Bake Sale

Bake Sale by Saran Varon is a quirky little confection from the talented lady who brought us the beautifully understated graphic novel, Robot Dreams. It is a treat to look at, and it has recipes from the story collected at the end, for any aspiring bakers out there.

Bake Sale is every bit as visually beautiful as Varon’s previous graphic novel, but I confess, it’s not as satisfying when it comes to the narrative. I really wanted to love this book (I mean come on, look at that cover! A-dorable). While I can say I love the soft simplicity of the illustrations, the storyline left me a little baffled. It’s never a good sign when it’s not easy to describe exactly what the book is about. Part of the problem for me here is I do not think that the concept is something that kids can connect to. They will see the cover and think, “I want to read this,” but then I’m afraid the story will leave some readers disappointed.

Cupcake enjoys his life working in his small bakery, hanging out with his band mates, and spending time with his best friend Eggplant. He starts to slip into a baking slump, so Eggplant shares that he is planning a trip to Turkey and he promises that if Cupcake comes along he can introduce his friend to Turkish Delight (Cupcake’s baking idol). This prompts Cupcake to do everything he can to raise money for the trip, but Cupcake never gets to go because he ends up giving up his earnings to fund Eggplant’s trip when he loses his job.  It feels like an odd and somewhat confusing combination of topics for a ten-year-old reader, right? The ending is very open, and I think that’s another thing that kids will find disappointing. I like an open ending. I find they are often the most realistic and rich endings in fiction, but this ending felt like an abrupt cut off, rather than a satisfying stopping point. The thematic threads related to following one’s passions, being selfless in friendship, and never giving up, are just not explored or developed enough to make this book completely successful.

Cute? Certainly. I bought it for the library because of its sheer cuteness. (Wait until you see the endpapers – maybe the most delicious I have ever seen!) I’m just worried that the reading experience for most kids will be a let down, the way some pretty cupcakes look much better than they taste, which can be really upsetting. I speak from experience. So I’ll let you know the kid-appeal verdict soon.

Bake Sale by Sarah Varon is published by First Second.

Extra Yarn. I love it (and not just because there are dogs wearing sweaters in it).

I am more than a little bit in love with Extra Yarn by Mac Barnett, with illustrations by the always stylish Jon Klassen. It is not because I currently have a lot of extra yarn in my house from my former days of knitting semi-glory (some of it is in Gryffindor colours for a scarf I have yet to finish for my hubs. Sorry D. One day, one day). It is not only because it is a story that has more than one small dog wearing a sweater in it (not to mention plenty of other animals wearing tiny sweaters). No my friends, it is due to the fact that this book is perfect. There, I said it. Perfect. I cannot imagine it being better. It’s a good sign that it was hard for me to stop hugging the book to review it, right?

One day, in her cold and dreary town, Annabelle finds a box of yarn. It has every colour of yarn inside of it and she’s immediately captivated. Now because Annabelle is a useful and quirky and imaginative sort of girl, she goes home and knits herself a sweater. When she finds she has extra yarn, she knits one for her pooch, Mars. (There is a dog named Mars in this book. Don’t you love it when an animal character in a story is perfectly named?). When she’s done she finds she still has extra yarn. Can you see where this is going? Annabelle keeps on knitting. She knits for a grouchy boy and his grouchy dog. She knits for her classmates and oddballs. She knits for animals. And then she knits “sweaters for things that didn’t even need sweaters.”

This is the part of the review when I must pause and show you this:

Annabelle does not knit a phone booth cosy (the brainchild of this amazing group), but she does become a guerilla knitter. Do you know about this movement? It’s when knitters take to the street and knit things for places / objects that you’d never think require sweaters or else create knitted objects that interact with buildings / statues / stuff in the city. The group responsible for the knitted phone cosy above, is called Knit the City, and one of the reasons they give for doing what they do is to “wage woolly war on the mundane, humdrum and expected.” They believe that the world can be made better by this whimsical act. Have you ever seen the result of a little guerilla knitting? I have. On our Sunday walk we pass a park bench that has arm rests which have knitted covers. One week they were normal bench arm rests, and the next they were knitted. It wasn’t the most creative act of guerilla knitting, but we were still charmed to find it.

Back to Annabelle. Basically, she changes her whole town through her knitting. There’s a twist I won’t tell you about because I don’t want to reveal everything about the book before you have a chance to read it / hug it for yourself. Extra Yarn is about making your community better by doing something small and how that something small can sometimes become something bigger. You never really know where an idea will take you. It’s about creativity and being quirky and proud of it. It’s about magic and creating goodness. And dog sweaters. That too.

Make something. Make beauty. Be different.

And read Extra Yarn. Perhaps I will go finish that Gryffindor scarf now…

Before I go, one more delightful idea from Knit the City:

 

Extra Yarn is published by Balzer + Bray, an imprint of Harper Collins. Thank you for sending me a copy to review!

Completely brilliant. Another reason to hug an independent bookseller.

Over the holidays, when I saw this, of course I thought the next moment of my beloved Flying Dragon.

If like me, this makes you wonder if you can keep believing in the magic of independent booksellers, maybe you should take a look at this:

There it is. Magic. Never seen a gang of e-book readers doing that, have ya? Real books are cool.

(And don’t you love the Harry Potter-esque music.? These people made it).

This has made my Thursday awesome. I feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

 

AGAIN!

How is it that Emily Gravett manages to create in every book she produces something that is creative and charming and beautiful that leaves you smiling and wanting to read it all over again?

Well in AGAIN! we have not only a book that has all of the aforementioned qualities, but it happens to be about the experience of loving a book so much you want to hear it over and over. Once is never enough for Cedrick the tiny green dragon who is the star of the story. Each night he settles down with mum (or perhaps dad, it’s hard to tell with dragons) to hear his favourite story about Cedric the red dragon. He is crazy about this book. When it’s over, he asks to hear it again. This pattern continues all the way to the end. And there’s a surprise at the end that is completely delightful and is guaranteed to make every kid laugh (and be a lesson about the dangers of temper tantrums). My eyes went wide with delight. Honest.

As with all of Gravett’s books, she takes a simple concept and executes it brilliantly by letting her illustrations tell most of the story. Even though the illustrations are not overly detailed, with a clean white background on every page, you’ll notice new things the more you look. Kids will like that. This book is completely winning. It proves that Gravett is a master of the picture book form. Her books are sure to be enjoyed again and again and again for years to come.

Here she is sharing how to draw a dragon like Cedrick:

AGAIN! is published by Macmillan Children’s Books.

Cybils Finalists Are Here!

Just in case you didn’t get enough outstanding books for Christmas this year, you should be able to find plenty to entice you over at the Cybils blog since the 2011 finalists have been announced.

Of course, I’m particularly interested in the Middle Grade Fiction list, since I’m excited to be a member of the judging panel again this year. So here are those titles:

Darth Paper Strikes Back – by Tom Angleberger

Ghetto Cowboy – by G. Neri

Nerd Camp – by Elissa Brent Weissman

The Friendship Doll – by Kirby Larson

The Great Wall of Lucy Lu – by Wendy Wan-Long Shang

Warp Speed – by Lisa Yee

Words in the Dust – by Trent Reedy

Read more about why you need to read these books right here. I’ve already started. Happy Reading!

Matched

First off, good news! My pooch is home. He was home for Christmas. He has spent the bulk of the past five days sleeping in front of the tree (good boy!) in his fleece-lined doggy hoodie, being patted and whispered to and told that he is wonderful and wise and brave. The other day the tree nearly fell on him (good thing he had the quick reflexes to leap out of the way at the last moment), which was scary, but otherwise, it’s been a quiet Christmas. He needs some serious fattening up, so we’re working on that, one tiny liver treat at a time.

Having my hound back home again providing premium contented background snores has cheered me up for hours of happy holiday reading. Matched is the first book I finished and the last before moving on to my Christmas books. I’d say it is the perfect curl-up-on-the-couch-and-go-nowhere book because you’re pulled quickly into the dystopian world and the love triangle at the heart of the story.

Cassia has always been a good girl, a rule-following member of the Society, trusting and happy to have so many of life’s most important decisions made for her, like who she will marry, for instance. At her matching ceremony, Cassia is thrilled to learn that her match is Xander, her long-time friend. It makes sense and it feels right. But when another boy’s face flashes on the screen for a moment before it blacks out, Cassia does not know what to think. Is the other boy, Ky Markham, her true match? This so-called “glitch” changes Cassia’s perspective forever, leading her to wonder what it would be like to have the freedom to make her life her own, to read whatever she wanted, to go where she wished, to write the words she keeps inside her head.

I’d say that anyone who liked Divergent should enjoy Matched. There’s less action and more romance, but it’s just as compelling and the dystopian society is immediately intriguing. I liked how Condie weaves in Dylan Thomas’s poetry without making this element seem forced or emo. My only quibble is that it is perhaps too focused on the Ky + Cassia romance, with Cassia swooning over Ky fairly constantly, which I found tiresome in a few places. However, I suppose it makes sense that she is completely focused on love and her romantic future at the time in her life when she is being matched. (Also, try not to mind the weirdly squished green girl in the bubble on the cover. I get the symbolism, but I’m not loving the design). I am curious to see where Condie takes this story in the second book, which I believe is told from both Cassia and Ky’s perspectives.

There’s a website devoted to the series. I’m expected Crossed to show up sometime in the next six months at my library, given that I’m 126 out of 400 people waiting for it. I’ll be excited when it’s my turn.

Matched is published by Penguin.

Wishing for a Merry Doggy Christmas

Christmas is nearly here.  I have made (and consumed) a lot of peppermint bark, but there’s a little bark missing, and it belongs to him:

My pooch is sick. He has been at the vet for 5 miserably long days. The boy has pancreatitis. This is not fun. He’s skinny and stinky and he’s a cone head and I miss him terribly. The house is quiet without his gentle doggy snores. His red bed is waiting in front of the tree. His Siamese brother is testy (Where is he? Where is my frenemy?) We are hoping he will be home for Christmas. The other day, a friend of ours sent us this. Sniffle:

If you could spare a “get well soon Malcolm dog” wish today, that would be wonderful. Let’s bring this hairy fella home for a bath and a snooze next to his Christmas stocking.

It should be no surprise then that this Christmas picture book is my favourite this year:

Zoe and Beans: Zoe’s Christmas List is nothing short of adorable. This is because of the sweet, snowy, and soft illustrations and the heart-warming animal / human friendships portrayed in the story. The best part has to be the fold out pages where little bear goes on a very long swim and faithful and obedient Beans dives in to rescue him.  Put it under the tree. Read it to your little one, human or canine. I plan to.

Here’s Chloe Inkpen talking about the characters, and you should visit the website for the books too:

Happy Christmas everyone. Hug your hound today.

Bunheads

Snowflakes are falling here on the blog. Christmas cookies have been made. The nog is brewing. You can practically hear the Sugar Plum fairy floating around in her tutu, right?

Well then, I’d say it’s just the right time for Bunheads, the perfect novel for any balletomane, no matter the time of year. Plus, you know you want it just for the cover. If you have an ounce of girly-girl inside of you, all of those tutus will surely set your heart a-flutter. Former professional dancer Sophie Flack’s debut is a rare glimpse inside the highly competitive and supremely physically challenging world of a top tier ballet company. It’s the story of Hannah, one dancer in the corps de ballet, and her struggle to be noticed and hopefully promoted to the role of principal dancer.

The extreme, grueling physical discipline required of any professional dancer really comes through in Flack’s writing. She manages to achieve a balance of not romanticizing what it means to be a dancer and still communicating the passion and the artistic rewards of ballet. It’s fun learning many behind the scenes secrets of the dance world. You’ll feel like you’re standing in the wings watching the magic happen. I think that the novel also has the potential to speak to readers who are not bunheads, since it’s really about making choices about the direction you want to head in life, deciding what you value most, taking risks, and not being afraid to go for something you’d never considered.

I kept on waiting for Hannah to go over to the dark side, you know, like she did:

But she doesn’t. She’s one of the pretty, non-psycho ballerinas. Perfect for Christmas. Now for the requisite reading music:

And if you want, here’s the cutie author showing you how to create your very own bunhead:

 

Bunheads is published by Poppy.

What?!!!! (in a good way)

Sometimes you miss things. BIG things. Jane Austen things. I had no idea about this. I should be ashamed. Now that I know. I want. I want very much:

By the way, have you seen Downton Abbey? Such fun:

 

I know what we should do! We should all get Death Comes to Pemberley at Christmas and we should read it and then have a Downton Abbey marathon with cookies and tea and perhaps knitting! (Trina, I’m talking to you ).

Please write forever and ever P.D. James.

I had a Favorite Dress

I think it would be pretty hard to walk past this pretty book in the library or bookstore and not pick it up. I Had a Favorite Dress by Boni Ashburn, with perfect illustrations by Julia Denos, is an ode to fashion, creativity, resourcefulness, and style. If you know a little fashionista (or a grown up one for that matter), I think she will fall head over sparkly heels for this gorgeous gem of a picture book.

The main character is a little girl who loves to dress up, and loves her “favoritest” dress, which she wears on Tuesday, her favorite day of the week. But one day, she grows up a little and the dress is too short, so she turns to her crafty Mama who tells her not to make mountains out of molehills, and she snips and sews the dress into a fab new shirt. This pattern continues, with Mama transforming each article of clothing into something new, and equally stylish, until the end of the book, when the little girl makes a piece of art using the few scraps that are left of her beloved dress.

What’s wonderful about the book is that it isn’t simply frilly and fluffy. It’s not just a story about loving clothes, it’s also about how clothes tell stories about who we are in the here and now. It shows readers the beginning of one girl’s journey as she discovers this form of self-expression. It shows how there is joy in making things, and how we can love something enough to find creative ways to use it again and again. You could even say there’s an environmental message here, but it isn’t shoved down your throat. I like picture books about regular daily life and the cool things that can fill our days. It’s a book celebrating all things crafty and D.I.Y. I’d say you couldn’t find a better gift than this and some paper dolls with fashionable outfits.

The highlight of the book has to be Denos’ outstanding illustrations that capture in their whimsical, hand-crafted appearance, all of the creative energy of the narrative. I love the collage elements and the dreamy watercolours and scribbly lines. It all fits together in one of those wonderful, rare, “this is the perfect illustrator for this book” packages. Read more about Denos and her artwork over at 7imp in this wonderful interview.

Here is an adorable video of one of those tiny fashionistas I was talking about, reading the very beginning of the book. It will make you want the book, some pretty bangles, and maybe a little British-accented child of your own:

I Had a Favorite Dress is published by Abrams.