This Is What Happens!

As far as I'm concerned, there are few things I enjoy more than attending a topnotch children's literature conference/festival/institute. From Thursday evening through early Sunday afternoon, I was having a grand old time at Food, Glorious Food!, the 2007 Children's Literature Institute at Simmons College in Boston.

Every time I attend one of these events I just can't help myself. I say I'm only going to buy a few books...but I'm a glutton for children's literature. Here's a sampling of the "few" books I got that were written and/or illustrated by presenters at the institute--and by fellow blogger Leo Landry.

LEO LANDRY

DAVID MACAULAY

RICHARD MICHELSON

ALICE HOFFMAN

ANGELA JOHNSON

KADIR NELSON

MATTHEW REINHART

ARTHUR YORINKS

SY MONTGOMERY

That's just a sampling of the books I brought home.

I hope to post briefly about the institute later this week. Be forewarned--I take very few notes...and my memory isn't what it used to be.

Poetry Friday: A Fairy Tale Poem

When I was an elementary classroom teacher, I did an extensive unit on folklore. I like the old fairy tales and folktales--not the sanitized versions, but the traditional retellings, including the "grim" Grimm tales in which Snow White's stepmother dances to her death in hot iron shoes...and the nasty stepsisters of Ashputtle (Cinderella) get their eyes pecked out by birds.

I also enjoyed reading modern humorous picture book versions of old tales to my students when I was a school librarian. To name a few of the books I read: Falling for Rapunzel by Leah Wilcox, Goldie and the Three Bears by Diane Stanley, Henny Penny by Jane Wattenberg, The True Story of the Three Little Pigs and The Frog Prince Continued by Jon Scieszka, and The Wolf Who Cried Boy by Bob Hartman.

With these old tales in mind, I selected the following poem for this Poetry Friday. I hope you like it.


Immortality
Lisel Mueller

In Sleeping Beauty's castle
the clock strikes one hundred years
and the girl in the tower returns to the
world.
So do the servants in the kitchen,
who don't even rub their eyes.
The cook's right hand, lifted
an exact century ago,
completes its downward arc
to the kitchen boy's left ear;
the boy's tensed vocal cords
finally let go
the trapped, enduring whimper,
the fly, arrested mid-plunge
above the strawberry pie,
fulfills its abiding mission
and dives into the sweet, red glaze.


You can read the rest of the poem here at Poetry 180.

Food, Glorious Food!

I'll be spending the next few days at the Children's Literature Institute, Food, Glorious Food!, at Simmons College in Boston. According to the brochure:

The summer symposium and institute seek to satisfy our appetite for reading and talking about fine books for children and young adults. Food, Glorious Food! will also consider the way food operates in books for children and young adults beyond physical sustenance.

Here's a list of the guest speakers: Marc Aronson, Natalie Babbitt, Marina Budhos, Jack Gantos, Barry Goldblatt, Alice Hoffman, Polly Horvath, Angela Johnson, David Macaulay, Richard Michelson, Sy Montgomery, Kadir Nelson, Jerry Pinkney, Matthew Reinhart, Deborah Stevenson, Roger Sutton, Nancy Werlin, and Arthur Yorinks.

Not a bad line-up...huh?

I'm not sure I'll post on Poetry Friday. I'll try--but it takes me forever to write my reviews, etc., because I don't have a word processing program on the laptop I'm using. Hope to hear soon about the status of my hard drive and which files were retrieved. Wish me luck!

If I Built a Car

IF I BUILT A CAR

Written & illustrated by Chris Van Dusen

Penguin, 2005

Chris Van Dusen is also the illustrator of the Mercy Watson books written by Kate DiCamillo. His style of illustrating is very much the same in If I Built a Car, which is a recipient of the E. B. White Read Aloud Award.

In the book's author blurb, Van Dusen tells readers that he "has always been intrigued by glimpses of the future found in the 1950s and '60s issues of Popular Science magazine. Headlines would read The Car of Tomorrow!, and fantastic artwork might show sleek machines zooming down 'magnetic highways.'" Van Dusen's artwork in If I Built a Car certainly transported me back to the 1950s. It reminded me of the glimpses of the future we saw in magazines and on television back then. I'd like to note that I asked my husband to read the book last night and give me his opinion. My husband, who used to read Popular Science when he was a kid, loved the book!

If I Built a Car isn't a story with a beginning, middle, and end. It's a book written in verse in which a young boy relates to his father the kind of car that he would like to design and build. It's a book about using one's imagination and having dreams.

About the Book: Jack, the young narrator, tells his dad what his "future" car will be like while they are out driving. Jack explains to his dad what materials the car will be made from, the elements of its design, and all the nifty features it will have.

Here's an excerpt from the book:

You'll see that I've added a lot of neat things:
Plush fender skirts and retractable wings,
Three headlights up front, four taillights in back,
Plus two giant fins like our old Cadillac!
My brand-new design will be curvy and round,
With special jet engines that don't make a sound.
I'll paint it bright colors with accents of chrome
And top it all off with a Plexiglas dome.

The illustration that accompanies this excerpt is a two-page spread that shows what Jack imagines his car will look like. The gouache painting of the huge car is bright and colorful. Through the semi-transparent dome, we can see the outline of shapes. Is that a robot at the wheel? Is that a table lamp? Kids will certainly want to see what's under the dome of Jack's imaginary car.

In addition to the the fins and dome and jet engines and retractable wings, Jack explains that his car will also have a chassis made of polymer gel--his invention--that will prevent the car from getting dented if it should hit something. Some of the other features of his auto include a couch, a fish tank, a fireplace, a pool beneath a sliding floor, an instant snack bar, and (yes) a robot to steer the vehicle when the driver gets sleepy! But...wait...that's not all! The fenders of Jack's car will let it float on water like a catamaran. The car will also be able to submerge so the driver and passengers can investigate underwater. And the best feature of all?

Last but not least, the best feature of all
Comes down to a button that's shiny and small.
Push it and then, in the wink of an eye,
The car will take off! We'll be up in the sky!

I think Van Dusen's colorful retro-style illustrations are a perfect complement to his rhyming text. Even really young children who can't read could have a grand time studying the pictures of Jack's futuristic car. The front and back endpapers are filled with Jack's labeled sketches of his car's design. They'd be a great inspiration for young artists.

I know I would have loved this book when I was young. I think any kid who is a daydreamer would. It's a perfect picture book for kids who are mechanically inclined...for kids who like to draw...for kids who like to build things. It's definitely a great book for budding engineers. I am planning to give If I Built a Car to a grand nephew for summer reading. I bet he'll be inspired to design his own car of the future!


Bet you'd like to see the illustration of Jack's instant snack bar! Just click here.

Click here to see Jack's car blasting out of the water into the sky.


If I Built a Car is on the 2008 Master List of the Monarch Award sponsored by the Illinois School Library Media Association.

OUT & ABOUT: July 23, 2007

At American Indians in Children's Literature, Debbie Reese has posted a "provocative essay" by Beverly Slapin entitled How to Turn a Traditional Indian Story into a Children's Book (for fun and profit).

Read all about MotherReader's Summer Contest for Cassie Was Here. Check out her follow-up post Summer Poem, Summer Contest, too!

Nancy at Journey Woman is also having a contest to celebrate her first anniversary as a blogger. Check out the contest rules here.

The Poetry Friday Roundup for July 20th is at Mentor Texts & More.

The Play's the Thing! July 2007 Carnival of Children's Literature is at Saints and Spinners.

The next edition of The Edge of the Forest will soon be published.

Check out the new photos and updates in Joyce Sidman's nature journal Nesting with Robins.

Anna Alter, one of the Blue Rose Girls, shows us a work-in-progress from her future book What Can You Do with an Old Red Shoe. See how Anna went from this sketch of a bunny

to this final draft of a full color illustration.

Thanks for letting us in our your artistic process, Anna!