Bruchac and Farnsworth honor the Indians of the Northeast, the written versions of the tale, and the elders and Wabanaki...
An Abenaki retelling of a traditional story of various indigenous nations of the Northeast that centers on loyalty and humans’ relation to nature.
Long ago, a young man travels north to hunt throughout the winter. One day, as he is following the tracks of a moose, he realizes he is lonely and wishes out loud for a partner. Returning to his lodge, he finds a fire burning and food waiting, but there is no one there. This goes on for days; on the seventh night he finds a woman waiting inside. The young man and woman develop a relationship based on respect and loyalty, and the hunter promises to always remember her. When he returns to his village in the spring, he finds himself pressured to take a wife. This tension eventually leads the hunter to live a double life, testing his devotion to and respect for the “great family of life.” Through his scenic paintings, Farnsworth evokes the light, seasons, and life in the forested mountains of the Northeast, supporting Bruchac’s words and achieving a striking visual depiction of the environment of Abenaki peoples. The narrative itself is elliptical, offering literal readers a story of loyalty but founding it on a subtle exploration of the spirit world and its relation to ours.
Bruchac and Farnsworth honor the Indians of the Northeast, the written versions of the tale, and the elders and Wabanaki tellers who keep this story alive. (author’s note) (Picture book/folk tale. 6-8)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-937786-43-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Wisdom Tales
Review Posted Online: June 5, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2015
Score one for cleanliness. Like (almost) all Munsch, funny as it stands but even better read aloud, with lots of exaggerated...
The master of the manic patterned tale offers a newly buffed version of his first published book, with appropriately gloppy new illustrations.
Like the previous four iterations (orig. 1979; revised 2004, 2006, 2009), the plot remains intact through minor changes in wording: Each time young Jule Ann ventures outside in clean clothes, a nefarious mud puddle leaps out of a tree or off the roof to get her “completely all over muddy” and necessitate a vigorous parental scrubbing. Petricic gives the amorphous mud monster a particularly tarry look and texture in his scribbly, high-energy cartoon scenes. It's a formidable opponent, but the two bars of smelly soap that the resourceful child at last chucks at her attacker splatter it over the page and send it sputtering into permanent retreat.
Score one for cleanliness. Like (almost) all Munsch, funny as it stands but even better read aloud, with lots of exaggerated sound effects. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-55451-427-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Annick Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 7, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2012
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Yarlett takes poor advantage of the format, as readers see only half of the correspondence, but the premise and punny names...
A lad finds a big red dragon in his basement and wisely seeks expert advice about its care and feeding in this epistolary episode.
Young Alexander’s missives (there are no cellphones, nor parents, in sight) are mostly paraphrased rather than shown, but each response comes as a small note folded into a pocket that’s been printed and shaped like an envelope: “Douse it in water right away!” writes panic-stricken fire chief H.Y. Drant; find it a large house or castle, advises B. East of World Animal Welfare; “fatten it up,” suggests Angus Teak the butcher (“Look forward to [eating, scratched out] meeting your dragon”) with sinister relish. Boy and dragon have wonderful times together, but the ultimate realization that dragons really don’t make good pets leads the narrator to follow the written advice of best friend Hillary (“the wisest person I knew”) and set it free. The later arrival of a slightly burned picture postcard in the “post” reassures him that the dragon won’t be forgetting to keep in touch. The human figures in Yarlett’s cartoon illustrations are either white or have their heads cut off at the page top. With the exception of the pasted-on postcard from the dragon at the end, all of the correspondence is removable and thereby losable.
Yarlett takes poor advantage of the format, as readers see only half of the correspondence, but the premise and punny names add some appeal. (Novelty. 6-8)Pub Date: Dec. 1, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-61067-818-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Kane Miller
Review Posted Online: Aug. 26, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2018
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