books together

When the November/December issue of AAA World arrived in the mail (it's free with membership), I immediately thought of Betsy Ray's trip to Oberammergau in Betsy and the Great World by Maud Hart Lovelace (illustrated by Vera Neville; 1952).  The cover story is about that small Bavarian village, famous for its Passion Play; I wonder if it's changed much since Betsy was there in the spring of 1914.  I am a great fan of Betsy-Tacy (although I have yet to join the Society), and this book was one of my favorites in the series.  Unfortunately, it's out of print again (my copy is ex-lib).  But if I ever make it to Oberammergau (or Sonneberg, for that matter), it will be because of Betsy.

Jen Corace has illustrated three children's books to date:  Little Pea and Little Hoot by Amy Krouse Rosenthal (see this post); and Hansel and Gretel, retold by Cynthia Rylant (review forthcoming).  All of which I love.  This noneditioned print, "Snow Storm," is being sold in conjunction with signed copies of Hansel and Gretel through Tiny Showcase (n.b., those are not Hansel and Gretel in the print; it's from this year's Craftland).  The print is small--4" x 6" plus border for framing--and so is the price.  It would make a lovely little gift for fans of Corace's work.  Like me, except I ordered one already.  Corace's children remind me so much of my own.

[Forthcoming from Chronicle Books, April 2009:  Little Oink by Amy Krouse Rosenthal, illustrated by Jen Corace.  I think I know what Little Oink doesn't like (getting dirty?), but I can't wait to read it anyway.]

We've been reading the Little House books together for the first time, and I don't know who loves them more: me or the kids.  Milly in particular.  I think she wants to be Laura.  Today she wanted to eat a Laura Ingalls lunch.  I was out of Jiffy cornbread mix, but we decided that ham, baked beans, apple slices, and milk were all pioneer-approved foods.

A trip to the library later, and now I'm reading The Little House Cookbook: Frontier Foods from Laura Ingalls Wilder's Classic Stories by Barbara Walker, with illustrations (from the original Little House books) by Garth Williams (Harper and Row, 1979).  I think it's fascinating:  organized into chapters such as "Staples from the Country Store" and "Foods from the Woods, Wilds, and Waters", each recipe gets an excerpt from the text of one of the books, a well-researched essay, and detailed directions.  Unfortunately, it's not particularly appetizing, but I've marked a few recipes to try; look for them in an upcoming special edition of Books that Cook.

In the meantime, you might want to try Laura's gingerbread recipe, which appeared in the Horn Book.  We would have made some after lunch, but I was all out of lard.  Milly was so disappointed!

[Nonfiction Monday is at Picture Book of the Day.]

Milly was fascinated by Annette LeBlanc Cole's The Magic Rabbit (Candlewick, 2007) earlier this fall.  It's a story about a street magician (Ray) and his white rabbit (Bunny), who are separated during a performance; that night, Bunny follows a trail of gold stars (and popcorn) that leads to a reunion with Ray.  A perfectly nice book; but I wasn't sure right away what it was about it that fascinated Milly.

We borrowed it from her preschool teacher and read it countless times over a long weekend.  It held up to repeated readings well, thankfully; but it was the artwork, I think, that did it:  elegant pen-and-ink illustrations, most of them of the city (Cambrige, MA?) at night--lit up by many magic yellow stars.  There don't seem to be many picture books illustrated in black-and-white, but it works wonderfully well here.

The Magic Rabbit inspired a lot of art projects at home, too:  Milly made her own magicians with silver crayon on black construction paper, and rabbits with gold on white.  We cut out a jarful of yellow stars and scattered them around the house.  I even made a magician's cape with a high stand-up collar just like Ray's, and a magic wand (the cape was Eco-felt; I ran out of steam before I got to the hat, though).  We gave them to the preschool when we returned the book, so everyone could pretend to be a magician.

[See also The House in the Night by Susan Marie Swanson; illustrated in black-and-white scratchboard with touches of "marigold" by Beth Krommes (Houghton Mifflin, 2008) and one of PW's Best Children's Picture Books of the Year.  It's a beautiful bedtime book, based on a cumulative poem found in The Oxford Nursery Rhyme Book.  I love the way the marigold highlights objects that are familiar yet fascinating to a preschooler--a key, a book, a bird, the moon.  And I've always loved Krommes's work; this post on Grandmother Winter is from this time last year.]

Today is Astrid Lindgren's birthday; it would have been her 101st.  It's also this blog's birthday: its first!  I'm celebrating by making plans for bookstogether's future.  All of which include...more posts, for starters.  Thank you for reading and commenting thus far!

And check out this gorgeous edition of Pippi Longstocking (Viking, 2007).  Tiina Nunnally's translation is described as sparkling; I like it, but I definitely prefer "thing-finder" to Nunnally's "thing-searcher" (does anyone know what that is in Swedish?).  I love Lauren Child's illustrations, though; her Pippi is sweeter somehow than Glanzman's (the one I grew up with), but still sassy.  And I really love the book's design, which occasionally merges text and illustration (full-color throughout) in all kinds of interesting ways.  Our new favorite Pippi.  And we do love our Pippi.

[N.b., it's not actually my birthday; that's October 5, and I share it with Toot of Holly Hobbie's Toot and Puddle (see A Present for Toot).  Although I'm probably more of a Puddle than a Toot, except when it comes to European travel.  And definitely more of an Annika than a Pippi, for that matter.]

I'm pleased to be a part of the virtual book tour for Amadi's Snowman, a picture book written by Katia Novet Saint-Lot and illustrated by Dimitrea Tokunbo (Tilbury House, 2008).  There are a lot of reasons to recommend Amadi's Snowman:  it's about the ways reading can show us the world; it's set in a part of the world (Nigeria) that few of us have seen, neatly making its own point; and, perhaps most importantly, it appeals to kids who are themselves learning to read or read fluently.

My own kids identified with Amadi, who is a very likeable character, despite the fact they've made many a snowman during winters in Michigan and Virginia.  [I'll admit, I sympathized with the older boy Chima, whose reading Amadi interrupts!]  A book Chima is reading, a book with a picture of a snowman in it, sparks Amadi's curiosity and convinces him that there is something to this reading business after all, even, or especially, for a boy who will grow up to a be an Igbo man of Nigeria.

I do think Amadi's Snowman would have benefited from some additional information about the Igbo and about Nigeria, if only a map locating the country on the African continent.  Fortunately, both author and illustrator drew on their personal experience of Nigeria in the making of this book; and Tilbury House has provided discussion questions and classroom activities, as well as an extensive list of additional resources pertaining to the literacy issues in Amadi's Snowman in particular and Nigeria in general, on their website.  I especially appreciated the list of picture book retellings of Nigerian folktales and other stories set in Nigeria.

This blog tour has also been a rich source of information about all of the above; check out author Katia Novet Saint-Lot's blog Scribbly Katia for more.  And thank you to Katia and to the folks at Tilbury House for making a wonderful book!

[In case you don't want to read the whole press release, the winner is Ain't Nothing But a Man: My Quest to Find the Real John Henry by Scott Reynolds Nelson, with Marc Aronson (National Geographic, 2008).  I'm intrigued by the book's subtitle; you can also read more about how Nelson and Aronson approach the topic of historical research for kids below.]

I recently requested a press release about the 2008 Aesop Awards from the folks at the American Folklore Society. Tim Lloyd, the executive director of AFS, responded with one; thank you. I'm reproducing it in full because I think it does a good job of explaining both the criteria for the award and how this year's award-winning choices meet or exceed those criteria. I'm also hoping to track down a copy of Anne Shelby's Adventures of Molly Whuppie (UNC Press, 2007), about which I had previously heard nothing.  I think I would love it!

The Aesop Award Committee of the Children’s Folklore Section of the American Folklore Society announces the 2008 Aesop Awards.

The Aesop Prize and Aesop Accolades are conferred annually by the Children’s Folklore Section of the American Folklore Society upon English language books for children and young adults, both fiction and nonfiction. The award criteria include: Folklore should be central to the book’s content and, if appropriate, to its illustrations; the folklore presented in the book should accurately reflect the culture and worldview of the people whose folklore is the focus of the book; the reader’s understanding of folklore should be enhanced by the book, as should the book be enhanced by the presence of folklore; the book should reflect the high artistic standards of the best of children’s literature and have strong appeal to the child reader; and folklore sources must be fully acknowledged and annotations referenced within the bound contents of the publication.

This year the committee has chosen one Aesop Award winning book and two Aesop Accolade books.

2008 Aesop Prize

Ain’t Nothing But a Man: My Quest to Find the Real John Henry. Scott Reynolds Nelson, with Marc Aronson. National Geographic, 2008.

Scott Nelson’s outstanding work is a meticulously documented historiography of his lengthy search to find the historical roots of the legend of John Henry, rather than a retelling of the well-known story and song. Derived from his academic book for adults, Steel Drivin’ Man: John Henry and the Untold Story of an American Legend (Oxford University Press, 2006), his research has been recast, with the assistance of Marc Aronson, as non-fiction for a younger audience, heavily illustrated with period photographs of railroad history. The research on the origin of the legendary figure is fascinating, while the work also provides insight into what it means to be a historian – or a folklorist. Nelson stresses the open-ended nature of history as process, not simply an endless account of facts and dates. In examining the historical process, he demonstrates the role that research into folklore can play in revealing previously unwritten history.

Nelson is not the first to ask whether there was an actual historical figure behind the well-documented song recounting an epic battle between man and machine, in which a steel-driving man outperformed a steam drill, but died as a result of the contest. However, he has unearthed new evidence and presents it persuasively to suggest that there was a real John William Henry, incarcerated in the Virginia Penitentiary in 1866 at the age of 19, who was one of over 300 African-American prisoners who died as a result of being contracted out to work on the C&O Railway. He includes an intriguing picture , taken in 1863, of a young black man named John Henry who worked in the Union Army’s 3rd Army Corps in Virginia, but he acknowledges that he can not prove that this is the same man. The Aesop committee’s comments note that “by exposing the racial complications of the story, [Nelson] provides insight not only into the history of one song, but also into the complex relationship of history, race, and folk memory.” Aronson’s afterword, “How to Be a Historian” extends the importance of the story to young readers by emphasizing ways that they themselves can participate in the historical process.

2008 Aesop Accolades

Dance in a Buffalo Skull. Told by Zitkala-Ša. Illustrated by S. D. Nelson. Prairie Tales Series, no. 2. South Dakota State Historical Society Press, 2007.

S. D. Nelson’s stunning illustrations bring new life to the language used by Zitkala-Ša (Gertrude Simmons Bonnin) when in 1901 she retold a story she heard as a child on the Yankton Sioux Indian Reservation. In this small-format picture book, the breathtaking artwork by Nelson, a member of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, heightens the suspense of this tale of night on the prairie, as happy mice feast and dance inside a buffalo skull, heedless of danger, while a wildcat silently creeps close, attracted by their merriment. The sensory imagery is rich, drawing out the sights and sounds of the prairie. Zitkala-Ša’s powerful storytelling makes this an excellent choice for reading aloud.

Zitkala- Ša, herself Lakota, born in 1876 on the Yankton Sioux Indian Reservation in South Dakota, served as a bridge between the tribal people of her birthplace and the white society that educated her in a Quaker mission boarding school, Earlham College, and the New England Conservatory for Music. As a writer, political activist, and musician, she sought to convey for a white audience, the traditions, values, and worth of her Indian heritage. This voice from the past is still strong today as her love for the teaching tale she learned from the Elders shines through in this story. One Aesop committee member commented “For someone writing a hundred years ago as an indigenous author, trying to present her culture to an outsider audience, I think she did an incredible job - and I love the way Nelson’s illustrations enhance the language for a modern audience and make it clear how well-done her telling really is.” The work of the South Dakota Historical Society Press, in its ongoing efforts to reflect the rich and varied history of South Dakota and to preserve its colorful culture and heritage, merits recognition.

The Adventures of Molly Whuppie and Other Appalachian Folktales. Anne Shelby. Illustrated by Paula McArdle. University of North Carolina Press, 2007.

Storyteller Anne Shelby’s updated Appalachian sensibility brings a charming twist to a collection of stories based on traditional tale types. The dynamic storytelling voice has the ring of folk wisdom, with a flair for the fun in the familiar. Heroine Molly Whuppie encounters witches, giants, an ogre who refuses to do housework, unwanted boyfriends, and a spectrum of puzzling predicaments. This clever and courageous girl manages to circumvent catastrophe with a potent combination of nerve, trickery, and plain old luck. Other characters include Molly’s sisters Poll and Betts, the famous Appalachian hero Jack (rescued more than once by Molly herself), and three cornbread-baking mice. In looking for stories with a strong woman or girl character, Shelby brings together the British Molly Whuppie with the Appalachian Munciemeg or Mutsmag. She also borrows some stories more commonly associated with Jack or the less well-known Appalachian male Merrywise. Whimsical illustrations complement the witty delivery and enliven the text.

Shelby is frank about the liberties she has taken in bringing a modern sensibility to her adaptations, but she carefully notes her sources and acknowledges the changes she has made. While she sometimes transforms male characters to female, she also brings existing women characters to the forefront, as in her version of “Raglif Jaglif Tartliff Pole,” in which the often anonymous giant’s daughter who saves Jack’s life is transformed into an Appalachian Molly. She notes her driving criteria: “I had to have some evidence of the story’s having been told in the Appalachian region, and I had to like it.” The Aesop committee especially commends “the care with which she preserves unique cultural expressions that give her stories such a strong flavor of Appalachian language” – a language she herself grew up with in eastern Kentucky in the 1950s. This collection is sure to appeal to readers, young and old alike.

How long is a minute?

Sixty seconds to a minute,
Sixty hiccups, sixty hops.

Or if you sing just one small song
Chorus, verses, not too long
That's just enough to fill

A minute.

From A Second is a Hiccup:  A Child's Book of Time by Hazel Hutchins, illustrated by Kady MacDonald Denton (First American edition, Arthur A. Levine/Scholastic, 2007).  Hutchins describes measurements of time, from seconds to minutes, hours to days, weeks to months to years, in terms children will recognize from experience.  Parents will be reminded of just how quickly that time passes.  A delight to read aloud and to look at together.

[Kady MacDonald Denton's illustrations of children here are just as charming and expressive as her work in this year's A Visitor for Bear by Bonny Becker (Candlewick, 2008).  According to her website, a sequel to that book (A Birthday for Bear) is now in progress.  How long do we have to wait?]

From Los Gatos Black on Halloween by Marisa Montes; illustrated by Yuyi Morales (Henry Holt, 2006):

Los gatos black with eyes of green,
Cats slink and creep on Halloween.
With ojos keen that squint and gleam--
They yowl, they hiss...they sometimes scream.

This book won the 2008 Pura Belpre Medal for Yuyi Morales's richly atmospheric paintings, which reflect the traditions of both Halloween and the Mexican Day of the Dead.  It also won a Pura Belpre Honor for Marisa Montes's rhyming text about a monster's ball on Halloween night that is interrupted by the arrival of [spoiler alert!] trick-or-treaters.

Montes incorporates some spooky Spanish words: see above as well as, for example,
la bruja (witch), el esqueleto (skeleton), la calabaza (pumpkin), and medianoche (midnight).  I like that the Spanish words are specific to the Halloween context; this helps integrate them into the text.  The text itself is sometimes redundant (I don't think the English word is always required, especially when there are context clues, illustrations, and a glossary), but that doesn't seem to bother the kids.

What does bother them are those gorgeous, glowing paintings.  Too scary!  Maybe next year.

[The Poetry Friday Round-up is at Becky's Books Reviews today.]

The finalists for the 2008 National Book Award in Young People's Literature were announced today:

Laurie Halse Anderson, Chains (Simon & Schuster)
Kathi Appelt, The Underneath (Atheneum)
Judy Blundell, What I Saw and How I Lied (Scholastic)
E. Lockhart, The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks (Hyperion)
Tim Tharp, The Spectacular Now (Alfred A. Knopf)

I can't wait to read Chains, which is set in Revolutionary New York.  The powerful cover art is by Christopher Silas Neal.

Coincidentally, I just finished M.T. Anderson's The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Vol. I: The Pox Party (Candlewick), set in Revolutionary Boston, which won this award in 2006.  It is itself an astonishing book.  Volume II:  The Kingdom on the Waves was released yesterday.  What to read first?