Tuesday Storytime: Summer Reading, Rockets

I personally think that rockets are a little bit tenuous of a connection for Heroes, but I like rockets and space and astronauts, so I'm game for it regardless.

This first month, the actual Summer Reading Programs are all "event" programs instead of reading programs, which is nice from a work standpoint, and less nice from a literacy standpoint, so these very early childhood picture books are the only ones I've collected for this particular theme.  Once July hits, these posts will either be a bit longer, or split up between morning and afternoon programs.

Roaring Rockets
Tony Mitton, illustrated by Ant Parker
ISBN: 0753451069
Sketchy "crayon"-like art hides skillfully framed compositions, enhanced by an excellent vocabulary.

This book is really very nice, and a great one to start off with.  The illustrations are misleadingly childlike and simplistic, almost Boynton-esque with the big-eyed animals as our astronauts.  However, the illustrations are correct and labeled, and the narrative is chock-a-block with excellent astronaut terms and concepts, all rendered in deceptively simplistic phrasing and word-choice.  Some highlights "Rockets carry astronauts with cool white suits, oxygen helmets, and gravity boots."  and "Down comes the lander with legs out ready and fiery boosters to hold it steady."


On the Launch Pad: a counting book about rockets
Michael Dahl, illustrated by Derrick Alderman & Denise Shea
ISBN: 1404805818
Bright colored collages count down to a liftoff with a beautifully diverse crew of workers.

I think my first favorite thing about this book is the vibrant clarity of the colors popping out in every page spread.  My second favorite thing about this book is that the "cast" is made of men and women in equal measure, and of beautifully varied skin-tones and hair colors.  From the workers cleaning the rocket, to the engineers in the control tower, to the truck-drivers, to the astronauts themselves... all the way through to the one lovely lady pulling the launch towers away in her little cart - it's just nice to see.  An excellent primer on the various and numerous people and tasks necessary to get a rocket up into space, with a great visual twist at the very end.


This Rocket
Paul Collicutt
ISBN: 0374374848
Stunning paintings stand in contrast to showcase the diversity of rocketry science.

This is an absolutely beautiful book.  Technically, it's only about as long as On the Launch Pad, so I could have used this in the middle, but I wanted to slowly work through the concept sequentially, and felt like this one would be better after the basics of rockets and flight science were established by the other two books.  Beautifully-drafted illustrations contrast on each spread, with rockets that are either fast or slow, tall or short, rockets like cars, rockets like trains... The endpapers are equally stunning.  The front has detailed vignettes of each rocket in the book accompanied by dense technical explanations, and the back has a complex and beautiful illustrated timeline of the Apollo 11 mission to the moon.  This book also shares On the Launch Pad's ending twist, but with a much more vibrant and lifelike interpretation.  Absolutely stunning book to showcase to the kids.