{"id":431,"date":"2010-09-07T19:52:22","date_gmt":"2010-09-08T02:52:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/riftraft.jayandcarissa.com\/?p=431"},"modified":"2010-09-07T19:52:22","modified_gmt":"2010-09-08T02:52:22","slug":"book-reviews-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/riftraft.jayandcarissa.com\/?p=431","title":{"rendered":"book reviews #2"},"content":{"rendered":"

i wrote a few book reviews way back when<\/a> (wow!\u00a0\u00a0 he looks so tiny in those pictures!) and it’s high time I give a shout out to some more favorites that have appeared in our nightly book rotation-so-mama-doesn’t-get-bored stack.<\/p>\n

All the World<\/a> <\/em>by Liz Garton Scanlon, illus by Marla Frazee (who received a Caldecott Honor Medal for this book)<\/p>\n

I LOVE the illustrations in this book.\u00a0 I love Marla Frazee in general (see Everywhere Babies<\/em> reviewed in last book review post), but this one reminds me of the best of my favorite childhood illustrator, Hilary Knight (who is a MAN!\u00a0 Did you know that?).\u00a0 There’s a subtle running storyline in the pictures and you can search for different people who crop up throughout the book and think about the relationships between those people.\u00a0 There’s some lovely interracial relationships depicted and the illustrations include a pair of women (at least one of whom is gray-haired) who ride a tandem bicycle through many of the pages, a Hispanic-looking grandfather and his three grandchildren, a farmer’s market, a couple of mamas carrying their babies in slings…. And the words are this beautiful poet with juicy words that end with the couplet:\u00a0 “Hope and peace and love and trust\/ all the world is all of us” and although I don’t think it was written to be a tear-jerker, I had to read the book several times before I could get through the end without getting choked up.<\/p>\n

Tumble me Tumbily<\/em><\/a> by Karen Baicker, illus by Sam Williams<\/p>\n

I first encountered this book as a series of board books at my mom’s house.\u00a0 I think I’d seen them before at the library, but they hadn’t caught my eye and they were rhyme-y<\/em> which I hated before Baby Dude came along (ah.\u00a0 I get it now.\u00a0 RHYME-Y is GOOD!\u00a0 But only if it’s GOOD rhyme-y).\u00a0 Anyway, this book is actually better as a hardcover than a board book because for some reason the board book editor thought it was necessary to add the phrase “The End” to the end of each of the board books and it always felt very … abrupt.\u00a0 and awkward.\u00a0 Once again, I’ll start by saying how much I love the illustrations in this book because there’s such a variety of skin tones!\u00a0 There’s even one dreamy picture in the first section that looks like it might be a Hispanic kid kissing a Caucasian mama, but some versions of the book are more contrasted than others so I’m not sure.\u00a0 Maybe that’s the point.\u00a0 Anyway, I like it.\u00a0 I especially love the two-page spreads that introduce each of the three sections of the book (“Tumble me tumbily” “Yum Tummy Tickly” and “Snuggle Me Snuggly”)–they are so bright and happy and cheerful, but not in an obnoxious way at all.\u00a0 The text is pretty good rhyme-y, but there were a few phrases that tripped me up the first few times I read them until I figured out where to put the emPHAsis.\u00a0 It’s a nice way to move from morning-time awakeness to eating time to sleepy time.<\/p>\n

Baby Bear’s Chairs<\/a>\/Books<\/a>\/Big Dreams<\/a> <\/em>by Jane Yolen, illus by Melissa Sweet<\/p>\n

This is a trio of books (dare I hope that more might someday be in the works?) about a cute little bear and his bear family.\u00a0 I finally figured out the other day why Melissa Sweet’s illustrations looked so familiar–she’s done lots of design work for the game company, Ee-Boo and I’m always so tempted by their games and products, mostly because of the illustrations by Melissa Sweet.\u00a0 In these three books, she’s created a world that I’d like to crawl into and live for a little while.\u00a0 The bears have great decorating taste and fashion sense and baby bear has the cutest favorite stuffie–a honeybee!\u00a0 And then there’ the text, written by the wonderful Jane Yolen.\u00a0 Again, these books RHYME, but the rhythm and meter are impeccable and the storylines are super cute too.\u00a0 Especially in Baby Bear’s Big Dreams–all about what he’s going to do when he’s older “because that’s what big bears always do”–totally reminds me of some of my favorite books as a kid (Hey Mom, remember Molly Moves Out<\/a>?).\u00a0 Love these books.<\/p>\n

One Naked Baby<\/a> <\/em>written and illus by Maggie Smith<\/p>\n

SUCH a cute book about a little boy who starts out naked right after a bath, then he visits “two fat cats” who look an awful lot like our two fat cats and then eventually he gets dressed and goes out into the spring day, splashes in some mud puddles and I’ll let you guess where the book ends up.\u00a0 Once again, great rhyming (I’ve got this one pretty much memorized.\u00a0 To me, that’s one mark of a well-written rhyme.) and cute little storyline, but it’s the illustrations that make me drool and want to hop inside the book.\u00a0 Seriously.\u00a0 I’ve been contemplating sewing myself a skirt just like the one the mama in this book is wearing.\u00a0 Oh, and maybe also one of the toy penguins lying around on the floor on one of the pages.\u00a0 I also love that the house in the book makes no attempt to hide the clutter, but instead of tilting stacks of junkmail and wads of dirty tissues like my house has, it’s littered with the cutest toys and inquisitive kitties!<\/p>\n

When Baby Dude gets old enough to start having opinions about the books we read, I’ll be sure to include his viewpoint, but for now, I’ll just assume that since he leans back into me and watches the pages go by when we read them before bed, occasionally patting the pages if he really likes the illustration, that he likes these books too.\u00a0 Of course, he’s a bit at my mercy for the moment.\u00a0 Lucky me.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

i wrote a few book reviews way back when (wow!\u00a0\u00a0 he looks so tiny in those pictures!) and it’s high time I give a shout out to some more favorites that have appeared in our nightly book rotation-so-mama-doesn’t-get-bored stack. All the World by Liz Garton Scanlon, illus by Marla Frazee (who received a Caldecott Honor […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-431","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/riftraft.jayandcarissa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/riftraft.jayandcarissa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/riftraft.jayandcarissa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/riftraft.jayandcarissa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/riftraft.jayandcarissa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=431"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/riftraft.jayandcarissa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":432,"href":"http:\/\/riftraft.jayandcarissa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/431\/revisions\/432"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/riftraft.jayandcarissa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=431"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/riftraft.jayandcarissa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=431"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/riftraft.jayandcarissa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=431"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}