Show and Tale: I Stink!

Posted by Gina on September 8, 2009 at 10:24 AM in Board Books, Show and Tale

If a garbage truck could talk, what would it say? Make friends with a smelly, sassy garbage truck with I Stink! by Kate and Jim McMullan.

Mom-blogger Laura's a fan: "A night in the life of an NYC garbage truck, including an alphabet of gross trash ('P is for puppy poop!'). My boy loves it. Also an eco message. Best book for an urban mom like me!"

What books with unexpected main characters do you love? Any other truck books to recommend?

Show and Tale: The Runaway Bunny

Posted by Gina on August 25, 2009 at 9:54 AM in Board Books, Classics, Show and Tale

Today's Show and Tale comes from Kathleen, a mom who picked Margaret Wise Brown's The Runaway Bunny. Brown and illustrator Clement Hurd, well loved for Goodnight Moon, created another classic with this sweet tale.

"It's a wonderful way to let your child know that you'd search to the ends of the earth for her," Kathleen said.

Have you read The Runaway Bunny? What are some other comforting books that you and your child love?

Thursday Three: Board Books

Posted by Pam on July 30, 2009 at 7:55 AM in Board Books, Recommendations

ABC’s
by Charley Harper
I certainly don’t need a board book for my fifth and eighth graders, but I might have to buy this one anyway just for the artistic value. The lovely and interesting illustrations of Charley Harper are completely the point of this (mostly) animal ABC book. Alphabet book connoisseurs are probably wondering about “X,” and I’ll tell you that it is not “Ox.” Oh, the suspense.

Charlie and Lola’s Opposites
by Lauren Child
What can I say? I love Charlie and Lola. I love the original books. I love the show. I love the books based on the show. And now I love the board books written from the success of the show based on the original books. The books are very simple in text — big and small, many and few — but Child’s illustrations are wonderful.

Cat and Dog
by Jane Kemp, Clare Walters, and Linzi West
It’s surprising that it took three people to produce books this simple in both words and pictures. I also think that the two books could have been smooshed together — maybe into one of those flip-over books — so you’d get more bang for your buck, because seven pages isn’t much book. That said, they are cute books about, respectively and most obviously, a cat and a dog. Fun, lively pictures.

Diverse Board Books

Posted by Susan on May 27, 2009 at 12:00 AM in Board Books, Recommendations

I love when I get comments that inspire posts of their own. Let me share with you a comment that Andromeda made on this post about board books:

"I am interested in finding out what board books you and other readers enjoy that include diverse characters. I have spent quite a bit of time looking for board books that feature black and brown faces and families, as well as multi-ethnic groups and families. I don't think there are enough of these books, particularly for infants and toddlers. I like Jabari Asim's books and Andrea Davis Pinkney's. What else have you found?"

Excellent question! There are lots of old and new board books that fit the bill. Plus, it gives me a chance to talk about some of my favorite board books that I haven't mentioned yet.

For starters, take a look at two classics: Ten, Nine, Eight by Molly Bang and On Mother's Lap by Ann Herbert Scott with illustrations by Glo Coalson. They're both great to read before bedtime. For an intriguing story about the creation of Ten, Nine, Eight, check out Molly Bang's website.

Busy Fingers and Busy Toes written by C.W. Bowie and illustrated by Fred Willingham are both fun and engaging books.

Rachel Isadora's Peek a Boo Morning was recently released as a board book last year. Hopefully, her picture books Peek a Boo Bedtime and Uh Oh! will be in board book format soon.

Cheryl Willis Hudson has several board books illustrated by George Ford: Let's Count Baby, Goodnight Baby, and Animal Sounds for Baby.

My Aunt Came Back by Pat Cummings is sadly out of print, but a library is a good place to look for it.

Be sure to check out Baby Dance by Ann Taylor. I love the exuberance and joy that radiates from both the father and his beloved daughter in Marjorie Van Heerden's illustrations.

I'm not usually a fan of books written by celebrities, but I like the rhythm and beat of Please Baby Please by Spike Lee and Tanya Lewis Lee. The illustrations by Kadir Nelson always make me laugh and empathize with the parents. It's available in hardcover and paperback too.

Babies love to look at pictures of other babies, and there are a number of books that do that extremely well. If you take a look at the various board books that show baby faces, you'll find a rainbow of beautiful faces.

Helen Oxenbury has four wonderfully simple and adorable books: Tickle Tickle, All Fall Down, Clap Hands and Say Goodnight.

Take a look at the delightful Everywhere Babies by Susan Meyers. I love Marla Frazee's playful illustrations. Also, there's Roberta Grobel Intrater's Baby Faces series. For an international perspective, look for Global Babies by the Global Fund for Children.

If you're not familiar with the authors Andromeda mentioned above, Jabari Asim's books are great: Whose Toes are Those? and Whose Knees are These? And check out Andrea and Brian Pinkney's Family Celebration Books: Pretty Brown Face, Watch Me Dance, I Smell Honey and Shake, Shake, Shake.

I've had a particularly tough time finding Asian American characters in board books (except for books of baby faces.) Hopefully, someone like Grace Lin will get into the act.

Thanks for getting me started. I'd love to see additions to this list. Does anyone have suggestions?

Fun with board books

Posted by Susan on May 20, 2009 at 12:00 AM in Board Books, Recommendations

Picture book author Mo Willems writes that "books aren't temples; they're playgrounds. They're meant to be played."

Since I talked last week about picture books that didn't turn gracefully into board books, it seems only fair to show the other side of the coin. I picked these two books because I think they are successful adaptations, and also because they're lots of fun to play with.

Good Night, Gorilla by Peggy Rathmann

The spare text and lush illustrations make this book a surefire winner. You could read this book again and again and still not discover everything that makes it so special. Here's a few fun things to look for in this deceptively simple book.

On the first page, under a crescent moon, there's a pink balloon wrapped around the door of the gorilla's cage with a banana attached to the bottom of the string. The mouse gnaws a hole in the string and releases the balloon, but he takes the banana with him. Can you find the mouse and banana on every page? How about the pink balloon? Or the moon?

(Note: it's easier to find the objects in the hardcover or paperback editions because they are bigger, but it's possible to find them in the board book too.)

The color of each key matches the color of each animal's cage. (For example, the gorilla's cage is orange, so it is opened with an orange key.) Once the cage is opened, the key stays in the lock. The zoo keeper's wife collects all the keys when she locks the animals back in their cages. When she gets back into bed, you can see the ring of keys on the floor.

Each animal has a doll in their cage (with the exception of the lion, who has a bone.) My favorite is the elephant who has Babar lying on the floor of his cage. And, there's a well known Sesame Street character in the armadillo's enclosure.

As the animals walk through the hallway in the zoo keeper's house, take a close look at the walls. All of the family photos have the zoo animals in them. And take a look at the photograph on the zoo keeper's bedside table. (You can see it best on the last page). It's a picture of the zoo keeper, his wife and the gorilla.

Aside from all of that, one of the things I like about this book is that there are so many different ways to read it. You can narrate what's happening in the story. Or not. You can make up silly animal voices when they all say good night. Or not. You can spend the whole time looking for the hidden objects. Or not. The book is your oyster.

Freight Train by Donald Crews

Don't be fooled into thinking that this Caldecott Honor book is simply a list of parts of a train. The magic comes in the second half. The train speeds through the book and makes the reader feel they are really watching it go by.

This book translates well into the smaller format and no illustrations were harmed to make the board book.

Try playing with it. Make train sounds while reading it. Or sing it. Or clap your hands to the beat of this extremely rhythmic book. Or let your child show you the colors on each page. Or count the railroad cars. The possibilities are endless.

Now that I've got you looking for hidden things in books, take a closer look at the tender and the engine. 1978 on the side of the tender refers to the year the book was published. The letters N & A on the black steam engine stand for the initial of the authors' two daughters: Amy and Nina.

For more ways to have fun with books, check out the great suggestions in the Mo Willems article I quoted above.

Looking for more on board books? Stay tuned.

Board Books: Susan

Posted by Susan on May 13, 2009 at 12:06 AM in Board Books

So, you can't wait to start reading to your baby. But your audience tends eat everything they can get their hands on including the books you're trying to read.

Not a problem, board books are the answer! They are smaller, durable, and should stand up to the average book-eating child. They're perfect for babies and toddlers, right? Well, the answer tends to vary.

Typically when hardcover books are reformatted into board books, they are abridged and changed from the original. Not every picture book transfers to a board book edition gracefully or effectively.

The board book version of Guess How Much I Love You by Sam McBratney cuts out many of the original illustrations and combines several pictures together. The hardcover edition is much easier to read and the pacing works far better.

Chicka Chicka abc is an abridgement of the wonderful Chicka Chicka Boom Boom. The poor lowercase letters never recover from their fall from the coconut tree the way they do in the original. Plus, we never get to meet the uppercase letters.

But all adaptations aren't bad. Goodnight Moon makes a delightful board book that preserves all the charm of the original. Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do You See? has just the right mixture of white space, rhyme and repetition to be a great board book for babies.

Also, there are many wonderful board books that were written as board books from the start. Sandra Boynton is an author that writes almost exclusively in board book format, with funny, effective, and enjoyable results.

Fuzzy Fuzzy Fuzzy: a touch, skritch & tickle book is one of my favorite examples, because it's truly written for babies. It's slightly larger than typical board books, which makes it easier for babies to see and turn the pages. The pictures are simple, bright and straightforward. There's something to touch or feel on every page, which is a big hit with babies. And best of all, it's funny, something Sandra Boynton was able to accomplish with a mere 26 words.

The version I own currently looks quite different from the publisher's picture. (That's just the outside, the inside looks worse). Which goes to show you, even board books can't always withstand the love and rough handling of a baby.

I'm going to be posting a longer list of board book recommendations, but first I want to know which board books you like. Are there particular authors you enjoy? Are there board books your children are fascinated with?