#149
Title: Can You Hear It?
Author: William Lach
Genre: J780.075 Art & Music Junior Literature
Challenges: Read and Review, The 2nd, Whisper in My Ear, Support Your Local Library, PB&J, Young Readers
Rating: A
Published: 2006
CDs/Hours: 1/ 40 minutes
Pages: 39
Dates read: 10/27/11 – 11/30/11

I haven’t been this high on a publication since I can’t remember when. This combination of art and music is the ultimate for teaching kids these subjects. William Lach, Senior Editor, Metropolitan Museum of Art brings together thirteen short works by American and European composers and thirteen pictures by world renowned artists. For example, a Japanese print of a hovering bee by Hiroshige illuminates the trilling flutes in The Flight of the Bumblebee by Rimsky-Korsakov. I was able to get my three and half year old granddaughter to listen for a couple minutes to this excerpt. I can’t wait until she’s a bit older to try this again with her when she can better appreciate every page and every cut from the CD.

In addition is an introduction to musical instruments, and a brief discussion of each artist. The question Can you hear - accompanies each musical selection and asks the reader and listener to hear the various instruments as it relates to the picture. I could just imagine what it would be like to be a student or teacher in such a class and the wonderful assignments unfolding – write a review of a musician, chose an artist and decide what picture would accompany your choice of music. The possibilities are endless.

#148
Title: Their Eyes Were Watching God
Author: Zora Neale Hurston
Read by: Ruby Dee
Genre: Classic Fiction
Challenges: Read and Review, New Author, 52 Books in 52 Weeks, Whisper in My Ear, Support Your Local Library
Rating: B+
Published: 1937
CTs/Hours: 4/7
Dates read: 11/20/11 – 11/30/11

I love what the back cover of the cassette holder says about this book. An American classic, Their Eyes Were Watching God is the luminous and haunting novel about Janie Crawford, a Southern Black woman in the 1930’s, whose journey from a free-spirited girl to a woman of independence and substance has inspired writers and readers for over 70 years.

“This poetic, graceful love story, rooted in Black folk traditions and steeped in mythic realism, celebrates boldly and brilliantly African-American culture and heritage. And in a powerful, mesmerizing narrative, it pays quiet tribute to a Black woman, who, though constricted by the times, still demanded to be heard.”

#147
Title : Oliver and Amanda’s Christmas
Author: Jean Van Leeuwen
Pictures by: Ann Schweninger
Genre: Kid Pic Book
Challenges: Read and Review, PB&J, Young Readers, The 2nd
Rating: B+
Published: 1989
Date read: 11/29/11

Great story about the Pig family who have secrets, buy a Christmas tree, bake cookies, hang stockings and enjoy the magic of Christmas morning. Read and find out - did Oliver get 22 gifts? - what kinds of cookies did they bake? - how big was Oliver’s stocking? - what did Grandmother Pig bring the kids? Reading a book at Tully’s before our Bible Study on Tuesday mornings is the routine these days and one both granddaughter and I equally enjoy.

#146
Title : The Cat in the Hat
Author: Dr. Seuss
Genre: Kid Pic Book
Challenges: Read and Review, PB&J, Young Readers, New Author, Give Poetry a Chance
Rating: B
Published: 1957
Date read: 11/24/11

In rhyme the kids in the story are a bit in awe of the Cat in the Hat -- and, to be sure, it’s a funny situation.

#145
Title : Elliot’s Noisy Night
Author: Andrea Beck
Genre: Kid Pic Book
Challenges: Read and Review, Support Your Local Library, PB&J, Young Readers, The 2nd
Rating: B
Published: 2002
Date read: 11/22/11

Elliot’s been hearing noises after going to bed at night. He asks his friend Beaverton what he knows about it. Beaverton tells him about the refrigerator and furnace. Yet the noises keep coming and before Elliot knows it, all his friends are also hearing the noises. You’ve got to read this story to find out how it ends. Truly charming!

#144
Title: The Forgotten Garden
Author: Kate Morton
Read by: Caroline Lee
Genre: Fiction
Challenges: Read and Review, New Author, 52 Books in 52 Weeks, Whisper in My Ear, Support Your Local Library
Rating: B
Published: 2008
CDs/Hours: 16/20 3/4
Dates read: 10/39/11 – 11/19/11

This charming book speaks to all ages – young adults, mothers and grandmothers – all will identify with Nell, Cassandra, Eliza. The story spans over 100 years of history – from before the 1913 voyage of Nell to Australia – it covers the lives of Nell’s grandmother Adeline, Adeline’s daughter Rose up to 2005 when Cassandra, Nell’s granddaughter researches the family to learn the truth about its secrets. It’s a true page-turner. And I loved every minute of it.

#143
Title : The Spirit Level
Author: Seamus Heaney
Genre: Poetry (821.914)
Challenges: Read and Review, Support Your Local Library, Give Poetry a Chance, The 2nd
Rating: B+
Published: 1996
Date read: 10/30/11 - 11/17/11

Winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature and editor of The Essential Wordsworth, poet Seamus Heaney has woven a patchwork of 40 free-style pieces that comprise this small, 82 page volume. Much of his Irish heritage shines through and takes us on a journey to The Gravel Walks where we see ’men in dungarees, like captive shades, mixed concrete’; we sit in the Poet’s Chair and feel ‘the way the air behind them‘s winged and full‘; ‘sailed beyond ourselves’ on The Swing and hear ‘all night behind the corpse house’ A Dog Was Crying Tonight in Wicklow Also. At the Wellhead we meet the sightless Rosie Keenan who ‘let us touch her braille in book’. All our senses become alive when Heaney speaks.

#142
Title : Over in the Meadow
Author: John Langstaff
Illustrations by: Feodor Rojankovsky
Genre: Kid Pic Book
Challenges: Read and Review, Support Your Local Library, PB&J, Young Readers, The 2nd
Rating: B
Published: 1957
Date read: 11/15/11

While we’ve read this book before, it was adapted by another author. With this version and as with his Frog-Went-A-Courtin’ Langstaff has music at the end for how the song is sung in ten verses, each verse represents a number such as old mother red fox and her little foxes two and old mother spider and her little spiders nine. The drawings by Feodor Rojankovsky are delightful.

#141
Title : Kipper’s Snowy Day
Author: Mick Inkpen
Genre: Kid Pic Book
Challenges: Read and Review, Support Your Local Library, PB&J, Young Readers, The 2nd
Rating: B
Published: 1996
Date read: 11/15/11

Kipper is back -- this time on a snowy day with his friend, Tiger. They play and cavort in the snow! And have a ball. Porter wanted to keep the book another day so we’re keeping it until she’s back again next week. We may even have snow by then, too!

#140
Title: A Light in the Attic
Author: Shel Silverstein
Genre: Kid Poetry Book
Challenges: Read and Review, PB&J, Young Reader, To Be Read, Read Your Own Books, Give Poetry a Chance
Rating: B
Published: 1981
Dates Read: 10/28/11 - 11/5/11
Pages: 168

As usual Silverstein masters the art of combining his whimsical drawings with equally charming, outrageous poems. From the first poem, A Light in the Attic, to the last, This Bridge – our poet knows how to tickle our funny bone and simultaneously settle in our psyche. A classic!

#139
Title: The Castle
Author: Franz Kafka
Read by: Alan Corduner
Genre: Classic Fiction
Challenges: Read and Review, The 2nd, 52 Books in 52 Weeks, Whisper in My Ear, Support Your Local Library
Rating: B-
Published: 1928
CDs/Hours: 10/13
Dates read: 10/11/11 – 11/4/11

Described as darkly bizarre, The Castle was the last book Kafka wrote and didn’t finish. He asked a friend to destroy his work – not just The Castle but all the things he’d written. His friend didn’t follow instructions and even commented about how he thought The Castle would end. It sounded plausible to me.

From the back cover – “A land surveyor, known only as K(arr), arrives at a small village permanently covered in snow and dominated by a castle to which access seems permanently denied. K(arr)’s attempt to discover why he has been called constantly run up against the peasant villagers, who are in thrall to the absurd bureaucracy that keeps the castle shut, and the rigid hierarchy of power among the self-serving bureaucrats themselves. But in this strange wilderness, there is passion, tenderness and considerable humour.”

#138
Title: Ten Little Rabbits
Author: Virginia Grossman
Illustrator: Sylvia Long
Genre: Kid Picture Book
Challenges: Read and Review, Support Your Local Library, New Author, PB&J, Young Reader
Rating: B
Published: 1991
Date Read: 11/1/11

I love it when the book combines not just story and art but factual information about the subject as Grossman and Long have done with this in counting-rhyme. Each number depicts a traditional custom such as rain dances, hunting, and smoke signals. For example, “One lonely traveler riding on the plain” shows a Sioux, one of the plains tribes riding on a travois with a shaggy dog pulling the rabbit clothed in a Navajo blanket. Although each number represents a separate tribe, the rabbits wear a different Navajo blanket. A glossary tells us a bit about ten tribes of North America.

#137
Title: Santa Baby
Adapted & Illustrated by: Janie Bynum
Genre: Kid Picture Book
Challenges: Read and Review, Support Your Local Library, New Author, PB&J, Young Reader
Rating: B
Published: 2005
Date Read: 11/1/11

This is one of those stories based upon a song so in the back of the book are the words and music. It’s a sweet story that granddaughter chose on her own one day at the library. She loves to read the books to herself and hold the book as though she were reading to and showing the pictures to her bear. The baby is dressed as Santa and helps his mother decorate the tree, tie bows on gifts and cut stars out of dough for cookies. It’s almost that time of year!