Book Recommendations — Children's

My Test Readers and I are big fans of Mo Willems' books, particularly Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! and Knuffle Bunny. But our current favorite is Leonardo, the Terrible Monster. It is a 2006 ALA Notable Children's Book for Younger Readers, and an excellent book for reading aloud with kids ages 3-6 (although the book itself gives age 36 as the upper limit!)

It's the story of Leonardo, a monster who is terrible at being a scary monster. So, he decides to "find the most scaredy-cat kid in the whole world and scare the tuna salad out of him."

After a great deal of research, he decides that a small boy named Sam is "the perfect candidate." Leonardo sneaks up on Sam and does his best scary monster stuff. Sam cries.

Before Leonardo can enjoy his success, however, Sam quickly gives him a long list of the real reasons he is crying—including stubbing his toe, having to clean bird poop out of his hair, and dealing with his mean big brother.

Leonardo thinks about Sam's situation for a minute, and then he makes "a very big decision. . . . Instead of being a terrible monster, he would become a wonderful friend."

It's a nice message with a wonderful presentation—for example, Sam's woes are all crammed onto one page, and my six year-old Test Reader loves it when I read them all quickly in one big breath. While the illustrations are muted in color, they are vivid in detail and expression.

New t-shirt at Zazzle

We've added another t-shirt at Zazzle.

Click here to go directly to the product page for this shirt.

Book Recomendations — Current Events, Religion

After the terrible school shootings last week at the Amish school house in Paradise, Pennsylvania, I was particularly struck by the contrast between the peaceful, traditional life of the Amish and the violent senseless attack. Rather than use this forum to debate the merits of gun control, I thought it would be more appropriate to recommend some books on Amish life and culture for anyone who is interested in learning more about this unique society.















Donald B. Kraybill, Distinguished College Professor and Senior Fellow at the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College, Pennsylvania, is one of the foremost scholars on contemporary Amish culture, and his book The Riddle of Amish Culture, is the definitive work on understanding the Amish society, culture, and worldview.

In reviewing this book, Paul Boyer, the Editor-in-Chief of The Oxford Companion to United States History, wrote . . .

Beyond the tour buses and stereotypes lies the complex reality of Amish life. In this welcome update of a classic study, Donald B. Kraybill explores with deep insight and solid research the fascinating ways this fast-growing traditional community negotiates its evolving relationship with a modern world of business, tourism, shopping malls, and roller blades. No dry academic book, this beautifully written work exudes the juices of lived experience and conveys its author's profound respect for, and understanding of, Amish life.

John Hostetler, who was raised in the Amish faith, was the founding director of the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College. As the Penn State Press notes, "from the early 1960s to the late 1980s, John A. Hostetler was the world’s premier scholar of Amish life." Christianity Today described his book Amish Society as "The best single book available on the Amish."











I'm currently reading this book—Rumspringa: To Be or Not to Be Amish by Tom Shachtman. It's an interesting look at Amish teenagers going through a specially designated period of life known as "rumspringa"—or "running around." Because the Amish believe that only adults may become church members, many Amish communities allow teenagers a period of freedom from Amish rules in the belief that they will then have the experience necessary to freely choose Amish life.

A surprisingly high number (80 to 90%) do return, and one of Shachtman's goals is to understand what motivates the teens to return to a society that seems, at least to outsiders, extremely restrictive.

Shachtman follows a number of Amish teenagers during this period in their lives, and I've found their stories facinating.













The fourth book I'll recommend is Mary Swander's Out of this World. For health reasons, Swander needed to move to a rural setting where she could grow her own food, and she settled in an Amish community in Iowa. Although the book is more of a personal memoir, Swander's experience of living among the Amish is central to her account of her life in this place.

Book Recommendations — Children's

These two titles—That's not my teddy . . . and That's not my train . . . —are part of series of books by author Fiona Watt and illustrator Rachel Wells. My young Test Readers have all enjoyed exploring the different textures in these books, and while there's not much of a story, the illustrations are bright and the descriptive words Watt uses are much more complicated than those found in a typical "touchy-feely" book—for example, "That's not my dinosaur. It's flippers are too slippery" and "That's my lion! His mane is so shaggy."

Those two lines—with variations depending on the book's subject and the page's texture—are the extent of the story in all books in the series, but my test readers have enjoyed the repetition of the words because it helps them to join in with reading the story.

Many of the books in the series are on "Buy 3, Get 1 Free" sale at Amazon right now. With such a variety of titles, you can probably find at least one or two that will appeal to any 0-2 year old readers you know.

Other titles in the series include:

That's not my bear . . .
That's not my bunny . . .
That's not my car . . .
That's not my dinosaur . . .
That's not my dolly . . .
That's not my dragon . . .
That's not my fairy . . .
That's not my kitten . . .
That's not my lion . . .
That's not my mermaid . . .
That's not my monster . . .
That's not my princess . . .
That's not my puppy . . .
That's not my robot . . .
That's not my snowman . . .
That's not my tractor . . .
That's not my truck . . .

James Maguire interview on "The Daily Show"

James Maguire is the author of American Bee—his account of several contestants who are preparing for the annual Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee. If you enjoyed the documentary Spellbound or Stefan Fatsis's book Word Freak, you will probably enjoy this book too.

New t-shirt at Zazzle — Mark Twain

We have a new t-shirt at Zazzle. The quotation is a little hard to read in this image—"Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society."

Book Recommendations — Children's

Another wonderful book my Six Year Old Test Reader enjoyed this summer is Wolves by Emily Gravett. The story is very simple—a rabbit gets a book on wolves from the library, and in the course of reading the book, the wolf gradually emerges from the book and enjoys a rabbit snack (or perhaps not, if you believe the alternate ending.) The two levels of the story are brought to life in the illustrations—we see both the book the rabbit is reading and the growing presence of the wolf.

I liked the Guardian's summary of the book . . .

Gravett's engagingly self-deprecating wit comes through in the humour of her children's books. Wolves, which tells the tale of a rabbit who reads a book on wolves and gets a nasty surprise at the end (or not, if you read the alternative ending thoughtfully provided for "more sensitive readers"), is full of the sort of wordplay that will appeal to children at the top of the intended age group, while the drawings of the wolves contain just the right amount of storybook menace to send a delicious shiver up the spine of younger ones.

The book won the Kate Greenaway Medal in 2005—a UK award for distinguished illustration in a book for children, and it was shortlisted for the 2005 Nestlé Children's Book Prize for the five and under category (the prize that was won by another book we've recommended—Lost and Found.)

In announcing the list of winners for the Kate Greenaway Medal, the organizers wrote that Wolves is a . . .

. . . real page-turner of a book. The style is spare, but at the same time there is so much in it, and the device whereby the book becomes the book within it is brilliantly employed. The illustrator’s style is totally unique, and the love and attention to detail here is obvious, even down to her having chewed the book herself to get the right effect.

In a review of the book, J. D. Biersdorfer from the New York Times noted . . .

What makes “Wolves” most entertaining, however, is its design. Gravett uses an eye-catching collage of hand-drawn sketches and photography to create a kind of a modern trompe l’oeil effect — complete with 3-D shadows and playful shifts in scale and perspective of the rabbit and the wolves he’s reading about. The bunny reads until he gets to the line “They also enjoy smaller mammals, like beavers, voles and ... rabbits.” A scarred book cover on the next page doesn’t leave much doubt about the harsh reality of the food chain, but for sensitive readers Gravett includes an alternate happy ending of interspecies friendship and shared jam sandwiches.

And no worries that our penguin theme is over—the Guardian hints that Gravett's next book will involve penquins:

In her light-filled attic studio with its stunning view across the rolling South Downs, drawings of penguins seem to fill every surface, evidence of work in progress on book number four.