The only difficulty I have with this type of theme is that it makes it more difficult to have a coloring sheet that goes along with the theme - in those cases I have a collection of general "storytime" or "book" themed coloring sheets that I use instead.
Baby Bear Counts One
Ashley Wolff
ISBN: 9781442441583
Very detailed woodcut-style art, very dark and vibrant and detailed.
Baby bear and Mama bear are walking through the autumn woods and Baby counts various animals as they prepare for winter by stocking up or migrating away. A good mesh of naturalistic (the artwork and the matter-of-fact descriptions of the animals' various activities) and fanciful (the conceit of Baby and Mama talking). Very nice, but a smidge on the long side. I actually read Bunnies!!! first, and I regret it, because this one was longer in reading than it ran when I previewed it, and we had VERY squirmy audience today. It would have flowed much better in the top billing, which is why I'm listing it here as such.
Bunnies!!!
Kevan Atteberry
ISBN: 9780062307835
A sweet-faced monster is quite excited by a family of pastel bunnies, but they keep running away!
The art here is notable specifically for the quality of the emotional content conveyed with very little text and minimalistic art style. It's really delightful to watch the kids respond as the little sweet monster gets more and more discouraged by the bunnies who keep running from his over-excited advances. The twist ending manages to be sweet and to draw a chuckle from both parents and the older (or genre savvy) kids who realize what's about to happen again.
Hush, Little Horsie
Jane Yolen, illustrated by Ruth Sanderson
ISBN: 9780375858536
Beautiful restful spreads and vignettes of pairs of dams and foals in various environments.
I love this book. It's sweet and calming and restful, and the catch at the ending is very well done - a parent reading to her horse-mad small child, putting them to bed. The rhymes are VERY repetitive, but I don't even care - they're pretty and calming, and just different enough to flow beautifully from one horse family to another. I do wish there was at least one horse father or grandparent present, but that could be easily altered by a quick-thinking reader. Beautiful and quite short on the read, which made it a delightful positive finish for our overactive audience today.
Showing posts with label Ruth Sanderson. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ruth Sanderson. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 20, 2016
Thursday, June 16, 2016
Summer Reading Research: Pretty Princess Books
One of our weekly themes this year is "Knights and Princesses" and I've had fun searching through Amazon and the catalog for the most diverse and interesting and active books I could find. However, I do admit to a soft spot for a beautiful princess book (illustrations and actual princesses), and here are two that won't be getting used this summer, but still deserve a shout-out for being utterly lush and delightful.
In the "so pretty but so peculiar" category, we have:
The Twelve Dancing Princesses
retold and illustrated by Ruth Sanderson
ISBN: 9781566568647
A peculiar re-telling of the traditional tale has plot-holes galore, but is so pretty it almost doesn't matter.
Sanderson is a manifestly accomplished illustrator, and if she wants to re-tell a fairy tale to illustrate, more power to her. Next time around, might I suggest a little more attention to the narrative?
First things first, this is one of the most beautiful fairy tale books I've seen. I'm quite partial to the lush gilded overdone illustrations of Kinuko Craft or Sarah Gibb (to name two very diverging methods of achieving lush and overdone) and Sanderson falls quite neatly into that same realm. These princesses are beautiful and have individual features, and exquisite dresses, the environments are detailed and delightful, and every page has beautiful details and grace notes to catch the eye and marvel over.
On the downside, the story has plotholes fit to drive a truck through. Our story begins with the king declaring that any prince who wished to try and solve the mystery of the worn-out dancing slippers would be welcome to try, and that many princes had attempted, but all had vanished during the night. Later on, we find that the vanished princes are the dancing partners (and the oarsmen in the swan boats) for the princesses, and that the princesses are the ones who bewitched them all, each in turn. So - did the princesses dance with each other before then? Did they row themselves across the lake? How on earth do the daughters of a king who is quoted as "a man who did not believe in magic cloaks or enchanted castles" find a magic trap-door, learn to bespell princes with enchanted wine, and find a magic kingdom conveniently underneath their bedroom? I know these issues exist to some extent in the original tale, but by making the daughters the active party in the dancing scheme with no obvious explanation how, all those impossibilities become a little harder to ignore. And really, the goal in a fairy tale is to just ignore the impossibilities and enjoy the story.
If those beautiful illustrations aren't sufficient to distract from the plot-issues, then I really don't know what would.
And in the "too long, but utterly enchanting" category, we have:
The Princess Who Had No Kingdom
Ursula Jones, illustrated by Sarah Gibb
ISBN: 9780807566305
Gibb's signature silhouettes and "Grahame Johnstone"-style willowy fae characters make a delightful modern fairy tale even more delectable.
Full disclosure, as soon as I read this book, I bought a copy for myself. It's SOOOO good. Jones has written a lovely story about a princess who lives on a pony-cart and supports herself by delivering odd packages to people, and by visiting local royals, trying to find her kingdom. (She's obviously a princess, because that's her name, and she's beautiful and sweet and kind, so: obviously a princess.) Despite set-backs, and the haughty disdain of the actual nobles, this sweet girl stays true to herself and realizes that perhaps life among the nobility isn't so grand after all, and she finds her own kingdom without having to go very far away at all. It's delightful and sweet and modern and just sassy enough to not be totally cloying, and that's not even starting on the illustrations.
The illustrations are amazing. When I was a child, my grandmother had a set of Dean's fairy tales and nursery rhyme books, the ones illustrated by Anne and Janet Grahame Johnstone. I spent a good portion of my childhood poring over those stories and those haunting and fae illustrations, especially the ones from the Frog Prince and the White Cat. Gibb reminds me so strongly of those delightful illustrations, but adds her own delightful touches like the truly stunning cut-out/silhouette work, and the fine-line details along the borders of just about everything. They're just perfect. They make my heart hurt with how delightful they are.
I love everything about this book, except that it's too long to read in storytime.
In the "so pretty but so peculiar" category, we have:
The Twelve Dancing Princesses
retold and illustrated by Ruth Sanderson
ISBN: 9781566568647
A peculiar re-telling of the traditional tale has plot-holes galore, but is so pretty it almost doesn't matter.
Sanderson is a manifestly accomplished illustrator, and if she wants to re-tell a fairy tale to illustrate, more power to her. Next time around, might I suggest a little more attention to the narrative?
First things first, this is one of the most beautiful fairy tale books I've seen. I'm quite partial to the lush gilded overdone illustrations of Kinuko Craft or Sarah Gibb (to name two very diverging methods of achieving lush and overdone) and Sanderson falls quite neatly into that same realm. These princesses are beautiful and have individual features, and exquisite dresses, the environments are detailed and delightful, and every page has beautiful details and grace notes to catch the eye and marvel over.
On the downside, the story has plotholes fit to drive a truck through. Our story begins with the king declaring that any prince who wished to try and solve the mystery of the worn-out dancing slippers would be welcome to try, and that many princes had attempted, but all had vanished during the night. Later on, we find that the vanished princes are the dancing partners (and the oarsmen in the swan boats) for the princesses, and that the princesses are the ones who bewitched them all, each in turn. So - did the princesses dance with each other before then? Did they row themselves across the lake? How on earth do the daughters of a king who is quoted as "a man who did not believe in magic cloaks or enchanted castles" find a magic trap-door, learn to bespell princes with enchanted wine, and find a magic kingdom conveniently underneath their bedroom? I know these issues exist to some extent in the original tale, but by making the daughters the active party in the dancing scheme with no obvious explanation how, all those impossibilities become a little harder to ignore. And really, the goal in a fairy tale is to just ignore the impossibilities and enjoy the story.
If those beautiful illustrations aren't sufficient to distract from the plot-issues, then I really don't know what would.
And in the "too long, but utterly enchanting" category, we have:
The Princess Who Had No Kingdom
Ursula Jones, illustrated by Sarah Gibb
ISBN: 9780807566305
Gibb's signature silhouettes and "Grahame Johnstone"-style willowy fae characters make a delightful modern fairy tale even more delectable.
Full disclosure, as soon as I read this book, I bought a copy for myself. It's SOOOO good. Jones has written a lovely story about a princess who lives on a pony-cart and supports herself by delivering odd packages to people, and by visiting local royals, trying to find her kingdom. (She's obviously a princess, because that's her name, and she's beautiful and sweet and kind, so: obviously a princess.) Despite set-backs, and the haughty disdain of the actual nobles, this sweet girl stays true to herself and realizes that perhaps life among the nobility isn't so grand after all, and she finds her own kingdom without having to go very far away at all. It's delightful and sweet and modern and just sassy enough to not be totally cloying, and that's not even starting on the illustrations.
The illustrations are amazing. When I was a child, my grandmother had a set of Dean's fairy tales and nursery rhyme books, the ones illustrated by Anne and Janet Grahame Johnstone. I spent a good portion of my childhood poring over those stories and those haunting and fae illustrations, especially the ones from the Frog Prince and the White Cat. Gibb reminds me so strongly of those delightful illustrations, but adds her own delightful touches like the truly stunning cut-out/silhouette work, and the fine-line details along the borders of just about everything. They're just perfect. They make my heart hurt with how delightful they are.
I love everything about this book, except that it's too long to read in storytime.
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