Review of Down to the Sea with Mr. Magee by Chris Van Dusen

We were first introduced to Chris Van Dusen's work by his book If I Built a Car, which I bought through a Scholastic catalogue from my son's preschool. My son was captivated by the imaginary car the little boy in the story designs - especially when it becomes a boat, a submarine and a plane. I was impressed enough to look for other books by him at the library and found Down to the Sea.

The back flap of the book says that the author/illustrator "always wanted to paint a picture of a boat in the top of a tree. When he wrote a story around that idea, Mr. Magee and Dee were born." I love the notion that Van Dusen took one fantastic situation and built a plot around it - and the result is funny, clever and really appeals to a child's appreciation of absurdity.

Van Dusen's rhyming text makes it fun to read out loud, and I especially appreciate his use of vocabulary. Most of his word choice falls within what a young child would recognize, but then he throws in language that would broaden most kids' vocabulary - Magee's packed lunch includes sweet pickled beets, whales in the story eat minnows, plankton and krill, and at one point Magee feels downhearted.

The plot itself is wonderfully silly - basically, Mr. Magee and his dog Dee, go for a boatride on the ocean, get shot into the air by a stream of water from a whale's blowhole, from there get swept by the wind into a tree, and are eventually rescued by a group of whales who use a spray of water to dislodge the boat. There are several points in the story where my son laughs out loud.

From my perspective, the illustrations are WONDERFUL. Van Dusen incorporates funky 1950s decor and clothing into his pictures - Magee wears browline glasses and a short-sleeved sweater tucked into his pants, he has a grooved aluminum diner table and dishes and vinyl kitchen chairs featuring that once hugely popular star pattern. Today's kids won't appreciate that it's "retro" but it gives a great look to the art. Van Dusen's color scheme is beautiful and bright, with creams, yellows, aquas, bold watery blues, and minty greens with pops of orangy-red.

Though his style is not photo-realistic, Van Dusen choice of vantage point for each of his illustrations seems informed by photography. On each page the point of view shifts - for one painting the "lens" is at water level looking up, in another it's overhead looking straight down, and in another the scene appears in cross section with the underwater world taking up most of the page. This shifting of the view point makes the illustrations very dynamic, and in addition, Van Dusen often places people or objects in the immediate foreground, foreshortening them to heighten the drama. Each picture is simple enough to be read - the plot details come through loud and clear - and yet he has worked in "extra" information that makes them fun to study and unpack. The lighthouse and old wreck mentioned several pages into the book are visible from the very first illustration, and then lobster trap bouys appear on a couple consecutive pages before you see the lobsters and traps, making it possible to notice new things on multiple readings.

My son was particularly delighted to tell me that Mr. Magee and Dee make a cameo appearance in If I Built a Car. This "trick" of incorporating your own past characters into your current book's illustrations is one that Mo Willems (of Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus and Knuffle Bunny fame) has perfected to an art. But it's no less rewarding here, when a kid can realize the relationship and make a connection between two books. I once read that a way to help children love books and reading is to start every book by reading it's title, the author's and illustrator's names out loud. This helps emphasize that this is a work created by someone. In our house, we've taken that a step further, and routinely follow up on the books of authors or illustrators we particularly like, checking out multiple titles by one writer from the library. My three-year-old son will now ask, "What other books are by this author?"

Another "game" that this book would be excellent for is discussing how the characters are feeling based on their body language and facial expressions. In Michele Borba's book Building Moral Intelligence she talks about the fact that empathy is not necessarily inherent in children, and that it needs to be nurtured. One method she recommends for helping kids learn to interpret and articulate others' feelings is to have them look at a picture and describe how they think the people and animals are feeling and WHY they think that. This helps them become sensitive to non-verbal means of communicating emotions - so they can recognize these emotions in themselves and in others, making them more empathetic and aware of emotional exchanges.

I feel very lucky to have discovered Chris Van Dusen's books and I'm poised and waiting for his next publication!

Review of Phoebe and Chub by Matthew Henry Hall and Illustrated by Sheila Aldridge

After we brought this home from the library, my son wanted to take it in the car to look at on the way to school. He's nearly three - so he wasn't reading the words, he was just looking at the pictures. He was captivated, so I assumed the pictures must be expressive.

Then we read the book. The pictures are expressive, but the themes (indicated as "rules" and numbered 1-3) add a level of sophistication the illustrations alone can't convey.

The story is about a tree frog (Phoebe) and a fish (Chub) who live at the bottom of a canyon. They make lots of friends, who are then able to help Chub give Phoebe a special birthday wish - the chance to fly.

There are several qualities about the illustrations that I particularly like. The first is that each drawing is packed with little details for the child invested in searching them out. A parent could easily prompt, "Where is the catepillar? Where is the ladybug? Where is the snake?" and keep a child closely looking at the pictures. Another thing, mentioned before, is that the animals have very expressive faces - Phoebe looks happy or relaxed or surprised. Other animals wave, or listen, or dance. There's a lot in the expressions to engage a child as well. In Dr. Michelle Borba's book about "Building Moral Intelligence" she encourages parents to develop their child's ability to read emotional states from outward expressions by analyzing faces and body language. She says that if children don't build a vocabulary for describing a range of emotional states (in part by recognizing them in others) they have a harder time labeling and defining their own range of emotions.

Sheila Aldridge uses two tools in this book that I've noticed elsewhere and really like as part of a book's illustrations. One is orienting one two-page spread differently from all the others. In this case, she switches from the usual horizontal approach of using two pages side by side to having them create a tall, vertical illustration (to show how deep the canyon is and to contrast the bottom where Phoebe lives with the rim where her friend the California condor lives). The other thing - which perhaps was the decision of an editor or designer - is one two-page spread with no text. I love the effect this creates. With nothing to read, my son and I instead discuss the picture. We've spent more time talking about this picture than any other in the book, and in this case it represents the climax of the story. I love the idea that the climax is better represented by the picture alone than could be done with picture and word together.

The last page includes "A note from the author" about the endangered status of a number of the animals represented. I feel like this is a bit too much for my son. I'm not ready for him to worry about the safety of animals - but for older kids, especially those studying the environment or ecology in school, this might be a nice layer to the story.

Review of Darcy and Gran Don't Like Babies by Jane Cutler Illustrations by Susannah Ryan

My husband and I always planned that our son would eventually have a brother or sister, so we've always tried to keep a range of sibling related books in our regular rotation. My mom discovered this one at the library, by chance, and it's become my favorite book to deal with the issue.

In reading reviews on Amazon.com on various books on the sibling issue it seems that many parents are critical of the books that include a main character who is upset or angry about the arrival of a baby. I can appreciate that you don't want to prepare your child for the baby to be a negative experience - on the other hand, I believe that the older child will have feelings of anger, jealousy, and fear, and normalizing those feelings is one of the values of books. We recently had Ella and the Naughty Lion out from the library. In it, Ella discovers that a lion slipped in when her baby brother arrived. The lion acts out and at times is very naughty. After reading it a couple of times I realized the lion was an analogy for Ella's behavior after her sibling's arrival - but it seems a bit too vauge to be very effective for small children. Although maybe I'm not giving kids enough credit.

This is all a long preamble for Darcy and Gran, which I think is perfect. In the beginning we see a very dejected Darcy standing in the shadows as her parents delightedly play with the new baby. The text simply states, "Darcy didn't like the baby." She goes on to report to everyone that she doesn't like the baby, to which everyone has a reply. Her mother tells her the baby is like Darcy was a long time ago; her father tells her that she'll like the baby better later; her doctor tells her she's not supposed to like the baby; and the neighbor tells her, "Of course you do." Darcy is unsatisfied with all these answers, until she tells her Gran that she doesn't like the baby - Gran says, "Me neither...I never did like babies."

Darcy and Gran head out for a day at the park. On the way home, Darcy recounts to her Gran all the things people said about Darcy not liking the baby. Gran agrees with Darcy's mom and dad. She has beautiful interpretations of the doctor and the neighbor - Gran explains that the doctor means it's okay if Darcy doesn't like the baby, the neighbor means that deep down Darcy does like the baby.

By their return home Darcy seems more accepting of the state of things, with her Gran's perspective. The final page shows Darcy and the baby sitting on Gran's lap.

The illustrations do a fantastic job of mimicing Darcy's particular point of view. The opening picture with Darcy in the shadows, looking sad and lonely suggests her state of mind - the early pages show her parents lavishing attention on the baby, literally with their backs turned to Darcy. The drawings of Darcy are very expressive: it would be a great exercise with a child to ask at different points how Darcy is feeling.

Towards the end of the book there are a series of drawings that indicate memories or imagined future events - they are painted with lighter, pale colors in bubbles with wavy edges, to set the apart from the rest of the illustrations.

Then, at the end, the pictures now reflect Darcy's improved feelings about her family dynamic. As she and Gran return from the park, baby and Dad are waiting at the door for them. On the next page Mom is on hand to give Darcy a hug (while Dad brings dinner to the table - nice touch). And in the next two-page picture, Darcy, Gran, Mom and Dad look at photo albums together as the baby bangs on pots and pans nearby.

I really like the balance the author and illustrator strike. Darcy is allowed to feel and express her dissatisfaction with the baby. No-one punishes her or discourages her. In fact, Gran totally validates her, but is also able to help her out of her narrow thinking. The unique grandchild-grandparent relationship offers some perspective Darcy can't accept from anyone else.

Review of Celeste A Day in the Park by Martin Matje

I am all in favor of children's books having a moral. In the tradition of some of Dr. Seuss's greatest stories, my personal favorite being Horton Hears A Who, I think picture books can be persuasive without being moralistic or scary or threatening. Matje's Celeste is clever in ways that parents will appreciate and is silly in ways kids will appreciate, and manages to teach a lesson at the same time.

The story is about a little girl, Celeste, and her "pet," a teddy bear named Timovitc Radetski (who goes by the nickname Tim). The plot is quite simple: Celeste and Tim head to the park for a picknick where a duck steals one of Celeste's vanilla cucumber sandwiches. Celeste, outraged by the duck's unrestrained theft of her sandwich, runs after him. A large (VERY LARGE) police officer intervenes on the duck's behalf, and Celeste is left powerless.

Matje has rapidly brought the story to a complex situation and one that suggests the powerlessness that must be a frustratingly common experience for kids. The solution, however, is wonderfully simple. Tim steps in, negotiates between Celeste and the duck, and resolves the standoff. The final pages show that all it took to make peace was three sandwiches, one for Tim, one for Celeste and one for the duck!

That Matje wrote and illustrated the book must have led to the integration of text and picture. Many pages have lettering incorporated into the illustration, or in places where there is "regular text" special words are set off in color, in a different size, or in a cursive-type script. The words become a part of the dynamic, graphic composition.

Most of the watercolor illustrations have the types of details kids love to pick out: a taxi on the city street, a bird and some bees or a snail and some flowers, all found in the park. The way Matje draws Celeste reflects careful observation of real children. She has a range of emotional states, she is either calm and contented or she is hysterical, anxious, stunned, or chagrined. The dramatic expressions she exhibits would make it easy for any child to "read" how she feels in a given situation.

But my favorite part is that in the end Celeste makes things right by letting go of her inital selfish impulse and nuturing her newfound friends with homemade sandwiches. We can't always expect our children to instinctively share or to automatically think of others, but we can hope that with a little coaxing they'll see the value of compromise.

Review of The Wind by Monique Felix

Let me say right off the bat that I have mixed emotions about books without words. I know that they're great for kids, and that they inspire creativity and an expansive way of thinking about "reading" that is valuable at nearly every age. On the other hand, there are times when it comes to reading at bedtime that I'm tired. And I don't want to narrate a series of pictures and ask engaging questions. I just want to read the words. So, with that confession on the table, let me say that as far as my son is concerned, books without words are great, and this is a wonderful example.

This is part of a series of books - we have four of them (The Wind, The Boat, The House, and The Plane) but there are quite a few more that I have not seen. The main character is a mouse and he appears at the beginning of the book on a plain white page. He begins to alter his environment by chewing that page. Each page turn brings the next part of the sequence, inspiring questions about what the child thinks is happening (or if your child is young, prompting you to describe the action). In The Wind, the mouse is chewing the background page into a square. As he does so, wind begins to blow from behind, pushing around the edges of the paper. At moments, the wind is powerful and can inspire a dramatic account of the action, if you're so inclined.

As the wind calms (and the paper square is moved away from the right side of the page) we see a scene as if from above, revealing a lone cabin in the mountains, a rising hot air balloon, a helicopter, a red propeller plane. As more details of the scene are revealed on the right hand side of each two-page spread, the mouse occupies himself on the left, creating his own form of aerial transportation out of the paper square he chewed free. On the last page he jumps down into the scene with a paper pinwheel on his tail, like a helicopter rotor.

A couple of times when reading these books, my son and I have been inspired to create out of paper whatever the mouse in the book made - a pinwheel, a paper boat or airplane. It's a fun way to connect to the book, and to demonstrate to my kid that his mom actually knows how to make stuff!

My husband complains about this book because there's a mistake in one of the illustrations that he just can't get past. After he pointed it out, I noticed yet another. But I won't mention them here - I don't want to ruin it for you!

Review of When It Starts to Snow by Phillis Gershator Illustrated by Martin Matje

I bought this book in an airport bookstore as my 20-month-old and I were about to board a cross-country flight. He was, at that point, still a lap child and I remember reading this book to him at least 10 times before the plane had even left the ground. I had recently accepted a job that would move our family from snowy Boston to sunny Arizona, and was already feeling nostalgic about the snow storms we would miss.

This book is the most beautiful combination of poetic verse and subtle teaching, all seen through the frame of a little boy who can't wait to enjoy the pleasure of the snowy world outside. The format of the book takes us through a range of animals and their reaction to the coming snow - geese fly south, fish swim deep, horses await the farmer with feed.

Matje's illustrations are absolutely charming. Each animal appears in its habitat, and animals that share the same environment (beaver and fish, pig and horse) are on opposite pages. My favorite visual tool in this book is the choice to have one page that is just an illustration - no words - and a very spare and simple illustration at that. In the text it falls just before the cadence of the repetitive verse changes rhythm, and it causes a meditative pause. The no-text page is mostly taken up with a wide expanse of snow, although it also includes the little boy peeking out from behind a tree, and for those who look closely, subtle footprints pressed into the white snow.

Another clever aspect of the illustrations is that on some pages we only see part of an animal, with the rest of the animal revealed only on the book's cover illustration. In fact, sometimes when the main character is seen, it is only his red hat that appears in the picture. I also like the way that, in places, the animal sounds are not in the same font as the rest of the text, but are drawn much larger to become a part of the page's overall graphic design. It means that my son can point out those words - the "Honk, honk, honk" of the geese or the "Oink, oink, oink" of the pig because of the way they stand out.

I mentioned that this book is educational - it actually works in scientific information about how animals adapt or hibernate in winter and what kinds of homes and dens they live in. But it's never heavy handed, which is a lovely way to learn.

Even after reading it dozens of times, many of them that first day on the plane, I still love this book, its calming text, and soothing illustrations. And because of its repetition, my son happily chimes in, especially at the end when the little boy cheers for snow - "Hip, hip, hooray!"

Review of The Witch's Children by Ursula Jones Illustrated by Russell Ayto

This is a book that was recommended to me by my sister-in-law, who is as passionate about great kids' books as I am. In fact, it was one my husband read to my pregnant belly before our son (who will be three in April) was born.

The story is about three witch's children who visit the park and get into trouble by doing magic they aren't skilled enough to undo. The story is inventive, unpredictable, and has a great twist at the end that is quite clever. There is enough repetition for young children to understand the structure of the book, but not so much that it's mind-numbing for parents. It's not scary (the witch is a typical mom who bails her kids out when they get into trouble) and it has a happy ending but if you are very religious and are opposed to the idea of witches this might not be the book for you.

The illlustrations are wonderful - I think Russell Ayto is incredibly talented. One aspect I just love is that the story is set on a windy day (you don't realize how unusual it is to have weather factor in to a children's story until you see an example where it does) and Ayto's drawings have a stylized treatment that exaggerates the wind - the children's hair blows directly to the left, and trees lean 90 degrees from vertical making the strength of the wind palpable. He varies his methods for creating episodic information - sometimes two side-by-side panels contain consequtive events, in other cases a series of small drawings cascade down the page to indicate the chronology. At times the action is set in an environmental context (the park) and at other times the drawings are simply placed on a field of graduated color.

I particularly like the way the book's design incorporates the text with the illustrations - in places words are much larger for emphasis, or slant this way and that as they appear to blow in the wind. Ayto's sense of pattern, color, and design make it an appealing visual experience and could easily inspire a clever interior designer to create a room based on its stripes, polka dots and color combinations.