Picture Book Review: The Frank Show

David Mackintosh, author & illustrator. (2012). The Frank Show. New York, New York: Abrams Books for Young Readers.  Age range: 5-7.

My volunteer time among the local library stacks has led me to a new picture book gem, The Frank Show by David Mackintosh.  A little boy is trying to hard find a family member to bring to show and tell.  Mom and Dad are busy.  The only person left is Grandpa Frank.  Frank is boring, and complains about everything.  The other kids in class have family members who do cool stuff like speak Italian or work at the potato chip factory.  Frank surprises everyone, including his grandson, by regaling them all with tales of battlefield heroics from his youth.

Interview: Tony Kushner, Friend Of My Brothers Book Author Maurice Sendak : NPR

Interview: Tony Kushner, Friend Of My Brothers Book Author Maurice Sendak : NPR.

It’s October 1st.

Let’s set the mood for Halloween.  Take a gander at an unsettling Victorian children’s story, Lucy Clifford’s The New Mother (1882).  Enjoy!

By Cindy (Flickr) [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons.

Picture book review: A Home for Bird

Philip Stead, author & illustrator. (2012). A Home for Bird. New York, New York: Roaring Brook Press.

Can Vernon the frog help the silent Bird find its way home? Follow Vernon as he helps his lost friend.

A Home for Bird was published in April 2012, and is still in print. The book’s list price is $16.99 in the US, and $18.99 in Canada. Amazon has the price at $11.55 for brand new copies. The cover price of $16.99 to $18.99 is rather prohibitive for many books, especially children’s books. Amazon’s price is more reasonable, but then one would need to pay for shipping and wait for the book to arrive in the mail. The cheapest and easiest way to access the book is to go to the library. (Could I be biased in this regard?  Yes, likely.) Philip Stead won the 2011 Caldecott medal for A Sick Day for Amos McGee, as such his work is likely to be included in children’s library collections.

Happy Roald Dahl Day!

One of my favorite Roald Dahl quotes:

“Watch with glittery eyes the whole world around you because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places.”

Some other great Dahl gems.

Also, an interesting article about the old gent’s adult material.

J. K. Rowling’s Casual Vacancy

Casual Vacancy, Rowling’s first novel for adults, will be released Sept. 27th. There are no pre-release copies or early reviews. I look forward to reading it, though $17.99 for an e-book is beyond ridiculous.

Important tips for encouraging literacy in children.

“Studies have shown that it’s ‘print knowledge,’ and not just general experience with books, that advances children’s reading ability.

‘Print knowledge’ is an awareness of the mechanics of the reading process, like the fact that English is read from left to right and that written words map on to spoken ones…  Ohio State professor Shayne Piasta and her coauthors report that when preschool teachers drew students’ attention to print while reading to them, the children’s skills in reading, spelling and comprehension improved. These positive results were long-lasting, too, still showing up a full two years later.”

How do you encourage print knowledge?  For example:

“Ask, ‘Where should I begin reading on this page?’, and ‘Do you know this word?’ Say, ‘I spot three capital letters on this page—see if you can find them,’ or ‘This dot here is a period, and it tells me I’ve reached the end of the sentence.’ Point out, ‘This is the title of the book—it’s on the cover and also on the inside,’ and ‘This is the name of the author—she wrote all the words that you see.'”

http://blogs.kqed.org/mindshift/2012/06/surprising-tips-that-help-kids-learn-to-read/?sc=fb&cc=nprbooks

Maurice Sendak (1928-2012)

So long and thanks for all the books.

From the NPR:

Wonderstruck is better than The Invention of Hugo Cabret.

There, I said it.  Let the scandal ensue.

Brian Selznick, author and illustrator of The Invention of Hugo Cabret (2007) and Wonderstruck (2011), is a great talent.  His words and art combine to produce works that spark curiosity about the world: how it works, where it’s going, where it’s been, and who lives in it.  The debut of his distinctive style was with The Invention of Hugo Cabret, a story about a Parisian orphan boy in the 1930s who repairs an automaton that he finds in the garbage.  The automaton, once repaired, draws a picture that leads Hugo on to a bigger mystery surrounding the crotchety old man who operates a toy booth in the city’s train station.  (Interestingly, this was inspired by a salvaged mystery automaton at the Franklin Institute who signed the name of its maker after it was repaired– keep on dreaming, archaeologists.)

Hugo and the automaton

Draw Me A Story

The “Draw Me A Story: A Century of Children’s Book Illustration” exhibit at the Frick Collection in Pittsburgh is a rare treat.  The pieces in the exhibit range from Randolph Caldecott and Kate Greenaway to modern illustrators such as Maurice Sendak and Chris Von Allsburg with a wide range of mediums, subjects, and styles.

I was struck by L. Leslie Brooke’s piece of the handsomely clad bear striding down the path in front of the lion from Johnny Crow’s Garden as seen below.  L. Leslie Brooke (1862-1940) was an English illustrator and occasional author of children’s books.  Some of his better known works include Johnny Crow’s Garden, The Jumblies and Other Nonsense Verses (written by Edward Lear and illustrated by Brooke), and The Golden Goose Book.  Brooke’s work was my favorite of the collection because of the gentle humor with an emphasis on facial expressions.  The composition of an illustration can set the scene with each character in his or her place, but facial expressions are what deliver the emotion.  In my opinion, Brooke’s adeptness in depicting expressions and body language might be credited to his deafness if he depended upon visual emotional signals in everyday life.

Lion Loses His Pride