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.

New Arrivals: Picture Book: Three Bears in a Boat, David Soman

Three Bears in a Boat

David Soman (Ladybug Girl and Bumblebee Boy)

ISBN: 9780803739932

Nautical and expressive bear cubs in soft-wash environments, navigating tricky emotions.

Our bear protagonists are siblings, and so you know from the start that there are certain kinds of trouble that it takes good friends or blood-relatives to get into.  After an accident, the trio heads out to repair the damage (and to prevent them from having to fess up).  The sailing isn't always smooth, and the relationship is strained by blame for the accident, but shared peril and misery are always great to put things in perspective.  Our intrepid wanderers come back, somewhat the worse for wear, and find what they were looking for was always right at home (which, in picture book land, is about as good of a moral as you can get).  Special props for the anxious and clingy mother bear at the end, who adults will realize has been much more exercised over the missing cubs than over the broken trinket.

Unsurprisingly from the deft creator of Ladybug Girl, these siblings have good hearts and good intentions, but we see in this story that emotions and circumstances can bring out the worst in even the best of us.  Showing how they rely on each other, forgive each other, and take responsibility (shared) for the inciting problem is a great visual (and so very visual - check out those postures and faces and emotional colorings) to give to little kids who are still figuring out all this complicated emotional and relationship stuff, with brains that aren't even done growing yet.  Sometimes I think that picture books like these that show empathy and emotional connections might even do a lot of grown-ups good.