I'm always unreasonably pleased when we have a storytime that actually falls on the day of the celebratory event of the season. This time around we get an actual Valentine's Day storytime, and I had such fun.
Catching Kisses
Amy Gibson, illustrated by Marie Van Lieshout
ISBN: 9780312376475
A sweet tour of United States landmarks following kisses as they blow through the air.
This is a sweet book, and I'm happy to use it on Valentine's Day. We follow various kisses as they travel on the wind between people, and to the hearts of the ones who catch them. Beautiful and charming, and the illustrations of the landmarks kept the adult attention while the little ones pondered all the different types of kisses there were.
Together
George Ella Lyon, illustrate by Vera Rosenberry
ISBN: 0531070476
A pair of young girlfriends play happily together in various imaginative and fantastical scenarios.
A gleeful set of girls plays merrily through the pages of this sweet and fanciful book, where the two of them divide tasks into parts. "I'll find the ball if you'll call the team" and then once together they play at their games, always with the refrain "Let's put our heads together and dream the same dream" across a spread of even more imaginary landscapes. Sweet, visually interesting, and open-hearted.
Love Monster and the Last Chocolate
Rachel Bright
ISBN: 9780374346904
Love Monster has a box of chocolates and an eternal dilemma: should he share them?
The Love Monster is back from vacation to find a box of chocolates on his doorstep. He's delighted, because Love Monsters LOVE chocolates, especially certain kinds. But his glee is soon mired in guilt - he SHOULD probably share with his friends. But if he does, what if there aren't enough to go around? What if someone takes the one he likes best? What if the only one left is COFFEE flavored? What if there isn't one left AT ALL?? Oh dear. Sharing is hard. but Monster comes out on the caring side of things and discovers his friends are sweet and thoughtful too. No word on what happens when two monsters share the same favorite chocolate type.
Showing posts with label George Ella Lyon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label George Ella Lyon. Show all posts
Thursday, February 16, 2017
Tuesday, March 29, 2016
Tuesday Storytime: Sailing
Spring is a perfect season here for sailing. We live near a large lake, and the warm days with fresh breezes (and pop-up storms) make for memorable times, and easy pickings for Storytime reads.
Three Bears in a Boat
David Soman
ISBN: 9780803739932
Three bear siblings head off on a sailing adventure to replace an accidentally broken treasure.
The storyline could be a little tighter, and the metaphorical storm vanishes a little too quickly for my tastes, but this story of siblings working together (and fighting) will strike a chord with lots of kids. Our three bears break mom's beautiful blue shell, and immediately hatch a wild plan to find a replacement. They sail away into adventure, before returning safe and sound to mom. A lovely blended homage to the adventure of Where the Wild Things Are and the homey sweetness of Little Bear.
Sail Away
Donald Crews
ISBN: 9780688110536
Short and onomatopoeic and evocative.
Crews is delightful when he's presenting a simple vibrant concept, and here is no exception. Super-simple premise has a sailboat puttering out for a day's sail, encountering a storm (over almost as quickly as Soman's was) and puttering back in to moor safely in the harbor. Graphically arresting, with words that become part of the illustrations, and just enough language to move the pictures along.
Boats Float
George Ella Lyon, illustrated by Mick Wiggins
ISBN: 9781481403801
By the author of Trucks Roll, and of Planes Fly. Less of a storyline than in Trucks Roll.
The illustrations are busier here than in Trucks Roll - they actually remind me a little bit of the old Richard Scarry books. The narrative is familiar; a rhyming cadence lists different types of boats, aspects of boats, or boat terminology, and always ends on "Boats Float" at the conclusion of each spread or section. There is a funky mostly-sideways page that doesn't actually need to be turned sideways (a very winding river with the text following the path of the river) and it goes on just a smidge long for my tastes, but it's fun and cute and has really good vocabulary.
Three Bears in a Boat
David Soman
ISBN: 9780803739932
Three bear siblings head off on a sailing adventure to replace an accidentally broken treasure.
The storyline could be a little tighter, and the metaphorical storm vanishes a little too quickly for my tastes, but this story of siblings working together (and fighting) will strike a chord with lots of kids. Our three bears break mom's beautiful blue shell, and immediately hatch a wild plan to find a replacement. They sail away into adventure, before returning safe and sound to mom. A lovely blended homage to the adventure of Where the Wild Things Are and the homey sweetness of Little Bear.
Sail Away
Donald Crews
ISBN: 9780688110536
Short and onomatopoeic and evocative.
Crews is delightful when he's presenting a simple vibrant concept, and here is no exception. Super-simple premise has a sailboat puttering out for a day's sail, encountering a storm (over almost as quickly as Soman's was) and puttering back in to moor safely in the harbor. Graphically arresting, with words that become part of the illustrations, and just enough language to move the pictures along.
Boats Float
George Ella Lyon, illustrated by Mick Wiggins
ISBN: 9781481403801
By the author of Trucks Roll, and of Planes Fly. Less of a storyline than in Trucks Roll.
The illustrations are busier here than in Trucks Roll - they actually remind me a little bit of the old Richard Scarry books. The narrative is familiar; a rhyming cadence lists different types of boats, aspects of boats, or boat terminology, and always ends on "Boats Float" at the conclusion of each spread or section. There is a funky mostly-sideways page that doesn't actually need to be turned sideways (a very winding river with the text following the path of the river) and it goes on just a smidge long for my tastes, but it's fun and cute and has really good vocabulary.
Monday, January 18, 2016
2015 Review Round-Up: Planes Fly! by George Ella Lyon & Mick Wiggins
Planes Fly! (Trucks Roll!)
George Ella Lyon, illustrated by Mick Wiggins
ISBN: 9781442450257
Rhyming cadence language and rich illustrations make this a storytime natural.
Read November 2015
I was so happy when I saw this picture book show up in our new piles of books! It's by the author that did the also-excellent Trucks Roll! and I am super stoked to see this one. Oddly enough, there are simply not that many good picture books about planes and flight. Considering it's a yearly rite of passage for many kids going to see relatives, and considering that picture books are a perfect conduit for illustrating new concepts and introducing new activities to kids, I'm always staggered that I have so much trouble finding good airplane travel books. This one has a few niggles; I don't love it quite as much as I do Trucks Roll!, but it's solid and catchy, and very much welcome.
George Ella Lyon, illustrated by Mick Wiggins
ISBN: 9781442450257
Rhyming cadence language and rich illustrations make this a storytime natural.
Read November 2015
I was so happy when I saw this picture book show up in our new piles of books! It's by the author that did the also-excellent Trucks Roll! and I am super stoked to see this one. Oddly enough, there are simply not that many good picture books about planes and flight. Considering it's a yearly rite of passage for many kids going to see relatives, and considering that picture books are a perfect conduit for illustrating new concepts and introducing new activities to kids, I'm always staggered that I have so much trouble finding good airplane travel books. This one has a few niggles; I don't love it quite as much as I do Trucks Roll!, but it's solid and catchy, and very much welcome.
Tuesday, December 16, 2014
Tuesday Storytime: Trucks
Yeah, I know, why pick this theme for this time of year. I felt like it. :)
Tough Trucks
Tony Mitton (Dinosaurumpus), illustrated by Ant Parker
ISBN: 0753456001
Anthro-animals work with slightly cartoonish trucks on jobs with very metered verse blocks.
I really like this one for the vocabulary: study, accelerate, "weave and wend," piston, liquids... really interesting and potentially unfamiliar words for little ones. The rhyme is solid (sometimes a bit too solid) and perhaps a bit plodding, but it works for the measured pace of the very loose framework of "trucks and truckers working at jobs." Because the characters are all various animals, there's no indication of gender, except for a waitress-cat wearing a frilly apron. I would have preferred to see frills on a couple of the truckers/workers or a gender-neutral apron on the wait-staffer, but at least they are animals, so one can plead that they are multi-gendered.
I Love Trucks!
Philemon Sturges, illustrated by Shari Halpern
ISBN: 0060278196
Multi-gendered, multi-ethnic drivers and characters fill a tiny town full of types of trucks.
Our narrator for this very short and simple trucking celebration is a kid playing with trucks in a sandbox, describing various types of truckish jobs that get done while the blocky, primary-colored artwork keeps the environment simple and straighforward and very appealing. The best-loved truck is an ice-cream truck, so if you're in a rural or ice-cream-truck-less area, be prepared for some really intense questions about trucks that dispense ice-cream.
Trucks Roll!
George Ella Lyon, illustrated by Craig Frazier (Stanley Mows the Lawn)
ISBN: 9781416924357
Abstracted and graphically-intense scenes in forced-perspective or otherwise intriguing compositions.
This is my favorite truck book from today, and might be my favorite truck book in general. Frazier's graphic art is just phenomenal, and everything from the endpapers (in that bright burnt-yellow industrial corrugated-iron pattern) to the movement and energy blasting out of his pages just makes me so energized and happy as a reader. The storyline isn't amazing - it isn't really a story, and is really very like Tough Trucks as far as ideas go, but here we stick with trucks on the road, and what they might carry (wild cargoes like rabbits or giant cookies under tarps) and it works much better to have our focus limited to road trucking. What also works much better is the rhyme and cadence here - we get shorter rhymes and so less interesting vocab, but the words and phrases just leap out, with the coda "Trucks roll" becoming more and more impressive til we reach the end. Finally, the idea of having the "Trucks stop" in the middle of the book, and ending at dawn (another bravura graphic design, with the shadows on the trucker, the steam on the coffee, and even the hood-ornament as a bird reaching for the sky, all with bright yellow and orange sun rays streaming across) is really brilliant, and a nice change from the usual choice of stopping at "bedtime." Love this book.
Tough Trucks
Tony Mitton (Dinosaurumpus), illustrated by Ant Parker
ISBN: 0753456001
Anthro-animals work with slightly cartoonish trucks on jobs with very metered verse blocks.
I really like this one for the vocabulary: study, accelerate, "weave and wend," piston, liquids... really interesting and potentially unfamiliar words for little ones. The rhyme is solid (sometimes a bit too solid) and perhaps a bit plodding, but it works for the measured pace of the very loose framework of "trucks and truckers working at jobs." Because the characters are all various animals, there's no indication of gender, except for a waitress-cat wearing a frilly apron. I would have preferred to see frills on a couple of the truckers/workers or a gender-neutral apron on the wait-staffer, but at least they are animals, so one can plead that they are multi-gendered.
I Love Trucks!
Philemon Sturges, illustrated by Shari Halpern
ISBN: 0060278196
Multi-gendered, multi-ethnic drivers and characters fill a tiny town full of types of trucks.
Our narrator for this very short and simple trucking celebration is a kid playing with trucks in a sandbox, describing various types of truckish jobs that get done while the blocky, primary-colored artwork keeps the environment simple and straighforward and very appealing. The best-loved truck is an ice-cream truck, so if you're in a rural or ice-cream-truck-less area, be prepared for some really intense questions about trucks that dispense ice-cream.
Trucks Roll!
George Ella Lyon, illustrated by Craig Frazier (Stanley Mows the Lawn)
ISBN: 9781416924357
Abstracted and graphically-intense scenes in forced-perspective or otherwise intriguing compositions.
This is my favorite truck book from today, and might be my favorite truck book in general. Frazier's graphic art is just phenomenal, and everything from the endpapers (in that bright burnt-yellow industrial corrugated-iron pattern) to the movement and energy blasting out of his pages just makes me so energized and happy as a reader. The storyline isn't amazing - it isn't really a story, and is really very like Tough Trucks as far as ideas go, but here we stick with trucks on the road, and what they might carry (wild cargoes like rabbits or giant cookies under tarps) and it works much better to have our focus limited to road trucking. What also works much better is the rhyme and cadence here - we get shorter rhymes and so less interesting vocab, but the words and phrases just leap out, with the coda "Trucks roll" becoming more and more impressive til we reach the end. Finally, the idea of having the "Trucks stop" in the middle of the book, and ending at dawn (another bravura graphic design, with the shadows on the trucker, the steam on the coffee, and even the hood-ornament as a bird reaching for the sky, all with bright yellow and orange sun rays streaming across) is really brilliant, and a nice change from the usual choice of stopping at "bedtime." Love this book.
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