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A SHAKER'S DOZEN by Kathleen Thorne-Thomsen

A SHAKER'S DOZEN

by Kathleen Thorne-Thomsen & Paul Rocheleau

Pub Date: Sept. 1st, 1999
ISBN: 0-8118-2299-0
Publisher: Chronicle Books

This counting book takes readers from the numbers one to twelve in one long, rhythmic sentence that travels with the intrinsic taste of the Shakers, its subjects (one Shaker home, two Shaker doors, three Shaker doves, etc.), through their culture. The sentence ends, appropriately (given the group’s dwindling numbers) at the notion of the Shakers eating pies “as long as they are able at a long Shaker table.” Every spread includes a brief factual comment on the objects shown, and, with the afterword, fill out the picture of Shaker life past and present. It’s an evocative, elegantly simple book, to enrich arts and social history collections; with pictures of pies, dolls, hats, and tools, it also works for the learning-to-count crowd. (bibliography) (Picture book. 5-9)