A welcome addition to children’s literature about death and dying.
In this children’s picture book, a special bond between young Lily and her great-grandmother helps them through the elderly woman’s time at a hospice residence.
This story starts by explaining the main characters’ unusual names for each other. Lily’s great-grandmother is called “GG” for short, a fact that the book awkwardly explains by having the girl say, “I forget—why do we call you that?” When Lily asks about her own pet name, GG says mysteriously, “I call you Mamela, because you are close to my heart.” (It likely comes from the Yiddish word for “little girl”—literally, “little mother.”) Lily sums up, “You’re my GG and I’m you’re Mamela,” and GG answers, “And that’s the way it will always be,” setting up a refrain that repeats a bit too often throughout the text. Next, Lily visits GG’s apartment and learns how to make chicken soup with GG’s secret ingredient. In this part, the simple but emotionally resonant illustrations show GG looking hale and hearty, but “[a]fter dinner, GG felt tired,” which provides the only inkling of what’s to come. Readers may not be fully prepared when, “a few days later,” Lily’s father gently breaks the news that GG is dying. Lily responds by telling him that GG is at the top of a family tree she made in school; that night, she has a bad dream about GG falling off that family tree, which gives the book a nice, true-to-life touch. When Lily’s parents take her to the hospice residence, GG is in a wheelchair and suddenly looks much older. “You look…tired. Are you okay?” Lily asks. The next day, GG and Lily snuggle together while listening to a harpist play. The book pairs an ethereal illustration with lyrical text (“Ariel’s music wrapped around them just like GG’s rainbow afghan”), which truly captures the healing, transporting power of music in this setting. Shortly after making GG’s chicken soup with her father, Lily goes for a last visit and poignantly whispers in GG’s ear, “You are my Mamela. Because I love you with all my heart.”
A welcome addition to children’s literature about death and dying.Pub Date: April 15, 2014
ISBN: 978-0989930901
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Lamb Press
Review Posted Online: March 21, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Broccoli: No way is James going to eat broccoli. “It’s disgusting,” says James. Well then, James, says his father, let’s consider the alternatives: some wormy dirt, perhaps, some stinky socks, some pre-chewed gum? James reconsiders the broccoli, but—milk? “Blech,” says James. Right, says his father, who needs strong bones? You’ll be great at hide-and-seek, though not so great at baseball and kickball and even tickling the dog’s belly. James takes a mouthful. So it goes through lumpy oatmeal, mushroom lasagna and slimy eggs, with James’ father parrying his son’s every picky thrust. And it is fun, because the father’s retorts are so outlandish: the lasagna-making troll in the basement who will be sent back to the rat circus, there to endure the rodent’s vicious bites; the uneaten oatmeal that will grow and grow and probably devour the dog that the boy won’t be able to tickle any longer since his bones are so rubbery. Schneider’s watercolors catch the mood of gentle ribbing, the looks of bewilderment and surrender and the deadpanned malarkey. It all makes James’ father’s last urging—“I was just going to say that you might like them if you tried them”—wholly fresh and unexpected advice. (Early reader. 5-9)
Pub Date: May 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-547-14956-1
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Although the love comes shining through, the text often confuses in straining for patterned simplicity.
A collection of parental wishes for a child.
It starts out simply enough: two children run pell-mell across an open field, one holding a high-flying kite with the line “I wish you more ups than downs.” But on subsequent pages, some of the analogous concepts are confusing or ambiguous. The line “I wish you more tippy-toes than deep” accompanies a picture of a boy happily swimming in a pool. His feet are visible, but it's not clear whether he's floating in the deep end or standing in the shallow. Then there's a picture of a boy on a beach, his pockets bulging with driftwood and colorful shells, looking frustrated that his pockets won't hold the rest of his beachcombing treasures, which lie tantalizingly before him on the sand. The line reads: “I wish you more treasures than pockets.” Most children will feel the better wish would be that he had just the right amount of pockets for his treasures. Some of the wordplay, such as “more can than knot” and “more pause than fast-forward,” will tickle older readers with their accompanying, comical illustrations. The beautifully simple pictures are a sweet, kid- and parent-appealing blend of comic-strip style and fine art; the cast of children depicted is commendably multiethnic.
Although the love comes shining through, the text often confuses in straining for patterned simplicity. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: April 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4521-2699-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2015
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