lemon AND The Donut Chef!  It took some hunting but I finally located a couple Staake books to read.  And yes, the mystery was solved as to why I had never before read a Staake book — they don’t stock them at my preferred library!  Truly a shame.  These two are really gems.

Here’s a favorite Staake rhyme from The Donut Chef:

They tried new shapes beyond just rings

Their donuts were such crazy things!

Some were square and some were starry,

Some looked just like calamari!

Some were airy, some were cone-y!

Some resembled macaroni!

 And this one spoken by cute little Debbie Sue:

“‘Scuse me, Mister,” said the tyke,

“But where’s the donut that I like?

It isn’t here, it isn’t there –

You think it’s under that éclair?

Staake mentioned in his lecture that he was known for his decorative endpapers.  The one in The Donut Chef features a delicious spread of the chef holding up chef holding up chef (almost Escher-esque) with his belly embodying a different donut flavor.  I thought I’d be put off by the busyness of all his drawings — however I felt they were just right for the story.  I enjoyed the book’s message about the simple things being best and the book truly was fun to read aloud.  Well done, Mr. Staake!

I thought I’d pick another library book too as my selection of the week, for heavens you should think I’m already biased toward Staake for seeing the man in person.  I’m still trying to decide on my favorite…

In the meantime, enjoy these covers:

 

Library Book of the Week #3: LIZZIE NONSENSE

Last night I loudly exclaimed “I love this, I love this!” while reading this book to myself.  My husband, sitting close by, didn’t respond.  He was trying to read another book to the kids at the time and perhaps didn’t appreciate my enthusiasm. 

The author’s name was familiar to me when I picked the book out (I couldn’t remember why) and after I read the story I started to read the blurb about the author/illustrator on the book’s jacket.  Suddenly it hit me.  “It’s her,”  I interrupted my husband again,  “it’s by the woman who did Sunshine and Moonlight!”  I could hardly contain myself.  “It’s her, I repeated.  This one has words!” 

Jan Ormerod is a seriously underrepresented author at our library!  I always wondered what works she completed, and now I know she can project that familial love and warmth even with a book with text.  This one is called Lizzie Nonsense (2004), about a little girl living in the pioneer Australian bush, whose Papa must leave for weeks to take a trip to town.  Lizzie and Mama are left with each other, Baby, and Lizzie’s dear imagination. 

You can guess I’m already a big fan of Ormerod’s illustration.  How many artists can portray a father in his tighty whities and still make the scene look sweet and charming (Sunshine, 1981)?  There’s a lot of love that shines through her drawings, without being too saccharine.  Ormerod has the knack for finding the beauty in the simple interplay between parent and child and their daily tasks.   

This is my library pick of the week.

   

 

Library Book of the Week #2: HOW SMUDGE CAME

How many times have you come across an adult with a mental handicap as a protagonist in a children’s story?  That may be unusual enough.  But How Smudge Came (1997) by Nan Gregory features a woman who lives in a group home and works cleaning the floors of a Hospice House where people are dying.  That is the setting for a sweet tale about Cindy with down syndrome who finds a stray puppy and tries to keep him.   

This is also the first book I’ve come across that employs all caps for every first line of a paragraph and italics for Cindy’s thoughts.  You get lovely text like this:

Knock!  Knock!  ON HER DOOR.  “CINDY?”

Into the closet goes Puppy.

The door opens.  They never wait for her to answer.

“Cindy, John is drying the dishes.  You can put them away.”

Cindy concentrates on the plates.

Don’t break a plate, Cindy.  Think about the plates, not the puppy. 

I love that Ron Lightburn’s illustrations are rendered in colored pencil — my current medium of choice.  His choice of pencils on rough paper and the resulting fuzziness is well suited for the story.  I also appreciate that you never see the face of the people who command Cindy or tell her things she doesn’t want to hear.  You get the sense that Cindy never sees them either. 

I like books that make me cry, and this is a touching tale. 

This is my library pick of the week.