Picture Book Tuesday

STARTED & FINISHED:

Isadora, Rachel. (1979). Ben's trumpet. New York: Greenwillow/HarperCollins.

[I've looked at this one MANY times while shelving in the jPS section and I'm not AT ALL surprised that it was a Caldecott Honor Book. I LOVE what she's done here, making the jazz musings appear as jagged lines throughout. The black & white illustrations are amazingly detailed and just nail the feeling of listening to a great jazz ensemble. Plus, it's a sweet story of a boy who makes believe that he's playing a trumpet like his idol in the band, and, finally, his idol invites him to learn to play the actual instrument. LOVE this one and can hopefully fit it into a storytime somwhere.]





Stewart, Sarah. (1995). The library. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux.

[Beautifully constructed book about a woman who loves reading so much that the books begin to pile up until her house becomes a library. While it's a bit sad that this woman is the classic "crazy cat lady", the whole layout of the book, complete with David Small's wonderful illustrations - from the end papers as books packed on shelves and the pigeons flying onto the title page, to each page being framed and the little pen illustrations next to the words (oh, and seeing the woman's cat grow up with her...) - is perfectly thought out. I could do without the rhyming text, but the collaboration between Stewart and Small (which extends into a couple of other books) is a magical one. And, what self-respecting children's librarian can resist a tale about the love of reading?]





Brown, Margaret Wise. (2004). Where have you been? New York: HarperCollins.

[Another one that seems tailor-made for a storytime - although, the repetitive form text strays from the "where have you been?" form a few times... I picked this one up because it's got illustrations from my favorites, Leo & Diane Dillon. Their shading and color gradations are just masterful and will hopefully delight (rather than creep out) young ones. The lion wearing shades and playing the saxophone rules.]





Brown, Margaret Wise. (2001). Two little trains. New York: HarperCollins.

[Another one by Margaret Wise Brown with illustrations by Leo & Diane Dillon. While I found some of the text in this one to flow awkwardly, the illustrations fantastic. On the left-hand side of each spread is a depiction of an actual train rolling through the city and countryside while the right-hand side of the spread depicts a toy train in a home going through a comparable setting (i.e. going on a bridge over a river on the left side and riding along the top rim of a bathtub on the other). Again, the Dillions hit it WAY out of the park...]

*