THE CASTLE ON HESTER STREET

New pictures add fresh animation to a slightly retouched text originally published in 1982. Young Julie listens happily as Grandfather describes how he crossed the ocean in a golden wagon pulled by Moishe, a very special goat; how Teddy Roosevelt personally welcomed him; and how he emerged from his huge castle on New York City’s Lower East Side to sell gemstone and plate-sized buttons. Meanwhile, Grandmother counters with more likely accounts of an overcrowded immigrant ship, Ellis Island and hard times on Hester Street. The two find common ground at last, in telling how they met and had Julie’s mother and other children: “We had each other and we were free to live as we wanted.” Properly chastened, Grandfather promises to tell only the truth from now on—such as the tale of how he and Moishe once sang for Woodrow Wilson. The historical references make the narrative a bit creaky, but Kulikov recreates warmly lit, authentic-looking interiors and street scenes, and his smiling, flexibly posed figures project an intimacy that will draw children in to this intergenerational interchange. (Picture book. 6-8)