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Cool Book Reviews Children images

A few nice book reviews children images I found:

Beautiful:

shepherding a childs heart

Image by Kevin Shorter
Shepherding a Child’s Heart by Tedd Tripp is one of the best books on parenting out there. I have posted a review of it on the prayer blog.

Refinement :

New picture books, early November 2007

Image by your neighborhood librarian
Reviews from Pink Me: Children’s books reviewed for grownups.

There have been grumbles about me doing this.

Juliet says she’d rather just come into the library and have me hand her books. To Juliet I say: You are a lazy cow but I love you anyway. You have my permission to skip this entry and all future entries like this one.

Jaime says she’s not interested in picture books at all. To Jaime I say: You are a bitter childless freak but I love you anyway. Have fun in VIETNAM, a place that I can’t even think of visiting until my children have both developed the ability to get from the dairy aisle to the checkout without getting lost and making me think that one or both of them have been kidnapped for ransom or disgusting sexual reasons. You have my permission to skip this entry and all future entries like this one.

The incredible book-eating boy by Oliver Jeffers.
Everybody get this book. The art, done in paint and pencil on old book pages, is sophisticated and naive at the same time – reminiscent of Marcel Dzama, it is hipster-friendly, yet warmer and more cartoony, with many visual jokes; the story is simple and terrific. Buy it, give it away, buy another one. The art is too detailed for story times, but for all other uses, superb.

A kiss goodbye by Audrey Penn illustrated by Barbara L. Gibson.
Yuck. Chester the raccoon has to move because the men are going to come and cut down his family’s tree. He doesn’t want to, his mother talks him into it, he meets a pretty girl raccoon at the new place. Any book that includes the phrase "a tiny tear rolled down his cheek" has a lot to make up for, and this one doesn’t.

Living Color by my man Steve Jenkins.
I don’t know Steve Jenkins, but I have a friend named Steve Jenkins, who is a great guy, so I always feel like I know Steve Jenkins and he’s my bud. This book, like all of his books, is gorgeous gorgeous gorgeous, done in paper collage; and super-informative, a book that any kid could spend hours poring over.

Leaves by David Ezra Stein.
Also I have an imagined kinship with David Ezra Stein. I grew up with a David Stein, a misunderstood genius who played the cello – and I have a close family member named Ezra. So, again, I’m going to be prejudiced toward this book. BUT. Oh, this is a winner by anyone’s lights. It’s a young bear and his relationship with the seasons, specifically, with the leaves. The bear is inked so expressively, you can feel yourself stretch when he stretches. And there are 9 or 10 pages of the tree under which the bear is hibernating, during which we see the seasons change. That almost always works for me.

The Witch’s Child by Arthur Yorinks, illustrated by Jos. A. Smith.
Just in time for Halloween… oh, what’s that you say? Halloween was last week? Huh. Tell that to the people who process new books in my library system, will you? This morning we got numerous new books on monsters, a haunted house pop-up, and this really wonderful spooky witch story. This artist is terrific – that witch is terrifying looking, but cool too, with her striped tights and Balenciaga-esque high heels, and when she can’t make her straw doll come to life, you can even feel bad for her. Wonderful new version of this old story.

Big Bug Surprise by Julia Gran
Another winner! Prunella is a bug aficionado – she collects insects and knows a lot about them. But other people aren’t that interested. Until bees swarm her classroom and she knows just what to do. Would be terrific for the facts alone (did you know that bees can’t see white? I didn’t), but the energetic, stylized illustrations more than hold their own.

Why war is never a good idea by Alice Walker, illustrations by Stefano Vitale.
You know, you wonder about some books. Anyone who thinks war is (ever) a good idea is not going to crack this book, and everyone who agrees that war is never a good idea basically doesn’t need to. On the other hand, Lady Alice does come up with some new perspectives: "Picture frogs beside a pond holding their annual pre-rainy-season convention. They do not see War, huge tires of a camouflaged vehicle about to squash them flat." You could see this as a read-aloud to older elementary school children. The concepts and language are quite vivid and could provoke good discussion.

Ruthie and the (not so) teeny tiny lie by Laura Rankin.
A little girl tells a lie and then feels terrible about it and tells the truth. If this ever ever happened in real life, this would be a fine book, but in my experience, it does not.

Ridin’ Dinos with Buck Bronco as told to George McClements.
Cute, cute cute! Lively collage and colored pencil art illustrates this dinosaur fact book with a fanciful premise. A fun read-aloud, especially if you bust out yer funny cowpoke voice.

Small Sister by Jessica Meserve.
Two sisters, Small and Big, and how unfair it can be when you are Small. The very clear language serves the simple story well, and contrasts with the extremely rich, pictorial art. Lovely.

Millie waits for the mail by Alexander Steffensmeier.
Europeans again! What IS it about Europeans? European illustrations always seem to deliver 35-50% more visual information than the illustrations for English-language books: is it because their same-language market is proportionately smaller? Millie – a COW – waits for the mail in order to SCARE the mail carrier. This is a pretty funny premise in the first place, but Herr Steffensmeier fills each page with so many sunbathing chickens, incongruous miniature elephants, etc, that the story is almost secondary, no matter how satisfyingly it is plotted and resolved.

The Lemonade Club by Patricia Polacco
Get out your hankies. This is the true story of Patricia Polacco’s daughter Traci, her best friend, Marilyn, who won a battle with leukemia as a child, and their teacher, who survived breast cancer. It’s a real roller-coaster: kid gets leukemia and undergoes chemo. When she comes back to school she is very self-conscious about her bald head, but she finds that all the kids in class shaved their heads too! Then we discover that the beloved teacher has breast cancer. Cut to 5 years later and the whole class is in church. "The music was playing softly. It was one of Miss Wichelman’s favorite hymns. The flowers were so beautiful. Everyone there was thinking about Miss Wichelman." And then you turn the page and there’s Miss Wichelman coming down the aisle in a wedding gown – it’s not her funeral, it’s her wedding! Hooray! Oh my god, but I’m emotionally spent. I’ve said it before and I’m saying it again… SPINE LABEL. DIFFICULT THEMES. If I picked this up at random I would have been completely blindsided.

A few nice book reviews children images I found:

Refinement :

Book Expo 2009: Children’s Book Display

Image by NYRB Classics

Wonderful book reviews children:

last minute new picture books

Image by your neighborhood librarian
Reviews from Pink Me: Children’s books reviewed for grownups.

Skippyjon Jones and the big bones by Judy Schachner
Last year, Big Man’s kindergarten teacher said of the Skippyjon Jones books, "I feel like I’m sort of being manipulated to like these books, and I really just don’t." She couldn’t put her finger on what she didn’t care for, and it’s a tough call – LOVE the chalky, colorful, detailed illustrations that are both quirky and technically accomplished; I like the title character, who is both independent and imaginative, and his tattletale little sisters and no-nonsense mom, with their fun names; and I adore Schachner’s use of Spanglish ("Hola, dudes!") throughout. Hell, there’s even a song or two. I think what always bugs me about these books is the plot, weirdly enough. Accompanied by his crowd of Chihuahua friends, Skippyjon Jones assumes his alter ego, Skippito Friskito the great sword fighter, and goes on an imaginary adventure in his closet. And I swear, it’s the adventure story that always falls apart. Even my kids get confused looks on their faces during the part where Skippito battles the giant bee / dances with the dinosaurs / whatever. I keep reading these books though, because Skippyjon and his family are great characters and I love saying their names. You guys want to start calling me Mama Junebug Jones, you go right ahead.

A closer look, by Mary McCarthy
A neato book about observation and scale for the youngest pairs of eyes. VERRY reminiscent of Steve Jenkins, with strong colors and paper collage art.

Water Boy by David McPhail
A nice, weird book about a boy’s relationship with water – the water in his body, the water in his bath, the water in the environment. Like a caring teacher, David McPhail’s characteristically quiet, rich watercolors get right down in front of the boy to observe his reactions to the ordinary and extraordinary manifestations of water in his world.

Calendar by Myra Cohn Livingston, illustrated by Will Hillenbrand
The sparse text here was a little abstract for my four year old, but the energetic, slightly minimalist illustrations almost made up for that.

Meet the meerkat by Darrin Lunde, illustrated by Patricia Wynne
Patricia Wynne keeps showing up as the illustrator of books produced by employees and alums of the American Museum of Natural History, and while her somewhat clumsy mice and hominids in books such as Ian Tattersall and Rob DeSalle’s Bones, Brains and DNA make you feel like maybe she’s overworked, the keenly observed drawings of meerkats in this book by mammalogist Darrin Lunde show you what she can do given a single subject. This is a great little book about a popular little beast, a rare item in the Easy nonfiction area.

Bean Thirteen by Matthew McElligott
The faux-woodcut illustrations in this buggy book about division are just fantastic. Chunky, hip, and expressive, with a sophisticated, punchy palette. The story? Meh.

Phooey! by Marc Rosenthal
Where Once Upon a Banana does cause-and-effect with road signs, Phooey! does it with onomatopoeia. A bored kid kicks a can, which disturbs a cat, who jumps on an elephant, etc. All the while the kid, complaining that nothing every happens around here, walks right past all the exciting action. Rosenthal, who calls Celesteville "my utopia" in his dedication, displays a love of clean line and clear color worthy of Babar.

Tap dancing on the roof by Linda Sue Park, pictures by Istvan Banyai
Linda Sue Park here does for sijo what Andrew Clements recently did for haiku – her clear, funny examples of this short poetic form in effect show kids how it’s done. After reading poems like

Pockets
What’s in your pockets right now? I hope they’re not empty:
Empty pockets, unread books, lunches left on the bus – all a waste
In mine: One horse chestnut. One gum wrapper. One dime. One hamster.

…it’s almost impossible to not want to try it yourself. And Istvan Banyai? Do I really have to say it? The Goran Visnjic of illustrators.

Refinement :

strangers by taichi yamada

Image by northern green pixie
I can’t remember the last time I read a ghost story! I was given this as a birthday present. Beautifully presented – the cover photo is intriguing and atmospheric, the slim tome is a sparsely written tale set in Tokyo. Unlike Murakami’s writing, Yamada’s includes no incidental detail. What you get here is the basic story, little else, told in the first person by a 48-year old writer who has just divorced his wife, and is re-examining his life. One day he takes a trip to the area in which he lived as a child, and things start to get a bit spooky. I found the first two-thirds of the book to be compelling and absorbing, and I liked the straightforward style, but then it seems to me that the author started to get bored, because the final third seems rushed and rather clichéd. The last few pages were actually quite disappointing, and didn’t measure up to my expectations.

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