Fox

In my continuing effort to read all the books in the anthology 1001 Children's Books You Must Read Before You Grow Up, I took home Fox, written by Margaret Wild and illustrated by Ron Brooks. I'd never heard of the book before but minutes after reading it, I can't get it out of my mind. I'm haunted by this book.

The story is simple about a magpie with a burnt wing that can't fly and a one-eyed dog who has trouble seeing. The two are the best of friends and protect each other. Each day the magpie sits on the dogs back while he runs so she can feel like she's flying and the dog has a second pair of eyes to see. "Fly Dog Fly! I will be your missing eye, and you will be my wings." It's a sweet friendship based on need and tenderness. When a fox arrives, the magpie is worried. And it becomes even more worrisome when the Fox tells the magpie to ride on his back to really feel like she's flying. Magpie resists for a time. She's loyal to Dog. But finally she gives in. Fox takes her for a long fast ride until he reaches the desert. I won't give you the ending. It was not something I was expecting. It's the reason I'm haunted by this book. I can't stop thinking about where and how the author ends the book. I loved this tale of sweet friendship and betrayal. And I can't shake it.

Ron Brooks' illustrations are rough and haunting as well. He uses multiple wispy lines to create the characters and the setting. Brooks hand lettered the book to give it a very primative feel. In fact the whol books seems like a folklore tale. An Aesop's story in vivid color. The colors are lovely. Brooks uses multiple media to create both his characters and the worlds they live in. The cave and the desert and the woods are represented with the same wispy lines but look distinctly different.

I've read several books since reading Fox and although there are many that I've wanted to write about, this story pushed it's way to the top. It's not the kind of story that I typically like although the friendship is wonderfully rendered. I loved Dog, loyal Dog with his one white sightless eye. He is presented as quintessential dog. But this story would have been something that I'd read and considered done if it wasn't for the ending. I'm haunted by it. I can't stop thinking about Magpie and Dog. And for me that is why this book is powerful. It's one of the more powerful picture books I've read in a while.

John, Paul, George, and...Ben

I'm sure I've mentioned before how much I love Lane Smith's work. I fell in love with Lane's work at The True Story of the Three Little Pigs, his first collaboration with Jon Scieszka. Since then I've read and looked at everything that Lane Smith has done. I own most of his books and I love almost everyone. But John, Paul, George, and Ben has a special place in my heart. I giggle every time I read it. I laugh out loud repeatedly. I love the history, both pretend and real. And I love the characters.

This is really the story of John, Paul, George, Ben, and Tom. John Hancock, Paul Revere, George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson, that is. All the men who had a role in forming the United States. Lane imagines them as boys and shows off how their early personalities affected their later contributions. He looks at each of the men separately, mixing historical facts with invented stories. While the facts are fun, it's what Lane invents that makes this book. For example, Paul Revere used to be in the bell ringers chorus (before they invented fun, Lane comments) and because of the loud bells, he can't hear himself talk anymore. So he yells. As a store clerk in his father's store, the yelling does not go well (You need extra extra large underwear?). As a rider warning about the British attack, the yelling makes him a hero. The yelling is all invented. And is giggle inducing. And the stories just get better from there. Ben Franklin has to be my favorite (but I'll save that for you to find).

Lane Smith's illustration work is what got him his start. And he's on top of his game here. Mixing formal portraits with gross caricature, he creates a book that's both zany and beautiful. He makes the background paint look cracked to give the book an aged feel. The muted colors look faded. But the characters are what make the book. George Washington (looking a bit like Charlie Brown) has oddly cracked teeth in reference to his later need for dentures. Paul Revere has his famous tri-corner hat and a huge mouth that is always wide open. Ben doesn't yet have his famous spectacles but he's instantly identifiable. The artwork is perfect. The stories are funny and the book makes me happy. Lane even provides a section at the end with historical facts about each figure and lays to bed some of the popular myths. So I could even say it was educational as well.

The Library

I special ordered The Library by Sarah Stewart and David Small from my local children's bookshop. I've been checking (read as scouring) bookstores for years to find a copy and hadn't had any success. I had some extra money and was ready to give up the search. I'm so incredibly excited to own this book but I'm sad that I had to order it. A book this good shouldn't be this hard to find.

The Library tells the story of Elizabeth Brown who started reading at a very early age and never stopped. We see her arrive "skinny, nearsighted, and shy" and watch as she grow up reading book after book after book. She buys them at a terrific rate and reads them while doing her errands or vacuuming. She reads them instead of going on dates. She reads them constantly. And she slowly fills up her house with books. When Elizabeth can no longer find the door, she realizes that she'll have to take drastic action. So she does the only thing she can. She turns her house into a library, moves in with a friend, and spends the rest of her life visiting and reading her books.

This book is an incredible mix of illustration and words, like most of Sarah Stewart's collaborations with her husband David Small. These two work together so seamlessly that it's hard to pull apart which part is more important, the words or the images. Sarah Stewart tells this story in bits of verse, rather then the epistolary style that she used in other books. Most pages have four or five lines that provide snippets into Elizabeth's life, from early age to old age.
"Books were piled on top of chairs
And spread across the floor.
Her shelves began to fall apart,
As she read more and more."
The images that accompany this verse is of stacked of books fitting into every nook and cranny of her living room. The books are stacked on the floor, on the shelves, as end tables. But the readers don't see this as odd. Instead Small's illustrations make the image seem cozy, the kind of house that any reader wouldn't mind spending time in. And that is really the power of this book.

I loved Elizabeth from the beginning mostly because I saw myself in her. She is surrounded by books, teacups, cats, and solitude; and I found myself wanting to step into her world and read with her. She's a character who doesn't worry about her odd lifestyle (a lifestyle I don't find odd, only admirable). She is happy with her books. The verses and the images present a picture of cozy happiness. Any reader will love the images of books filling the house. We see her start with only a few books that she lends out and watch as she gains more and more. She's an eccentric character that doesn't mind being eccentric. With Stewart's verses and Small's cheerful images, we see a character at peace in the world. I was enchanted. I've fallen in love with most of the collaborations between these two (The Journey, The Gardner...) but this story struck a chord with me. A must have for any librarian or regular reader. It's hard not to fall in love with Elizabeth Brown and this book.

A Story for Bear

I'm a sucker for two kinds of books: books about reading or books, and books about animals. So when I saw A Story for Bear, written by Dennis Haseley and illustrated by Jim LaMarche I knew I had to read it. This combines my two favorite things, in wonderful ways.

When a bear finds an abandoned letter in the woods he take it home with him because it seems magical. The words don't make sense to him of course but he has a sense of peace when he looks at them. After a long winter of hibernating and staring at the paper, he wanders out into the spring and stumbles upon a cabin. At a chair right at the edge of the woods, sits a woman reading. The bear creeps closer to see the magic symbols over her shoulder. She notices him and over several days lures him to her. And then she starts reading. The bear doesn't understand the story but he feels the same sense of peace as he had with the paper. He returns for more and more stories. As the summer wears on he becomes a regular for story time. But summer ends. One day he returns to find the woman not in her chair. Instead she has left him a stack of books. Slowly he carries each one, gently, to his cave for the winter. And the hope that she will return in the spring.

It doesn't get much sweeter than this story. Haseley tells a story that made me both cry with happiness and at the same time feel completely at peace. Like the bear, I wasn't sure why it made me feel this way but it did. I love the description of him carefully carrying each of the brown, red, green, and black covered books back to his den. Haseley describes how the stories (or at least the way the woman sounds while telling them) stays with him during the day. How he feels that sense of peace when he can hear her speaking in her head. The simple line "For my Bear" brought me instantly to happy tears. Haseley makes us care about both the woman and the bear. And of course the stories. I found myself wanting to be that woman.

LaMarche creates beautiful landscapes and sweet characters with acrylics and colored pencils. He creates a bear that is somewhat realistic but also no where near threatening. I loved the cover image of the woman with her knees pulled up in the chair, reading to her attentive bear. But the natural landscapes that LaMarche creates are just stunning. With almost impressionistic lines he creates a beautiful stream, gorgeous pine trees, and of course a very cute bear. The emotions that he can create with only a few lines are wonderful. The images of the bear sitting surrounded by his books, is one of the most lovely images of the book. And something I would gladly buy a print of to hang on my wall. This book has beauty and emotions in both the story and the pictures. It is a book that celebrates nature and celebrates reading. It's my type of book.

The Dangerous Alphabet

As much as I'm looking forward to the upcoming collaboration between Adam Rex and Neil Gaiman, Adam doesn't quite fit with Neil's more macabre work (although seriously, Adam Rex and Neil Gaiman!!!, two of my favorites in one book. I'm going all fangirl). For Neil's darker work, I was taken with his collaboration with Gris Grimly on The Dangerous Alphabet. A perfect book for Halloween. It was enough to creep me out.

The story (because this alphabet book has one) follows two brave children and their trusty pet gazelle (gazelle?) through the underbelly of the city. Shortly after they start their journey the girl is lured by strangers into taking candy and gets snatched. Facing pirates and monsters, the young hero manages to save his sister from being kidnapped. So there is a happy ending. But there is a lot of creepiness to get through before you get there. Unlike other alphabet books, Gaiman doesn't focus on creating a literal word connection. This is no "A is for Apple" book. Instead we find more clever word associations like "C is the way that we find and we look", a pun on C and see as homonyms. Others like "I am the author who scratches these rhymes" for "I", will unnerve after we have gotten used to the pattern of B is for Boat. But by the time we reach "I" in the book we are already unnerved. This is not a safe children's story that you put them to bed with. It is creepy and dark. Children often like to be scared (in a safe setting of course) and these will accomplish that. "J is the joke monsters make of their crimes", was a particularly creepy page for me as we see children chained up or in cages. Or the "O is for ovens" page where we see pies being made with distinct parts sticking out.

Grimly's illustrations are macabre and unusual. There is something about them that reminds me of old comics I used to read, but can't seem to place. The heroes are almost skeletal looking themselves although the gazelle has large Disney eyes that are a little out of place for a strange unnerving book like this. But that only adds to its charm. The book is filled with sewer tunnels and horrible looking gangster monsters and floating eyeballs. The backgrounds are all tans and browns and the characters are mostly rendered in fine line ink. The text is wonderful but it would be lost without the images. Grimly takes the sparse text and brings it to life in all of its horror. "D is for Diamonds, the bait on the hook" would be far less scary without the dead dog floating in the water or the hideous fisherman holding the pole. In fact it is Grimly who makes this book scary. Every detail in the pictures is geared to unnerve. And of course to illustrate the letter. It took me a couple of reads before I started noticed the garbage and ghosts on the "G" page or the milk, maggots, and mice on the "M" page. I should have. The out of place llama on "L" should have been a direct give-away.

I don't normally list an appropriate age for books. I feel that children should not be limited by their age range. I was reading 6th grade book in third grade. I was reading adult titles in middle school. But I will suggest reading this one first before reading it to your child. You know best their tolerance for creepy stories. And this one fits the bill. It's a fun book, particularly for Halloween and the word play makes it one of the better ABC books I've read. Gaiman and Grimly create a creepy classic. Just make sure that your child won't be too disturbed.

Blog Suggestion

I have a stack of books that I need to review sitting by my computer. I pick them up and start a post and then get distracted (woo shiny things). But the books keep calling to me to discuss them and sometime this week I'll sit down and write those. But in the meantime I wanted to share a blog I found this past week.

I love getting a chance to peek into the studios of writers and artists. Apparently so does Jennifer Bertman. Her blog, From the Mixed-Up Files of Jennifer Bertman (I love the reference by the way) has interviews and images provided by authors and artists of their creative spaces. The images that the interviewee sends can be anything from views from their windows, images of their favorite coffeehouses, pictures of their desks and supplies, to family members and pets. Jennifer asks questions about some of the special objects in their studios, what their typical day is like, what media they prefer, and their best writing advice...among other great questions. I have not yet found an interview that didn't fascinate me. When Jennifer isn't interviewing writers, she's sharing book suggestions. I've picked up a couple of her suggestions and haven't been disappointed. This blog has quickly become a favorite. For anyone who likes seeing how writers and artists work, this blog is a treasure trove.

The creative space of the brilliant Aaron Zenz. Don't you just love it?

Diary of a Wombat

I had heard about Diary of a Wombat written by Jackie French and illustrated by Bruce Whatley for years now. I’ve been told that I had to read it. I’d heard how wonderful it was. But the book wasn’t what I was expecting. I was expecting this modern classic to be sweet. Judging by Bruce Whatley’s adorable wombat on the front I was expecting cute and sweet. What I didn’t expect was to laugh so hard I snorted. I didn’t plan to giggle with each page. This book is a joy.

The simple story is told from the point of the view of a wombat as it “trains” its human neighbors how to get along. Some pages are as simple as Tuesday which is mostly made up of sleeping and eating grass. That is until the wombat discovers the family next door. After destroying the flat, hairy creature at the door (welcome mat), the wombat demands a reward. After it gets a carrot, it quickly learns how to demand them (chewed through the door). And  the trouble for the family is just beginning. The wombat digs burrows in the garden, chews up gardening equipment, pulls laundry off the line, and generally makes a pest of itself.

This book has a marvelously dry sense of humor. I was so shocked when the book turned funny that I read a line and literally snorted. The humor snuck up on me. I love how droll French’s wording is. After the wombat grows tired of carrots, it demands something else. “Demanded oat AND carrots. Only had to bang large metal object (garbage can) for a short time before they appeared”. Or where she demands a reward for destroying their welcome mat. Each page brings new mischief and a new interpretation by the wombat. It is not exactly subtle but the dry sense of humor is right up my alley.

Bruce Whatley creates an adorable character who looks at the world through sleepy eyes and is more than happy as long as it’s getting its way. The book is filled with white space which leaves tons of room for playing with the pictures and the words. We see the welcome mat, but French never reference it directly. It’s only the flat, hairy creature that is invading the wombat’s territory. I love the triumphant look on the wombat’s face after the battle. Most of the time though it just looks sleepy and cute. Whatley’s acrylic illustrations are a mix of detailed expressions and blurred edges. Most of the illustrations are of our hero but that is really all we need with the book. An adorable book that made me laugh.