scholarly journals The Honeybee Man by L. Nargi

2011 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Mead-Willis
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Picture Book ◽  
English Literature ◽  
Rare Book ◽  
University Of Alberta ◽  
Special Collections ◽  
Spare Time ◽  
The University ◽  
Local Ecology ◽  
Wild Blueberry

Nargi, Lela. The Honeybee Man. Illus. Kyrsten Brooker. New York: Schwartz & Wade, 2011. Print. This charming picture book chronicles the unconventional cottage industry of Fred, a Brooklynite who spends his spare time tending three colonies of honeybees housed on the roof of his townhouse. As the day unfolds, we follow Fred’s bees as they fan out across the borough, bringing back nectar from the herb gardens, flower pots, and even wild blueberry bushes flowering therein. Fred then harvests the honey and distributes jars of it to his neighbours. With this growing popularity of urban agriculture (and urban apiculture), Nargi’s story is a timely one, clearly aimed at progressive young families interested in the connection between local ecology and human community. The book is transparently but not disagreeably didactic: bee behaviour is examined and explained (both within the context of the story and in a two-page appendix), and the processes of beekeeping and honeymaking are illuminated through Fred’s perambulations within his apartment-cum-apiary. Brooker’s illustrations, a combination of gestural painting and collage, have a patchwork, handmade quality well suited to the book’s overarching preoccupation with all things organic and homespun. Her renderings of Brooklyn’s brownstone vistas are simple in their bright, flat planes of colour, but also satisfyingly dense with decoupaged texture and detail. Like the honey made by Fred’s “tireless Brooklyn bees,” her artwork is both a concentration - and a sweetening - of the teeming heterogeneity of urban life.Highly recommended: 4 out of 4 stars Reviewer: Sarah Mead-Willis Sarah is the Rare Book Cataloguer at the University of Alberta's Bruce Peel Special Collections Library. She holds a BA and an MLIS from the University of Alberta and an MA in English Literature from the University of Victoria. 

Polar Bear Morning by L. Thompson

2014 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Desmarais
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Polar Bear ◽  
Book History ◽  
Picture Book ◽  
English Literature ◽  
New York Times ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
University Of Alberta ◽  
Special Collections ◽  
The University

Thompson, Lauren. Polar Bear Morning. Illus. Stephen Savage. New York: Scholastic Press, 2013. Print.Ten years ago, Lauren Thompson and Stephen Savage collaborated on “Polar Bear Night”, which was a splendid picture book that swiftly became a New York Times best seller. “Polar Bear Morning” follows up on the simple story of a polar bear cub that ventures out onto the arctic tundra for an adventure, but this time our favourite cub meets a new friend. The story begins when the cub emerges from her dark den, peeks out at the clear blue sky, and follows the sound of seagulls. Soon after heading out into the snow and ice, she notices something tumbling down a snow hill. It’s a snow cub! The moment when the cubs first meet is beautifully portrayed in a two-page spread that shows two furry faces in profile looking at each other without words on the pages, which perfectly captures a child’s speechless, wide-eyed bliss upon meeting a new friend.The story continues with several charming scenes that show how the friendship develops: they climb the snow hill and tumble down together; they sprint beside the sea; they race past seals, walruses and whales; they pause at the ice’s edge; and finally, they jump into the sea together. It’s a delightful portrayal of a budding friendship, with simple, yet charming illustrations rendered in a gentle palette of soft blues, greys, pinks, and browns. This picture book is a joy to read and has all the makings of a beloved classic, including frolicsome illustrations, thoughtful design, and a captivating story. It’s a wholly satisfying picture book that will be a pleasure to read again and again.Recommendation: 4 stars out of 4Reviewer: Robert DesmaraisRobert Desmarais is Head of Special Collections at the University of Alberta and Managing Editor of The Deakin Review of Children’s Literature. A graduate of the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Information Studies, with a Book History and Print Culture designation, he also has university degrees in English literature and publishing. He has been collecting and enjoying children’s books for as long as he can remember.

scholarly journals The Lonely Book by K. Bernheimer

2013 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Desmarais
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Book History ◽  
Picture Book ◽  
English Literature ◽  
Public Library ◽  
University Of Alberta ◽  
The Public ◽  
Special Collections ◽  
Information Studies ◽  
The University

Bernheimer, Kate. The Lonely Book. Illus. Chris Sheban. New York: Random House, 2012. Print.This charming story about a well-loved book will not easily be forgotten. It’s the sort of picture book I would have loved to discover during my childhood visits to the public library. The tale begins in a classic fairytale style, “Once there was a brand-new book that arrived at the library.” As the story unfolds, young readers learn all sorts of details about the inner workings of a public library, including the custom that many of the newest books are placed on a special shelf in a high traffic area.The “lonely book” of this story initially had a popular and fulfilling life on the new book shelf but eventually it is relegated to the children’s section, along with countless other well-loved titles. Years pass, the book becomes a little tattered and worn, and is now checked out all too infrequently. Then, one morning, a little girl named Alice discovers it and falls in love with the story about the girl and her life under a toadstool, and so she takes it home. “The book had never felt so beloved.” Readers will discover how lonely it becomes when Alice forgets to renew her old book, and especially so when it begins a new life in the library’s storage basement. In time, Alice longs for her favourite book and despairs that she may never see it again. The story ends on a cheerful note, however, when Alice is reunited with her once cherished book at the library’s big book sale.For those of us who understand what it is like to cherish a book from our childhood, this book will bring back fond memories. The soft watercolour illustrations complement the story beautifully and they evoke a magical time when children fall in love with books, read them late into the night, fall asleep with them under their pillows, and dream sweet dreams about favourite characters and events.Highly recommended: 4 out of 4 starsReviewer: Robert DesmaraisRobert Desmarais is Head of Special Collections at the University of Alberta and Managing Editor of The Deakin Review of Children’s Literature. A graduate of the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Information Studies, with a Book History and Print Culture designation, he also has university degrees in English literature and publishing. He has been collecting and enjoying children’s books for as long as he can remember.

scholarly journals Why We Broke Up by D. Handler

2012 ◽  
Vol 1 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Mead-Willis
Keyword(s):  
High School ◽  
New York ◽  
English Literature ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Rare Book ◽  
University Of Alberta ◽  
Object A ◽  
Special Collections ◽  
Sexually Explicit ◽  
The University

Handler, Daniel. Why We Broke Up. Illus. Maira Kalman. New York: Little, Brown and Co., 2011. Print. In 1975, Judy Blume published Forever, in which a girl meets a boy at a high school party, dates him, falls madly in love with him, sleeps with him, and then breaks up with him. The novel was the first of its kind— a frank and sexually explicit portrait of teen love, delivered by a modern, post-women’s-lib female narrator. And while the book scandalized some readers, it became a coming-of-age touchstone for others. (Indeed, this reviewer remembers getting a copy from her mother – a bit embarrassing, given all the sex that was in it – as a sort of warning of the pleasures and pains of incipient adulthood.) Fast forward thirty-five years to Daniel Handler’s Why We Broke Up, in which a girl meets a boy at a high school party, dates him, falls madly in love with him, sleeps with him, and then breaks up with him. Not quite the trailblazer of a story that it was in 1975, but a fascinating (and in many ways superior) revision of the doomed-teen-romance downer. Daniel Handler is, after all, known to most as Lemony Snicket, and readers may detect shades of Snicket in the sly wit and mordant humour that infuse this particular series of unfortunate events. But his improvements on Blume’s prototype do not stop at style. For one thing -- and this is a big thing -- Handler invents a far more interesting narrator to tell the tale. While Min Green encompasses the moods and caprices typical of the teen girl umwelt, she also displays repertoire of quirks unwedded to age or gender: an obsession with cult cinema, a wicked sense of humour, and a singular worldview disclosed to the reader in lyrical, synaesthetic morsels. (“Enormous as a shout” is how she first describes Ed Slaterton, her love interest.) Through Min’s voice, Handler creates something that is less a love story than a headlong plunge into the teenage psychic cosmos— that welter of sensory, emotional, and cultural bric-à-brac that young people accrue in their projects of self-creation. The book is cluttered with spurious allusions to movies that were never made, musicians who don’t exist, food and beverages not on offer anywhere outside the text. (Viper shots, anyone? How about a bottle of Scarpia’s Extra Bitter?) These are a clever device on the author’s part; instead of attempting to tap the vocabulary of teenage cool (and burden the novel with effortful hipness), Handler fabricates a pitch-perfect simulacrum. As befits a post-2000 story of young love, there is a visual counterpoint to Handler’s text. Each chapter begins with the image of an object -- a bottle cap, a comb, a pair of earrings – rendered in lush oil paint by artist Maira Kalman. All are mementos of Min’s and Ed’s relationship, and all are cast away as Min comes to grips its ruin. But just as love leaves a trace that cannot be easily expunged, so the images conjured by this novel will resonate, mournful and comic, long after the book is closed. Highly recommended:  4 out of 4 starsReviewer:  Sarah Mead-WillisSarah is the Rare Book Cataloguer at the University of Alberta's Bruce Peel Special Collections Library. She holds a BA and an MLIS from the University of Alberta and an MA in English Literature from the University of Victoria.

scholarly journals Bon Appétit! The Delicious Life of Julia Child by J. Hartland

2012 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Desmarais
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Book History ◽  
Picture Book ◽  
English Literature ◽  
University Of Alberta ◽  
Line Drawings ◽  
Special Collections ◽  
Information Studies ◽  
The Moment ◽  
The University

Hartland, Jessie. Bon Appétit! The Delicious Life of Julia Child. New York: Schwartz & Wade Books, 2012. Print.Master chef and author Julia Child (1912–2004) was adored by audiences from the moment she first starred in her own television cooking show in 1963. It was an immediate success because people were captivated by Child’s warm, high-spirited personality and her enthusiasm for good food and wine. Indeed, she regularly toasted viewers with a glass of wine and her trademark “Bon appétit!” in her distinctive voice. Young readers are introduced to Child in this delightful picture book biography that is a feast for the eyes. It offers a surprisingly thorough account of her life, and includes scenes from her early childhood in Pasadena, California, her brief career with an American spy agency, and her struggle to publish the now famous “Mastering the Art of French Cooking”, to name but a few of the highlights. In one especially amusing spread, readers are shown how to make chicken galantine in 32 numbered panels, which make clear that Child encouraged her fans to try new foods and cooking techniques. Author-illustrator Jessie Hartland uses simple cartoons and a handwritten typeface to tell the story, and it is immediately apparent from the opening pages that the book is jam-packed with artwork and text, but the overall effect is one of considerable charm and animation. The endpapers are crammed with line drawings of kitchen tools, ingredients, and objects from Child’s life, which have English and French labels for readers who want to learn some essential vocabulary in both languages. For readers who want to learn more about Child, the book includes a useful bibliography, brief epilogue, and web links that show Child’s actual kitchen from her house in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and the restaurant where she had her first meal in France. This adorable publication will appeal to foodies of all ages. Highly Recommended: 4 out of 4 stars    Reviewer: Robert DesmaraisRobert Desmarais is Head of Special Collections at the University of Alberta and Managing Editor of The Deakin Review of Children’s Literature. A graduate of the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Information Studies, with a Book History and Print Culture designation, he also has university degrees in English literature and publishing. He has been collecting and enjoying children’s books for as long as he can remember. 

Circle Nine by A. Hetzel

2011 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Mead-Willis
Keyword(s):  
English Literature ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Rare Book ◽  
University Of Alberta ◽  
Special Collections ◽  
Literary Allusion ◽  
The One ◽  
The University

Heltzel, Anne. Circle Nine. Somerville, Mass.: Candlewick Press, 2011. Print. Why are hapless females in YA novels always named Abby? I don’t know, the amnesiac narrator of Circle Nine would reply. That’s just what it says on my necklace.  So begins Anne Heltzel’s debut thriller: a teenaged girl awakens on the pavement outside a burning building with no memories and no name, save the one she wears in gold around her neck. With her is a mysterious, charismatic youth named Sam, who claims to be her friend. Sam persuades Abby to retreat from the fire and into the woods, where they hide in the safety of his “cave-palace”: a glittering subterranean paradise full of shimmering fabrics and sumptuous furniture. There, the two of them sip pomegranate wine, discuss fine literature, and forswear all contact with the outside world, which Sam likens to an Aleghierian hell (hence the book’s title). We suspect this a fantasy, invented by Abby to protect herself from an uglier cave and an uglier Sam, to say nothing of the ugly events occluded by her smoke-kippered memory. The question is: whose fantasy is it? What sixteen-year-old with cheap bling on her neck would retreat into a happy place wrought with literary allusion, Platonic cave metaphors, and Oriental carpets? This is clearly the reverie of the author herself, still in love with her various muses. Abby’s fantasyland, though out of character, is not necessarily a detriment to the novel itself. Indeed, we could do without the predictable combination of flashbacks and sleuthing by which Abby reconstructs her true identity, and abide instead within her doomed and darkly luminous otherworld. For it is there that Heltzel’s storytelling is at its boldest, her writing most sensuous and wild, and it is here that the novel promises—if only briefly—to be something other than the dreary chestnut about a naïve girl brought low by bad luck and sly men.Recommended with reservations: 2 out of 4 starsReviewer: Sarah Mead-Willis Sarah is the Rare Book Cataloguer at the University of Alberta's Bruce Peel Special Collections Library. She holds a BA and an MLIS from the University of Alberta and an MA in English Literature from the University of Victoria.

scholarly journals Mudkin by S. Gammell

2011 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Mead-Willis
Keyword(s):  
English Literature ◽  
Young Girl ◽  
Rare Book ◽  
University Of Alberta ◽  
Special Collections ◽  
Single Night ◽  
A Minor ◽  
The University

Gammell, Stephen. Mudkin. Minneapolis: Carolrhoda Books, 2011. Print.Kids love mud. Of this there is no doubt. There is nothing like an afternoon spent knee-deep in ooze to undo the adult tyranny of cleanliness and crown a child king— or queen, as in the case of Mudkin. In this latest offering by Caldecott-winning illustrator Stephen Gammell, an imaginative young girl teams up with a playful sprite whose onion-shaped head and squat, gnomelike body are comprised, it would seem, entirely of mud. Mud-made too are the robe and crown he offers the girl, who gladly accepts her newfound role as monarch of muck. Together, the two of them caper and romp through a backyard mud-kingdom, until the rainclouds gather and wash Mudkin and his mud-realm away. The story’s premise – a child conjuring a magical playmate out of the elements – seems familiar, echoing as it does an illustrated masterwork of an earlier generation: Raymond Briggs’s wordless classic, The Snowman. Yet while Briggs’s story ends in a minor key (the snowman, wondrously alive for a single night, melts away in the morning sun), Mudkin’s watery fate carries no sadness; nor does it offer, as The Snowman does, a tacit elegy on the transience of childhood. Gammell’s riotous watercolours (so ecstatically fluid they erupt like geysers on the page) affirm this distinction: mud, unlike snow, is chaotic and unsentimental. Not a medium for reflection, it is the stuff of pure play. As a result, Mudkin is nothing more and nothing less than a bit of good – if not entirely clean – fun. Recommended: 3 out of 4 stars.Reviewer: Sarah Mead-WillisSarah is the Rare Book Cataloguer at the University of Alberta's Bruce Peel Special Collections Library. She holds a BA and an MLIS from the University of Alberta and an MA in English Literature from the University of Victoria.

scholarly journals Dead Time by C. Conlin / Shelter by J. S. Lee

2011 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Mead-Willis
Keyword(s):  
Dead Time ◽  
English Literature ◽  
Young Reader ◽  
Rare Book ◽  
Intended Audience ◽  
University Of Alberta ◽  
Special Collections ◽  
Single Voice ◽  
To Come ◽  
The University

Conlin, Christy A. Dead Time. / Lee, Jen S. Shelter. Single Voice Series. Toronto: Annick Press, 2011. Print. It is difficult to say which of these brief cold showers will leave you feeling happier to leap back into the warmth of the everyday. Presented back-to-back in a single volume, both novellas share an unhappy preoccupation: picking apart the threads of the past in order to untangle – or at least understand – the enmeshments the present. The narrator of Dead Time is Isabella, a teen awaiting trial for a crime which, she repeatedly insists, she did not commit. It was her boyfriend who murdered the interloping Lulu; as soon as he confesses his guilt, Isabella will be released from the grim “youth center” where she awaits trial. Author Christy Ann Conlin deploys the first-person voice masterfully— Isabella’s rage beats palpably from the page, and we are righteously indignant on her behalf. Yet the further she beckons us into her memory, recounting the events antecedent to Lulu’s murder, the uglier and less justifiable her anger becomes. So gradually is the reader’s sympathy eroded that the story’s final twist – though dimly visible all along – still manages to come as a surprise. Though more straightforward than its companion novel, Jen Sookfong Lee’s Shelter is no less dispiriting in its outcome. We begin at the unhappy end: our narrator, Abby, weeps alone on a park bench. Even before her latest catastrophe, it would seem she has plenty to cry about: maimed by debt, her parents abide in private misery, leaving Abby to run a singularly thankless household. Her only solace is a volunteer job at the local animal shelter, where she meets a beguiling young man named Sean. We know Abby’s infatuation with Sean will end badly, but the form and flavour of this badness is not revealed until Abby fully unspools her dismal yarn. Though hampered by some awkward turns of phrase- “… it feels like he’s always been part of me, like an elbow” - the story succeeds as a meditation on the blurred line between the security of a shelter – be it a house, a family, or a lover — and the confinement of a trap. Pitched at mature but not necessarily avid readers, Annick Press’s Single Voice Series entices with the promise of gritty, fast-moving narratives packaged in a clever two-for-one reversible format. Both Dead Time and Shelter are certainly gritty and, at less than 100 pages a pop, fast enough to read in one go. It is unclear, however, what the effect on their intended audience might be. Comfortless in their brevity, joyless in their details, these novels do little to stir the imagination or assuage the loneliness of the young reader. At best, they offer a frisson of discomfort, a chilling affirmation of vague adolescent unease: the world is indeed out to get you.Recommended: 3 out of 4 stars Reviewer: Sarah Mead-Willis Sarah is the Rare Book Cataloguer at the University of Alberta's Bruce Peel Special Collections Library. She holds a BA and an MLIS from the University of Alberta and an MA in English Literature from the University of Victoria. 

scholarly journals The King Who Wouldn’t Sleep by D. Singleton

2013 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Desmarais
Keyword(s):  
Book History ◽  
Picture Book ◽  
English Literature ◽  
Farm Animals ◽  
University Of Alberta ◽  
Special Collections ◽  
Long Line ◽  
Information Studies ◽  
To Come ◽  
The University

Singleton, Debbie. The King Who Wouldn’t Sleep. Illus. Holly Swain. London: Anderson Press, 2012. Print. The King featured in this fairytale picture book is a man on a mission. He refuses to nod off until he finds the perfect mate for his lovely daughter, so he interviews a long line of princes, but of course “not one of them was quite perfect”. The illustrations of princes in all shapes and sizes are highly amusing, and the prince with the “extraordinary mustache” is especially charming. Despite the King’s indifference to this motley crew, the princes refuse to give up, so they decide that the only way to talk to the princess is to make the King fall asleep. They present him with sleeping potions, stuffed animals, blankets, bedtime stories, and every imaginable soporific gift, but the King will not be deceived; indeed, he gives everything to his servants, who immediately fall asleep, leaving no one in the palace to cook his dinner.  Princes continue to come and go but no one makes the cut. A young farmer witnesses all the comings and goings and decides to approach the King with successive gifts of farm animals, but the King shoos him away at every turn. That is, until the farmer returns with an entire flock of sheep and encourages the King to count them to ensure that all one hundred are present and accounted for. Presto! The King finally falls asleep. Everyone is impressed with the clever farmer, especially the princess, and so they get married, have a magnificent wedding, and live happily ever after. The comical story, complemented by cheerful illustrations, provides plenty of entertainment for young readers. Recommended: 3 out of 4 starsReviewer: Robert DesmaraisRobert Desmarais is Head of Special Collections at the University of Alberta and Managing Editor of The Deakin Review of Children’s Literature. A graduate of the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Information Studies, with a Book History and Print Culture designation, he also has university degrees in English literature and publishing. He has been collecting and enjoying children’s books for as long as he can remember.

scholarly journals Ten Birds by C. Young

2012 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Mead-Willis
Keyword(s):  
English Literature ◽  
Blank Space ◽  
Rare Book ◽  
Found Objects ◽  
University Of Alberta ◽  
Everyday Objects ◽  
Special Collections ◽  
Japanese Paper ◽  
Visual Artist ◽  
The University

Young, Cybèle. Ten Birds. Toronto: Kids Can Press, 2011. Print.Faced with the prospect of fording a river, ten chubby, adorable birds use found objects to devise vehicles that will convey them, one by one, to the other side. Sound simple? Perhaps not. When Ten Birds won the 2011 Governor General’s Literary Award for Children’s Illustration, the jury praised it as a “visual riddle.” And indeed, there does seem to be more to this enigmatic counting book than mere plot summary can provide. For starters, the birds’ predicament is innately absurd: why don’t they just fly across the river? Or make use of the bridge that looms in the background of every illustration? And what are we to make of the birds’ report-card epithets (Outstanding, Quite Advanced, Needs Improvement), which may or may not correspond to their river-crossing ingenuity? Perhaps Ten Birds is less about birds and rivers than our tendency to overcomplicate the simplest problems, confusing complexity with elegance. Young’s exquisite pen-and-ink illustrations certainly suggest a tension between the two: dense, furious skeins of crosshatching resolve into minimalistic set pieces, in which vast swaths of negative space dwarf the objects depicted. Come to think of it, perhaps the book is simply an extension of Young’s prevailing sensibilities as a visual artist. Known for her miniature sculptures in Japanese paper, Young has a gift for amplifying the strangeness of everyday objects by reproducing them, out of context and much reduced, in a vacuum of blank space. Likewise, her ten flightless birds and their bizarre contraptions, intricately rendered yet utterly inexplicable, riddle the reader with their presence. (And, like the paper sculptures, they are darn cute.) The fact that Ten Birds refuses to explain itself is one of its principal charms, and its mystery will beguile readers young and old.Highly recommended: 4 out of 4 stars.Reviewer: Sarah Mead-WillisSarah is the Rare Book Cataloguer at the University of Alberta's Bruce Peel Special Collections Library. She holds a BA and an MLIS from the University of Alberta and an MA in English Literature from the University of Victoria.

scholarly journals The Best Birthday Party Ever by J. LaRue Huget

2011 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Debbie Feisst
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Young Adult ◽  
Picture Book ◽  
Read Aloud ◽  
Young Adult Fiction ◽  
Elementary Grades ◽  
University Of Alberta ◽  
Birthday Party ◽  
Layer Cake ◽  
The University

Huget, Jennifer LaRue. The Best Birthday Party Ever. Illus. LeUyen Pham. New York: Schwartz & Wade Books, 2011. Print. “My birthday is 5 months, 3 weeks, 2 days, and 8 hours away.  Today I started to plan my party.” And so the planning begins for the 5-year-old soon-to-be birthday girl in this charming picture book.  She has to start planning early if she wants the best birthday party ever.  She is going to invite all 57 of her friends including the mailman and the invitations will be sprinkled with fairy dust.  She will have 9 thousand balloons, streamers and napkins: all in pink.  On the menu is a 17-layer cake, each layer a different flavour, with 6 zillion candles on top.  Not only will there be: a magician, camel rides and a Ferris wheel, but each lucky guest will receive a hamster as a party favour. In a kid-friendly countdown style towards the big day, our sweet party planner gets more and more excited as her birthday approaches and the plans get more and more grandiose.  Only after her mother comments that this birthday party is “getting out of hand” does she agree to skip the sparkly necklaces.  The day finally arrives and while it may not be the party she dreamed of, she is appreciative and enjoys her day so much that she immediately begins plans for her next birthday. This beautifully illustrated read-aloud captures the excitement of a child as she looks forward to her special day and will appeal to lower elementary grades as well as preschoolers.  The whimsical mostly-pink drawings may be initially off-putting to boys but they are certain to relate and enjoy the story. Highly recommended: 4 out of 4 stars Reviewer: Debbie FeisstDebbie is a Public Services Librarian at the H.T. Coutts Education Library at the University of Alberta.  When not renovating, she enjoys travel, fitness and young adult fiction. 

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