Reading My Library

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A Repentant Reader

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I officially repent of all that I have ever said against children’s counting books.

When done right, counting books can be delightful, as evidenced by Ten Little Wishes: A Baby Animal Counting Book, Arlene Alda’s 1,2,3: What do you see?, and now Lena Anderson’s Tea for Ten

Lena Anderson Picture Books

Tea for Ten tells the rhyming story of Hedgehog, feeling lonely, sitting at her table, wishing that her friends would drop by so “she wouldn’t be just ONE”. Thankfully, some of her friends do stop in–and Hedgehog prepares a sweet tea for ten.

Lena Anderson’s picture books have an endearing cast of characters that might be stuffed animals or might be real animals, but are cute and cuddly either way.

Both Hedgehog, Pig, and the Sweet Little Friend and Hedgehog’s Secret are entertaining and have delightful illustrations–but Lena Anderson’s crowning glory (in my humble opinion) is Tick-Tock.

Tick-Tock includes the same familiar characters as Anderson’s other books–but this is another teaching book. In fact, it’s a counting book of sorts.

The story begins at one o’clock, with Uncle Will taking a string of youngsters to the park. At two, they climb a tree. At three, someone falls off the tree. At four… And so the story goes. At seven o’clock, the kids get ready for bed. Every hour afterward, at least one youngster wakes up for one reason or another–until at last the clock strikes twelve and Uncle Will falls asleep in exhaustion.

Like the rest of the books, Tick-Tock is told in rhyme. It’s a short book, but fun–and the illustrations are perfect. Each page has a clock face on it, with the hands pointed at the appropriate time and the numeral for the hour beside it. This is a perfect book for teaching numbers and the basics of telling time.

Reading My Library

For more comments on children’s books (counting and otherwise), check out Carrie’s blog Reading My Library, which chronicles her and her children’s trip through the children’s section of their local library.


Categories Reading My Library

This book’s a blast!

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Romeo and Lou, a penguin and a polar bear, play together in the snow, molding themselves a space ship for imaginary travels.

When their spaceship takes off, they unexpectedly find themselves in the midst of an alarmingly unusual forest.

Romeo and Lou Blast Off

They’re stymied by unfamiliar sites until they finally see something that looks right–another polar bear (actually a small white dog) and penguin (actually a rather large man in a suit.) They ask for directions–and well, things don’t really go so well.

They meet some walruses (workmen) busy “ice fishing” (actually using a jackhammer on a road). They find another space ship (mini-van) and get inside–only to be chased out by a school of angry fish (children coming out of the swimming pool.) A shark (policeman) chases them all the way over a bridge and onto a ship, where Romeo and Lou build themselves a new spaceship and sail home.

Reading My Library

Derek Anderson’s Romeo and Lou Blast Off absolutely enthralled me with its funny juxtaposition of everyday life and polar animals. The story itself is imaginative, even fantastical–but the real treat is seeing the walruses, the shark, the penguin, etc. all just everyday men that you never would have really noticed…well, they really do look rather like walruses, sharks, and the like. It’s uncanny!

If you happen to be able to find a copy of Romeo and Lou Blast Off, I encourage you to pick it up. You won’t be sorry.


Categories Reading My Library

A delightful tale, for sure!

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What happens when one silly chicken loses a feather and giggles “The more I pluck myself, the more gorgeous I look”?

Hans Christian Andersen's For sure! For Sure!Not much, except that another chicken hears and tells her best friend.

And Momma Owl hears the chicken friends discussing it and rushes off to tell the nice owl next door.

Who then shouts the news to the pigeon house below.

The story spreads and spreads until the coop where the silly chicken lives hears the dreadful story. Apparently five chickens had all plucked themselves bare trying to prove that they were pining away for the rooster. Then they had pecked each other to death!

Of course the story was true–everyone said so, for sure.

The original silly chicken was an upstanding citizen and roundly renounced the goings on, not realizing that she was the chicken who had started the whole rumor.

Hans Christian Andersen's For sure! For Sure!Hans Christian Andersen’s For sure! For sure! translated by Mus White and illustrated by Stefan Czernecki is a timeless tale about gossip and how rumours spread. I had never heard this particular tale of Andersen’s and was delighted to discover it in my trek through the children’s section of my local library.

The story was told just as stories for children should be told: using straightforward language without overly simplifying sentence structure. The story never once use the word gossip or rumors–but it makes its point clear nonetheless. Many an author could take a note from Andersen’s book and show instead of telling.

Reading My LibraryThe bright, simple illustrations perfectly complemented the text, indicating the delight the many birds were taking in sharing their news with yet another person.

This picture book has definitely got my thumbs up! For sure!

Categories Rants, Reading My Library

Universal Rights?

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Reading My LibraryDisclaimer: The book I describe and rant about within this page was read during my endeavor to read every book in Eiseley library and while following along with Carrie’s Reading My Library project. However, the contents of this post are more a political/social rant than a book review. Just letting you know.

I’d never heard of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (adopted by the UN in 1948) until I found a children’s version published in my local library. The book was entitled We are All Born Free: The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Pictures.

I had relatively low expectations of the book. After all, it’s an ideological children’s book written by a committee (Amnesty International). That doesn’t exactly make for soaring prose or beautiful language. In fact, it usually means it’ll be boring as all get out and clunkier than your first car. And so it was.

But that wasn’t what bothered me. What bothered me was the ideology contained within the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (which I have now taken a look at, thanks to this book.)

We are all born free

I didn’t have a problem with statements 1 and 2, dumbed down for children as “We are all born free and equal. We all have our own thoughts and ideas. We should be treated in the same way. These rights belong to everybody, whatever our differences.” Okay.

So too, the third statement: “We all have the right to life, and to live in freedom and safety.”

The fourth statement, against slavery? Statement five against torture? Yep.

A right to equal protection under the law? Sure. I’ll allow habeas corpus for all. (Statements 6-11)

After this, the statements get a bit sketchier. A few I don’t mind (although I’m not sure they’re followed anywhere–even in the US). Equal rights for males and females. Right to your own property (and against seizure without good cause.) Right to believe whatever we’d like. Right to make up our own minds. Right to speak our minds. Right to peacefully assemble. Right to vote. Okay. I’ll grant these.

But right to a home? Right to enough money to live on? Right to medical care? Right to ART? Right to a job? Right to a vacation? Right to a good life? Right to a free education? Right to learn a career?

Are you serious? In my mind, these things aren’t RIGHTS–these things are things you earn. You work to own a home. You work to earn money. You work to get medical care. You enjoy art because you choose to and you pay for it. You take a vacation when and if your employer allows it–or you quit your job and live with the consequences. You pay for your own education. You choose to do whatever it takes to learn a career. These things aren’t rights. They’re privileges that are earned. Who comes up with this stuff?

We often excuse such blather as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights because we’d love it if this Utopian society it describes existed. We’d love it if everyone had a free education, if everyone enjoyed the good life (Come to Nebraska–we are “The Good Life”), if everyone had access to art, if everyone had a roof over their heads and enough money to live on. We’d love it. We want that to happen. I want that to happen.

But just because something is desirable does not make it a right.

The noun right means something due to a person or community by law, tradition, or nature. If we are to modify the noun right with the adjective universal (which means of, relating to, or affecting the entire world or all within the world), then we must strike out the words “law” and “tradition”, since there is no universal law or tradition. We must define a universal right as something due to a person or community by nature (although I would argue that the modern “nature” is less appropriate than America’s founding father’s explanation of the source of inalienable rights: our Creator.)

In other words, universal rights are things that are due to people for the sole reason of their being people, regardless of who they are or what they do. Notice that term “due”? Universal rights are things that are owed to every person, regardless of their condition. They are the things that we all have a moral obligation to give to one another.

Most of these things listed as “rights” by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights are nice things. Wouldn’t we all love to have a free education? Wouldn’t we all love to have a roof over our heads? Wouldn’t we all love to have a job? Wouldn’t we all love to have enough money to live on? Wouldn’t we all love a vacation? Sure. (At least, I would love to.)

But the question is, do I have a moral obligation to give everyone else in the world a free education? Do I have a moral obligation to give them a roof over their heads? Do I have a moral obligation to give them a job? Do I have a moral obligation to give them enough money to live on? Do I have a moral obligation to give them a vacation? If those things truly are universal rights, than I am morally obligated to do all those things for every other person.

But I’m not. I don’t have to give everyone else an education, a roof over their heads, a job, enough money to live on, or a vacation. Those aren’t universal rights–things owed to everyone for mere virtue of their existence.

Universal rights means that I have an obligation to not kill anyone else (they have a universal right to life). I have an obligation to treat others justly (they have a universal right to equal protection under the law and habeas corpus). I have an obligation to not enslave or torture others. I have an obligation to not steal others’ property. These are universal rights–things due to all people by nature.

The rest? Many are nice to have but not necessarily defensible from a natural or moral point of view. It’s nice to belong to a country–but do I have a moral obligation to give another belonging in a country? It’s nice to have a “good life”–but do I have a moral obligation to give you a “good life”? No, not really. (I might, however, have a moral obligation to not give you a bad life–or to not interfere with your pursuit of a good life.)

Others are not only indefensible from a natural or moral point of view, but are actually contrary to other, clearly defensible universal rights. If everyone has a right to a free education, who pays for it? If everyone has a right to a home, who provides it? If everyone has a right to enough money to live on, who gives them this money? If everyone has a right to medical care, who provides this care? These things are not free. They all have a cost, either in time or in money or both. If these are universal rights, that indicates that they are due to all people REGARDLESS of what they do or do not do. Which means that the only way to ensure that everyone gets what is “owed” to them under this definition of universal rights is to compel another person to give it to them either by laboring under compulsion (slavery) or by giving up their possessions under compulsion (a form of stealing). Yet, slavery and stealing are clearly recognized as violations of true universal human rights.

In the midst of feel-goods about free medical care and education and homes and jobs and money, we forget that for every privilege we wrongly define as a right, we take away another true right.

For the sake of preserving human rights, let’s let our list of rights be short–but strictly observed.

Categories Reading My Library

The Twelve Dancing Princesses Princes Knights

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Reading My Library

The Twelve Dancing Princesses was not a fairy tale that figured heavily into my childhood. Mostly I remember either the fairy tales found in our red-covered copy of Andersen’s Fairy Tales or the Disneyfied or otherwise pop-culturified tales found in videos and Golden books.

My first real exposure to the story occurred this last February, when I read Jessica Day George’s Princess of the Midnight Ball. I loved the story. I loved how George told the story. I still haven’t read Grimm’s version–so I have no idea how it compares.

I haven’t been actively seeking out Twelve Dancing Princesses stories–but I managed to stumble across one this last week in my run through the picture book section of my local library.

And, boy, is this one a STORY!

Debbie Allen’s Brothers of the Knight is an imaginative retelling of The Twelve Dancing Princesses–except that instead of twelve princesses, there are twelve brothers–the sons of the Reverend Knight.

Reverend Knight is a hard-working black preacher in Harlem, taking care of his congregation and his twelve sons–Brooke, Bobby, Joe, Snacky, Gerald and Jackie, Teeny Tiny Tappin’ Theo, Lazy Leo, Big fat Raoul, Billie and Willie, and Michael (head of the clan, a ladies’ man). He tried to keep the twelve under check but without a wife (there’s no indication of what happened to her–I presume she must have died) he’s somewhat at a loss. He’s gone through dozens of nannies and housekeepers, but none of them can solve the problem that plagues the house–every morning, the twelve young Knight’s shoes would be threadbare and worn.

One Sunday after church, Reverend Knight goes into his office and prays for help with his sons–and when he gets home, a woman name Sunday is waiting on the steps. She wants the job of housekeeper. She’s come to help with the boys.

But can Sunday succeed in solving the mystery when all the other housekeepers and nannies have failed?

Turns out there are a lot of secrets in the Knight house–and Sunday’s determined to uncover them all. Who knows but she’ll have the Reverend Knight dancing before the tale is told!

I adored this rendition. It’s quirky, it’s fun, and it’s all about dancing (Sorry, I should have warned you that there’d be spoilers.) The story itself is fun enough–but add in that it’s narrated by the family dog and you’ve got utter hilarity.

Check this one out next time you’re at your library–and if they don’t have it, get them to order it. It’s a BLAST!!

Categories Reading My Library

Always Room for One More

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Reading My Library

I grew up in an 1100 square foot (+ unfinished basement) home with my parents and 6 siblings.

We barely managed to fit the dining room table into the dining room–and barely managed to fit ourselves around the table.

But despite all this, we regularly had family, friends, and neighbors over to play or be babysat–and to enjoy dinner with us.

I remember aunts or friends asking Mom if she was really sure that she wanted to babysit their kids. Mom would reply “What’s one or two more?”

I loved that attitude–and still love it–“What’s one or two more?”

No matter how squished we were in the first place, one or two or three more was still plenty do-a-ble.

Always Room for One More
Always Room for One More by Sorche Nic Leodhas is a children’s story I can definitely identify with. Based on an old Scottish song, the tale tells the story of “Lachie MacLachlan and his good wife, and his bairns to the number of ten.” They live in a little house, but Lachie declares that there’s “always room for one more.”

He invites in a tailor, a sailor, a Piper, a shepherd, soldiers, and more. The whole house is full with dancing and singing, and always with room for one more–until the poor little house simply bursts. Literally.

Poor little house. Poor Lachie MacLachlan. Poor Missus MacLachlan and ten MacLachlan bairns.

Except maybe not.

The many dozens of people to whom they’ve shown hospitality pitch together to rebuild their house–a new house, twice as big as the old–where there’s “always room for one more.”

I’m not precisely sure why this story is filed in my local library as jP Alger (indicating author name Alger.) The text is copyrighted by a Leclaire G. Alger–but I see no indication of who this Alger is or why he or she’s got the copyright. At any rate, it’s filed under A, so I’ve read it along with my books by author “A”.

The back of the book states that the story is an old Scottish popular song that has been handed down at least four generations in the author Sorche Nic Leodhas’s family. Leodhas has half-translated the work into words that can be understood by American readers–but has left in enough Scottish phrases to make the tale’s roots clear.

This was a delightful tale that I enjoyed very much. I definitely recommend that you look it up.

Categories Reading My Library

Artist Arlene Alda

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Reading My Library
For my second time in two weeks, I am forced to squelch my natural dislike of counting books and to recommend yet another “1,2,3” book. For this last batch of children’s picture books from my library reading challenge included yet another counting book–and a surprisingly good one, at that.

Arlene Alda&039;s 1 2 3
Arlene Alda’s 1 2 3: What do you see? is not your typical counting book–but it is typical of Arlene Alda’s artistic and imaginative writing and photography.

The text on each page is simple–just the numbers 1 through 10 with a particular number highlighted. But the photography is spectacular. Alda “finds” numbers in unexpected places–like the 3 found in the banana peel on the front cover. The book goes from 1 to 10 and back again for a total of two photos per number–from sources as diverse as a seashell, a flamingo, and the shadow of a bike.

Arlene Alda’s A B C: What do you see? takes the same tack, only with letters instead of numbers. Alda finds an A in a sawhorse, a B in a cut apple, a C in shrimp in a saute pan–and so on and so forth.

I marvel at Alda’s imaginative eye and have started to look for letters and numbers in my world too–Is that a T I see in that mailbox, centered on its post?

Alda continues to share her gift of creative sight in Here a Face, There a Face, where she finds faces in all sorts of organic and inorganic items. The text in this title is spare, but appropriate. “Looking up, Glancing down, Staring straight ahead. On a pot, in a pan, even on some bread.”

Did You Say Pears?

Did You Say Pears? takes on a slightly different flavour, exploring homonyms and homophones through words and photos. Alda poses a grand question throughout the book: “If [blank] is [blank] and [blank] is [blank], don’t you agree that pairs could be pears?” Some of the homonyms (words that have at least two different meanings) that Alda uses include: horns, pants, and glasses. Her homophones (words that sound alike but have different spellings and meanings) include blew/blue, flower/flour, and (of course) pairs/pears.

I am thoroughly enthralled with Alda’s writing and her photography. She is truly an artist–one who sees the world differently and invites her readers to see the world through her eyes. Check these books out next time you’re at your local library!

Categories Reading My Library

AL (a potpourri of children’s books)

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I’m still trecking (slowly) through my public library’s children’s picture books–mixing together my read every book goal with Carrie at Reading my Library‘s personal challenge.

Carrie is moving much more quickly than I–her last count had her at 558 picture books read (Wow!) and partway through the “B” section. In my defense, I don’t have any toddlers to read for–and I’m a full-time graduate student and teaching assistant.

Reading My Library

My last trip to the library gave me a modge-podge of books. The library had only one title per author for most of the authors in this trip–and I could find no discernible theme in what I found, except of course, that the author’s last names all began with the letters A and L.

The Butter Man by Elizabeth Alalou

The Butter Man by Elizabeth Alalou and Ali Alalou (illustrated by Julie Klear Essakalli) has a story-inside-a-story narrative. The young narrator is impatiently waiting for the couscous her baba (father) is cooking to be done. When she complains that she’s starving, her father begins telling her the story of himself, as a young boy in Morocco during a drought, waiting for the butter man. He and his family were hungry. There was no butter to dip their bread in. What’s more, the pieces of bread grew smaller and smaller with each day. To keep her son’s mind off the hunger–and to make the bread last longer–baba‘s mother tells him to sit by the road each day and wait for the butter man, who perhaps might give him some butter for his bread. If he ate the bread too soon, he would not have any butter to dip in the bread should the butter man come. So he waits each day with each day’s portion of bread, until the hunger is unbearable and he eats it without butter. Until one day, when he sees a man coming down the road. It’s not the butter man, but it’s even better.

I enjoyed this book. It’s a bit more text-heavy than the picture books intended for toddlers–it’s probably more suitable for slightly older children. But the cross-cultural story is engaging. The authors subtly contrast the waiting the narrator experiences–waiting for dinner to be done–with the waiting her father experienced in Morocco during a famine. The book gently encourages children to be patient–and to be thankful for what they have–without ever once mentioning a “moral”.

Louella Mae, She’s Run Away!, written by Karen Beaumont Alarcon and illustrated by Rosanne Litzinger, tells the story of a great search underway for Louella Mae, who has apparently run away. The story is told in lilting rhyme, with one stanza per layout. What makes this book unique and special, though, is that the last word of each stanza is left out, only to be revealed in the next page–allowing the reader to try to guess where the family will next search for Louella Mae. For example, one rhyme is…

“Round up the horses!
Hitch up the team!
Hop in the buckboard
and look by the…”

The next layout fills in the missing word “stream.” I enjoyed guessing at what location will be search next, and had a delightful surprise when Louella Mae turned out to be–well I won’t tell you what she turned out to be. You’ll just have to read the book!

Ten Little Wishes: A Baby Animal Counting Book I recognize the value of counting books, but I generally tend to hate them. I find them simplistic and boring. I mean, how many times can you handle “Two Birds”, new layout “Three Ladybugs”, new layout “Four Caterpillars”. Ughh!

So I wasn’t too excited when I found a counting book amongst my latest library pile. But I was pleasantly surprised. Ten Little Wishes: A Baby Animal Counting Book by Andrea Alban Gosline is NOT your typical counting book. Ten Little Wishes has a family taking their new baby on a walk through the countryside, taking a look at all the baby animals about and saying a wish for the baby at each stop. The family meets a doe and her 1 little fawn, a couple of mares and their 2 little foals… Each layout introduces a number, an animal, and the correct names for the adult and baby version of each animal.

All of this is done in sweet rhyme–

Around the corner, what a surprise!
10 new puppies with sleepy eyes.
A litter for Mama to cuddle and tend,
born before my story ends.
May baby make some special friends.

This book is definitely a keeper!

As a sidenote, the illustrations done by Lisa Burnett Bossi add an additional dimension to this book. I enjoy them as illustrations alone, but I especially enjoyed that they portrayed the father holding baby in a sling and mom and daughter wearing dresses. It’s a bit fun to see a little old-fashioned-ness in such a new book!

Categories Reading My Library

Not quite nursery rhymes (I like Allan Ahlberg)

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How do children learn nursery rhymes?

I certainly don’t know how I learned them–but learn them I did. Whether I was taught them by my parents, read them in books, or heard them from an audio cassette tape doesn’t really matter. I learned them any way.

Allan Ahlberg’s books Each Peach Pear Plum and Previously aren’t nursery rhymes–but they draw upon the grand store of English nursery rhymes to tell their tales.

Each Peach Pear Plum

Each Peach Pear Plum is an “I spy” book in which readers are given opportunity to find nursery rhyme characters in the illustrations.

Each Peach Pear Plum
I spy Tom Thumb

Every layout builds upon the previous layout–so Tom Thumb is easily seen in the second page, but Mother Hubbard is hidden.

This is a fun, not too difficult book/activity to do with young children who are already familiar with a decent collection of nursery rhymes and children’s fairy tales. (And if they’re not, you should remedy that post-haste!)

Previously by Allan Ahlberg

Previously turns the nursery rhymes and fairy tales backwards, starting with Goldilocks arriving at home “all bothered and hot.”

Previously she had been running like mad in the dark woods.

Previously she had been climbing out of somebody else’s window.

It turns out that previously Goldilocks had run into Jack (of Beanstock fame), who had previously tumbled down the hill with his little sister Jill, who had previously met a frog-prince, who had previously…

I think you get the picture.

Reading My Library

This is a fun, if somewhat inside-out romp through the repertoire of English fairy tales and nursery rhymes.

I’m enjoying Allan Ahlberg in my trip through my local library’s picture book section. Check out Reading My Library to read about Carrie’s trip through HER local library with her two sons.

Categories Reading My Library

Ag-Jon Agee

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Reading My Library

Continuing on through the alphabet in my quest to read every book in Eiseley Library, I stumbled upon author and illustrator Jon Agee. I’d heard of him before, read a review of his book The Incredible Painting of Felix Clousseau–but I’d never read anything of his before.

Unfortunately, my library didn’t have a copy of The Incredible Painting of Felix Clousseau when I was perusing the stacks–but it did have plenty of other fascinating pieces by Agee.

Agee illustrates in a blocky, just been sketched manner which I find innocently appealing–but it’s the stories that I enjoy the most. Agee’s stories aren’t fantasy, fluffy children’s stories. They’re slightly silly but otherwise relatively realistic stories which include both the young and the old. The stories are well written enough to be enjoyable for adults, and just ridiculous enough to be enjoyable for kids.

The Retired Kid by Jon Agee

The Retired Kid tells the story of 8-year-old Brian who, tired of the hard work of being a kid, goes into an early retirement. He flies off to a retirement community in Florida, where he meets a fantastic collection of old folks. He enjoys certain aspects of retirement (card games, golf, fishing, and movies)–but discovers that other parts are not so fun (prune juice smoothies, knitting classes, and weekly checkups.) He starts to think about the hard work of being a kid–and realizes that maybe his job isn’t quite so bad.

Terrific by Jon Agee

In Terrific, a grumpy old man named Eugene wins an all-expenses-paid cruise to Bermuda. His response is “Terrific. I’ll probably get a really nasty sunburn.” When Eugene’s ship is shipwrecked and he is stranded, he announces “Terrific”–and comes up with an even more pessimistic prediction for his future. But in the end, Eugene discovers something that is truly terrific–and this time, he’s not being sarcastic.

Nothing by Jon Agee

When Suzie Gump, the richest lady in town, asks Otis what’s on sale in his shop, he looks around and announces “Uh, nothing.” Suzie is eager to snatch it up, whatever the cost, starting a city-wide craze for buying nothing. Shopkeepers throw out all their best goods to make room for more nothing. Eventually, though, something will come back in style–and Otis’ll be ready when it happens!

I’ll be definitely keeping my eyes open for more Agee–his stories are a lot of fun!

Carrie at Reading to Know did an author highlight of Jon Agee when she was going through the AG’s.