A young girl’s daily life in colonial times is filled with chores in the house and on the farm. For Sarah, it’s often with her little sister tied to her apron strings. In Pennsylvania in the early 1770s, when Sarah grows out of her one and only dress, getting a new one involves a lot of work; the sequence of tasks is arduous: washing flax, carding, combing, spinning, dyeing, weaving, and sewing. Written in staccato rhyme, the period-specific words send the reader’s eyes to the beautiful watercolor illustrations that expand the story. Rand’s (Anna the Bookbinder, p. 302, etc.) traditional style and skillful renderings of faces and fabrics embellish the text, conveying a realistic picture of the Golden Age of Homespun, but the terseness of the rhymes tends to impede the flow of the narrative. “Sarah dressing, / Bodice, snug. / Ankles showing, / Long skirt, tug. / Winding pathway, / Singing lark, / Outhouse, smelly, / Creaky, dark.” The breezy tone of the author’s note at the beginning could easily have served to tell the story in prose. It’s Rand’s research (mentioned in his acknowledgement) that really supports the historical details in his pictures. Teachers will love this attractive window on the period, which provides many threads to different aspects of the time. (Picture book/poetry. 5-8)
Pub Date: April 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-399-23417-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2003
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An inspiring story of young boy's compelling desire to read. As a boy of nine, Booker works in a salt mine from the dark of early morning to the gloom of night, hungry for a meal, but even hungrier to learn to read. Readers follow him on his quest in Malden, Virginia, where he finds inspiration in a man ``brown as me'' reading a newspaper on a street corner. An alphabet book helps, but Booker can't make the connection to words. Seeking out ``that brown face of hope'' once again, Booker gains a sense of the sounds represented by letters, and these become his deliverance. Bradby's fine first book is tautly written, with a poetic, spiritual quality in every line. The beautifully executed, luminous illustrations capture the atmosphere of an African-American community post-slavery: the drudgery of days consumed by back- breaking labor, the texture of private lives conducted by lantern- light. There is no other context or historical note about Booker T. Washington's life, leaving readers to piece together his identity. Regardless, this is an immensely satisfying, accomplished work, resonating first with longing and then with joy. (Picture book. 5- 8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1995
ISBN: 0-531-09464-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Orchard
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1995
Innocuous adventuring on the smallest of scales.
The Mouse and the Motorcycle (1965) upgrades to The Mice and the Rolls-Royce.
In Windsor Castle there sits a “dollhouse like no other,” replete with working plumbing, electricity, and even a full library of real, tiny books. Called Queen Mary’s Dollhouse, it also plays host to the Whiskers family, a clan of mice that has maintained the house for generations. Henry Whiskers and his cousin Jeremy get up to the usual high jinks young mice get up to, but when Henry’s little sister Isabel goes missing at the same time that the humans decide to clean the house up, the usually bookish big brother goes on the adventure of his life. Now Henry is driving cars, avoiding cats, escaping rats, and all before the upcoming mouse Masquerade. Like an extended version of Beatrix Potter’s The Tale of Two Bad Mice (1904), Priebe keeps this short chapter book constantly moving, with Duncan’s peppy art a cute capper. Oddly, the dollhouse itself plays only the smallest of roles in this story, and no factual information on the real Queen Mary’s Dolls’ House is included at the tale’s end (an opportunity lost).
Innocuous adventuring on the smallest of scales. (Fantasy. 6-8)Pub Date: Jan. 3, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4814-6575-5
Page Count: 144
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: Sept. 18, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2016
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