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YOUNG FRANK, ARCHITECT

A gentle plug for the MoMA, this exquisitely designed book would be an enticing prelude to a visit with a young child as...

A visit to a museum proves to be transformational for a cross-generational pair of architects.

Young Frank is a very young architect who lives with his grandfather, also an architect and also named Frank, in a stylish high-rise apartment in New York. Young Frank loves to make things with household objects: a chair out of toilet-paper rolls, a curvy skyscraper out of a stack of books. Old Frank is skeptical that real architects do this kind of thing. A visit to the Museum of Modern Art with his precocious grandson shows Old Frank that architects do in fact make all kinds of things. The Franks peruse exhibits by two famous architects also named Frank: Gehry and Lloyd Wright. Inspired by the visit, they spend the evening back at the apartment designing a whole city full of imaginative creations from found objects, including a building made entirely from chocolate-chip cookies. Young Frank feels a little older, more “like a REAL architect,” and Old Frank feels “younger—and a little wiser.” The whimsical, cartoonlike illustrations recall Viva’s New Yorker covers, and the pages are furnished in a designer palette of grays, olives and ochres.

A gentle plug for the MoMA, this exquisitely designed book would be an enticing prelude to a visit with a young child as well as an invitation to all readers to let their imaginations run wild. (author’s note) (Picture book. 4-8)

Pub Date: Sept. 17, 2013

ISBN: 978-0-87070-893-0

Page Count: 40

Publisher: The Museum of Modern Art

Review Posted Online: Aug. 13, 2013

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2013

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BECAUSE I HAD A TEACHER

A sweet, soft conversation starter and a charming gift.

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A paean to teachers and their surrogates everywhere.

This gentle ode to a teacher’s skill at inspiring, encouraging, and being a role model is spoken, presumably, from a child’s viewpoint. However, the voice could equally be that of an adult, because who can’t look back upon teachers or other early mentors who gave of themselves and offered their pupils so much? Indeed, some of the self-aware, self-assured expressions herein seem perhaps more realistic as uttered from one who’s already grown. Alternatively, readers won’t fail to note that this small book, illustrated with gentle soy-ink drawings and featuring an adult-child bear duo engaged in various sedentary and lively pursuits, could just as easily be about human parent- (or grandparent-) child pairs: some of the softly colored illustrations depict scenarios that are more likely to occur within a home and/or other family-oriented setting. Makes sense: aren’t parents and other close family members children’s first teachers? This duality suggests that the book might be best shared one-on-one between a nostalgic adult and a child who’s developed some self-confidence, having learned a thing or two from a parent, grandparent, older relative, or classroom instructor.

A sweet, soft conversation starter and a charming gift. (Picture book. 4-7)

Pub Date: March 1, 2017

ISBN: 978-1-943200-08-5

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Compendium

Review Posted Online: Dec. 13, 2016

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2017

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HOME

Visually accomplished but marred by stereotypical cultural depictions.

Ellis, known for her illustrations for Colin Meloy’s Wildwood series, here riffs on the concept of “home.”

Shifting among homes mundane and speculative, contemporary and not, Ellis begins and ends with views of her own home and a peek into her studio. She highlights palaces and mansions, but she also takes readers to animal homes and a certain famously folkloric shoe (whose iconic Old Woman manages a passel of multiethnic kids absorbed in daring games). One spread showcases “some folks” who “live on the road”; a band unloads its tour bus in front of a theater marquee. Ellis’ compelling ink and gouache paintings, in a palette of blue-grays, sepia and brick red, depict scenes ranging from mythical, underwater Atlantis to a distant moonscape. Another spread, depicting a garden and large building under connected, transparent domes, invites readers to wonder: “Who in the world lives here? / And why?” (Earth is seen as a distant blue marble.) Some of Ellis’ chosen depictions, oddly juxtaposed and stripped of any historical or cultural context due to the stylized design and spare text, become stereotypical. “Some homes are boats. / Some homes are wigwams.” A sailing ship’s crew seems poised to land near a trio of men clad in breechcloths—otherwise unidentified and unremarked upon.

Visually accomplished but marred by stereotypical cultural depictions. (Picture book. 4-8)

Pub Date: Feb. 24, 2015

ISBN: 978-0-7636-6529-6

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Candlewick

Review Posted Online: Nov. 17, 2014

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2014

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