LAUREN CHILD, POST #1

LET ME INTRODUCE YOU...

Are you acquainted with Lauren Child?  She is one of my favorite author/illustrators of contemporary children's picture books.  Her quirky humor and unique collage-style art draw kids and adults alike to her books.  You can read about her journey in becoming a best-selling children's book author HERE, in the British newspaper THE GUARDIAN.

I thought this photo of her kitchen was cute.  She says, "My mother used to have this joke with me when I was little that I used to arrange things in my room to look like a shop window, and when she came in here she said I still haven't grown out of it."

Writer and illustrator Lauren Child's kitchen. Photograph: Beth Evans

I was introduced to Lauren's fun books by my library side-kick, 5-year-old Sophie and her mom.  We've read several Lauren Child books together and I look forward to sharing them with you in my posts this week.

Here's the first one Sophie introduced me to:

BEWARE OF THE STORYBOOK WOLVES “It’s bad news for a boy named Herb when the Big Bad Wolf and a little not-so-bad wolf fall out of a storybook, drooling and hungry. Thank goodness for fairy godmothers. After all, who else can bring the big wolf down to size and turn the little wolf into a fashion plate? If all that sounds silly, it is. It’s meant to be, in Beware of the Storybook Wolves. With a sly wit and a handful of evocative characters, Lauren Child takes the familiar “once upon a time” story, shakes it and then spins it for a giggle. Imagine Mother Goose meeting Roald Dahl’s “Enormous Crocodile.” The result is a smile-provoking yarn full of fairy-tale twists.”-- The New York Times

If your kids like this kind of wacky humor, they'll like Child's second book about Herb:

WHO'S AFRAID OF THE BIG BAD BOOK? "When Herb falls asleep with his head on top of a dusty book of fairy tales, he finds himself stuck inside the volume with no quick way out. Chased by a raging Goldilocks, who is upset that he landed in her story, the boy journeys through a parade of fairy tales and finally gets caught in the middle of "Cinderella." All of his past mishandling of the book comes back to haunt him-Cinderella's kitchen is sticky with cookie crumbs, the Queen does not appreciate the mustache Herb has drawn on her face, and Prince Charming has been missing since he was cut out of the book and used as a birthday-card decoration. Child's wildly expressive collages include boldly patterned backgrounds, cartoon characters, and photographs in unexpected places. The text (and font) grows and shrinks and winds jaggedly through the story, and turns upside down on several pages. This fast-paced creative tale has some really funny moments." - Library School Journal 

FROM "I'M NOT"...

TO "I AM"!

When my sister-in-law told me about the book I'M NOT, I thought, "Uh-oh, I hope this isn't an Alexander and the Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Day kind of book" (I know a lot of people like Judith Viorst's story, but it was a bit too negative to resonate with me and my children - Alexander's a grouch at the beginning and pretty much still a grouch at the end - we read it once and that was enough).  But on the contrary, I was pleasantly surprised with Pam Smallcomb's positive outcome to a negative sounding title, and it's a story I think young children will ask for again and again!

What I love about this book is the way the shy Narrator (a nameless little brown alligator who constantly compares herself to her talented friend, Evelyn, a little green alligator) begins to finally realize it's okay that she's different from her friend.  Even though there are a lot of things Evelyn is good at that she is not, there are things Evelyn isn't good at that she is!

This book doesn't celebrate being the "best" at everything, it's simply about being the best friend you can be. In the end, Evelyn says she needs a friend  - "A friend who is always by her side, through thick and thin, a true-blue friend."  She wonders, "Is there anyone in the whole wide world like that?" and our little narrator proclaims, "I AM! I AM! I AM!"

Pam Smallcomb's story made me think of two other sets of storybook characters that are good friends,  FROG AND TOAD

(who are also brown and green!)  and James Marshall's hippos, George and Martha,
 who bear a striking resemblance to Robert Weinstock's little alligators.

"BE-CAREFUL-WHAT-YOU-WISH-FOR"

Lots of stories, fables and fairytales convey the message, "Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it." Remember the myth about King Midas and the Golden Touch?  In answer to his wish for wealth, he is granted the gift that anything he touches will turn to gold.  He is unable to eat because his food and drink turn to gold.  Nathaniel Hawthorne penned a version in which Midas' own beloved daughter is changed into a golden statue when he touches her.  In the end, Midas hates the gift he had coveted.

In the movie The Wizard of Oz, young Dorothy wishes she could escape all her problems and live in a better place than Kansas by going "somewhere over the rainbow." She partly gets her wish, but her dream world winds up becoming a rather scary nightmare and ends up making her homesick for the very place and people she tried to get away from...she wanted to get away from home, but ends up realizing, "There's No Place Like Home"!

We can find the same underlying moral about "being careful what you wish for" in Edith Nesbit Bland's Five Children and It. In turn-of-the-century England, five children find a Sand-Fairy (or "Psammead") that can grant them wishes. But the sand fairy is an irritable literalist, who interprets the wishes of the children exactly as they ask, and wild things happen (e.g., the children wish for great beauty, and then the people around them don't even recognize them).

The book I'd like to highlight today is based on a Celtic tale with this same classic theme, in a picture book for kids 4-8.  It is Too Many Fairies, retold by Margaret Read MacDonald and colorfully illustrated by Susan Mitchell.  As I sat with my friend's 5-year-old daughter on the floor of a local bookstore reading this hilarious tale, she and I couldn't help laughing out loud at the trouble the old woman in the story gets herself into when she grumbles, "Work! Work! Work!  How I hate it! Hate it! Hate it!"

Her nonstop complaining soon brings four different fairies to her door to perform her chores. (A voice from outside calls each time: “Your luck has come! Open the door!  Let me in and you'll work no more!”) They each in turn wash her dishes, sweep the floor, make the bed, and do her knitting. But all the help still can't stop her from complaining about the noisy racket the fairies are making: "clankety, clankety," "swishety, swishety," "lumpety, flumpety," and "clickety clickety."

"These fairies are driving me crazy!" she laments. But when she tells them to stop, they begin to reverse all of their chores, tearing everything apart. A visit to the village "wise one" teaches the complaining old woman a lesson of being careful about what you wish for and being content in your situation.

The ending is imaginative and clever and the sound effects of the "rackety" fairies and the Old Woman's whining complaints make it fun to read aloud.  Your kids will definitely get the message!

HUGS FOR DADS!

There are lots of ways that parents nurture and hug their offspring -- not just with arms! But no matter how the embrace is made, one thing remains the same: all hugs are given with love.  Told in sweet rhyme with soft pictures: hugs with noses (elephants) and hugs in red roses (ladybugs) show that from the largest animals to the small bug, hugs are important to all! This sturdy board book (best for toddlers) shows how all sorts of animals express affection for one another. I love this little book for Father's Day, because even though it's about all kinds creatures, the last page shows a Dad hugging his child. (Written by Lorie Ann Grove and illustrated by Rebecca Malone)

If you'd like to read my post about Father's Day choices for older readers and Dads-who-love-baseball, CLICK HERE.   Last year I posted "Celebrating Dads", with a variety of picture books for kids up to age 8.  Another great Father's Day book is THE FATHERS ARE COMING HOME, from my recent post about Margaret Wise Brown.

The board book choices listed below are more great stories for First-Time Dads or any Dads with children, ages baby-4 years old:


DADDY HUGS

DADDY KISSES

DADDY CUDDLES

The Book that Inspires Me Most! For the Blog-A-Licious Tour

I’ve been invited by the amazing Pandora Poikilos to post on “The Book that Most Inspired Me” Blog-A-Licious Blog Tour. Join us in the hop that connects bloggers of all genres, backgrounds and locations and share with us all the book that inspires you the most too! For me, without a doubt it is Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

One Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, aka Lewis Carroll, born in England in 1842, wrote a book for Alice Liddell, the daughter of the head of Christ Church. He'd often told her the story of the girl plunging down the rabbit hole, and she asked him to please, please, please write it down for her.

Who can forget his spectacular characters: the Mad Hatter, the Red Queen, the March Hare, the Rock Lobster, the Caterpillar with his hookah and the sleepy dormouse? Alice’s entry into the eensy, weensy door that gained her entry into a magical world inspired not only my imagination, but seemingly many authors who designed similar magic portals in their novels: the wardrobe of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, The Magic Treehouse series, and the list goes on. Who can forget Carroll's wondrous inventions such as the “Drink Me” bottle, or events like the Mad Tea Party, where the guests simply moved ‘round the table when their teacups became dirty?

“A bright idea came into Alice's head. `Is that the reason so many tea-things are put out here?' she asked.

`Yes, that's it,' said the Hatter with a sigh: `it's always tea-time, and we've no time to wash the things between whiles.'

`Then you keep moving round, I suppose?' said Alice.

`Exactly so,' said the Hatter: `as the things get used up.'

`But what happens when you come to the beginning again?' Alice ventured to ask.

`Suppose we change the subject!' the March Hare interrupted.”

And who can forget the Gryphon teaching Alice the lines, 

“'Tis the voice of the Lobster; I heard him declare, 

You have baked me too brown, I must sugar my hair."

As a duck with its eyelids, so he with his nose, trims his belt and his buttons, and turns out his toes.”

Even the great Russian novelist, Nabokov was inspired by the wordplay and logic games of Carroll. Read Nabokov’s Pale Fire and this is quite evident. It is is a fictional 99-line poem being edited and critiqued by an ineffectual, pompous fictional editor. Nabokov's abundance of wordplay and hilarious absurdity is an obvious mirror to Carroll’s work.

The “curiouser and curiouser” Lewis Carroll also gave me the 

courage to know that I could do two things at once: 

be a serious visual artist and author. The man was 

multitalented. Not only the author of brilliant children’s

literature, he was a math professor at Oxford, an author of logic 

and math textbooks as well as political essays. He was 

also a respected photographer. He even coined 

words. Chortle, a nonsense word in his poem Jabberwocky, 

which was a combination of snort and chuckle, eventually 

made it into the dictionary! He even drew the original 

illustrations, which one can see at the 

British Museum (see image above).

Whenever and whatever I write, I think of Lewis Carroll; 

his unbounded imagination and his joy in playing with 

people’s minds in the best sense of the term. 

He will forever be my mentor.

And now, dear folks, I encourage you to visit the 

Blog-A-Licious blogger who precedes mine, 

Hannah Wept, Sarah Laughed, and and the awesome 

bloggers, Back of the Book Reviews. 

Here's the total list: 1. Roy, 2. Sulekha, 3. Dora, 

4, Shaeeza, 5. Mari, 6. Paula, 7. Karen, 8. Keiko, 

9. Mine--you're here!, 10. Kate & Ashley, 

11. Desiree, 12. Sonia, 13. DK Levick, 

14. Sarcasm Goddess, 15. Tosh, 16. Lucy, 

17. Leo & 18. Dora. 

But before you hop off, please let me know 

what books influenced you the most!!!