Tag The New York Review Children’s Collection

Need a House? Call Ms. Mouse!

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Need a House? Call Ms. Mouse!
George Mendoza and Doris Susan Smith
The New York Review Children’s Book Collection

Ms Henrietta Mouse is no ordinary rodent as her company sign board on the title page shows. Her team comprises builders, decorators and designers. We then see Henrietta’s Portfolio, which is pretty sizeable and includes Squirrel’s Treehouse, Trout’s Paradise, Mole’s Manor, Caterpillar’s Cocoon and Lizard’s Cliff House.She would be the first to admit that despite her creativity and imagination, without the help of her loyal, skilled team of mice, she wouldn’t manage.

First of all Henrietta listens to what her clients have in mind: Squirrel, for instance, wanted to feel as though he lives in a spaceship.

Farmer Rabbit needs lots of storage space for his summer crops, so Ms Mouse designs a home with a root cellar and Spider, a music lover, is the proud owner of a recording studio attached to his web.

Be they grand or simple, Henrietta knows what to do to create the house that reflects their lifestyle – the home of their dreams. Her own preference is for the simple life

In his captivating story, author George Mendoza offers readers some information about design and the building process and every one of Ms. Mouse’s creations is a visual feast, thanks to Doris Susan Smith’s intricate pen and ink and watercolour illustrations. These provide a cutaway view for each of the houses, so readers can really appreciate the complexity of their design.

Who wouldn’t want to live in a diverse community such as that of this group of animals.

First published in 1981, it’s good to see this book being made available to a new audience of youngsters.

Our Fort

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Our Fort
Marie Dorléans (translated by Alyson Waters)
New York Review Children’s Collection

Not so much a fort, rather a den, is how I’d describe the ultimate destination of the three children who celebrate the arrival of spring with a visit to their camp.

The story is really more about their journey than the construction they sally forth to find. Their walk takes them past sheep in a field and through billowing grass fields that almost engulf them. After a pause to share some cookies, the sky darkens and a wind storm blows up

and the three – full of ideas about potential adventures – have to fight their way forwards until the storm eventually blows itself out. With concerns about the fate of their fort after such a violent wind, on they go to their haven, which happily has withstood the onslaught and is ready and waiting for their arrival.

As we readers follow the children out through their front door, we too feel immersed in the countryside.

It’s as though we’re also making our way onwards and upwards in Marie Dorléans’ delicately worked, realistic rural scenes of her beautifully observed celebration of children’s ability to observe with all their senses and to find delight in the natural world around them, storms and all. Oh the joy of childhood’s freedom in a rural environment – a joy many adults rediscovered during the covid lockdowns of the past couple of years.

Brookie and Her Lamb / Fish For Supper

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Many years ago I was fortunate to meet M.B. Goffstein in The Children’s Bookstore in Brookline Village near Boston and she signed copies of two of her books – My Noah’s Ark and Natural History both of which I have treasured ever since.

So, I was excited to see that The New York Review Children’s Collection are bringing back into print two of her picture books first published over 45 years ago

Brookie and Her Lamb
Fish for Supper
M.B. Goffstein
The New York Review Children’s Collection

Brookie and her Lamb is a classic tale of a little girl’s unconditional love for her lamb. No matter what she tries to teach him – be that to sing or to read, even to sing songs from a music book, the only sound that emanates from the creature is ‘Baa, baa, baa.’ Nonetheless, despite being a little disheartened, she takes him for a walk to the park, which lifts her spirits. Back at home, she also goes to great lengths to show her appreciation of her friend, providing him a special spot with all the creature comforts a lamb might need,

and a great deal of tenderness too. Sweet and enchanting.

Subtle and utterly delightful in its quirkiness is the story of a grandmother’s daily routine, Fish for Supper. (A Caldecott Honor book 1977).
Of the narrator’s grandmother, we learn that she rises early, makes herself some breakfast, washes up, dons her sunhat and heads off to the water. There, with her simple fruit lunch and fishing gear, she gets into a rowing boat and spends the day fishing on the lake.
Come the evening she heads home carrying her catch in a can. She cleans the fishes then, fries them,

consumes them with care, washes up and goes to bed. Next morning she does the same … .
The characteristic spare line drawings herein are examples of perfect simplicity.

I suspect these little books will probably be of most interest to those studying children’s literature and or, art.

Timeless Tales: I Really Want to See You, Grandma / I Wish I Was Sick, Too!

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I Really Want to See You, Grandma
Taro Gomi
Chronicle Books

First published in Japan (the home of the book’s creator), in 1979, this story about a small girl and her grandmother and their efforts to see one another is now available in English for the first time.

Yumi and her Grandma live some distance apart, Yumi on a hill, her grandma on a mountain, and simultaneously each decides to visit the other – why they didn’t ring one another one can only assume is due to there being no mobile phones in those days.

They both leave home in upbeat mood, Yumi boarding a bus, her Gran taking a train.

Both arrive at the other’s home to discover the muddle and head back to their own homes …

missing each other again.

Will they ever get to meet or are they destined to spend the day passing each other on the way?

Gomi’s illustrations fill in much of the detail not mentioned in his simple text: ‘How come she was allowed to go on a bus without a grown-up?’ my listeners wanted to know after hearing this story of mix-ups and changing emotions.

Those in the early stages of becoming readers may well be able to try this one for themselves having heard the story read aloud first.

I Wish I Was Sick, Too!
Franz Brandenberg and Aliki
The New York Review Children’s Collection

I first came across this book as a young teacher in its Picture Puffin incarnation, I Don’t Feel Well.

It features sibling kittens, Elizabeth and Edward. Elizabeth is resentful of the attention her brother receives when he’s ill in bed. “It isn’t fair! … I wish I was sick, too!” she says.
When her wish comes true a few days later, she realises that, rather than all the attention received, it’s as her brother says, “The best part of being sick is getting well.”

Aliki’s chalky illustrations capture the emotions of the infant cat characters superbly and the story’s as amusing now as it was over three decades ago.

Share and enjoy no matter the state of the listeners’ health; equally, with its clear print and inviting layout, it’s a good book for solo readers to try for themselves.

Poetry Parade

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Silver
Walter de la Mare and Carolina Rabei
Faber & Faber
‘Slowly, silently, now the moon
Walks the night in her silver shoon;
This way, and that, she peers, and sees
Silver fruit upon silver trees;‘ …
It’s lovely to see Carolina Rabei’s enchanting visual interpretation of a de la Mare poem that was a childhood favourite of mine. I still have all the words in my head and often used to visualise a moon wandering silently in those ‘silver shoon’.

The illustrator imbues the whole thing with dreamy magic as she portrays the moon as feline, tiptoeing among the silver fruited tree branches, and then across the ground pursued by two small children and a host of faery folk, past the log-like sleeping dog …

and watched by all manner of nocturnal creatures that all gather in a clearing …

before some of them take a small boat and glide across the water while ‘moveless fish in the water gleam’ and the two children fall fast asleep. AAAHHH! Gorgeous.

Little Lemur Laughing
Joshua Seigal
Bloomsbury Children’s Books
I’m always excited to discover new poets and was delighted to receive a collection from rising star, Joshua Seigal. Playful is the name of the game where these poems are concerned: they cover all manner of topics from food (for instance Johnny and The MANGO wherein a boy retires to a warm tub to consume his favourite tea) to Fireworks; Seagulls to Stickers and Conkers to Colours and Chat. Alliteration abounds – indeed there is a page at the back of the book in which Seigal talks about his use of this in the title poem; there’s a generous sprinkling of concrete poems –

and some, such as Turvy & Topsy are completely bonkers, but went down well with my listeners.
In fact there isn’t a single one that isn’t lots of fun to read aloud to younger primary children. I’d certainly recommend adding this to a KS1 or early years teacher’s collection and buy it for any youngster whom you want to turn on to poetry.

The Fire Horse
Vladimir Mayakovsky, Osip Mandelstam & Daniil Kharms
The New York Review Children’s Collection
This contains three longish poems, one from each of the authors, all being translated by Eugene Ostashevsky and each having a different illustrator. The title poem has wonderful art by Lydia Popova; Mandelastam’s Two Trams artist, Boris Ender, used a limited (almost exclusively, black, grey and red) colour palette for his superbly stylish portrayal of the two tramcars. The final work, Play portrays verbally and visually three boys absorbed in their imaginary play worlds, the illustrations being done by Vladimir Konashevich.
For me, the book’s illustrations make it worthwhile, showing as they do, Soviet book illustrations from almost a century ago.
For book collectors/art connoisseurs rather than general readers, I’d suggest.

I’ve signed the charter 

Take Off and Fly with Fletcher & Zenobia and Rita

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Fletcher and Zenobia
Victoria Chess and Edward Gorey
The New York Review Children’s Collection
Wonderfully wry but then it is Gory, although he didn’t illustrate this one; that was Victoria Chess and a delightfully whimsical job she’s done of it too. It tells of a burgeoning friendship between two unlikely characters, Fletcher a tubby cat who, for reasons known best to himself, resides in a tall tree, and Zenobia, a doll who hatches from a large papier-mâché egg. Oh, I should have mentioned the trunk – that’s also up in the tree and contains an assortment of things including a hat collection and, once Fletcher discovers it, that egg.
Having been released from her eggy prison, Zenobia is eager to learn about her new surroundings but is even more eager to work out a way to descend.
In the meantime, the two agree to have a party, a party that includes a multi-layered lemon cake, peach ice-cream and fruit punch, a fair number of balloons and those hats – of course, the hats …

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and dancing. The latter is interrupted by a new arrival, one that appears to be an ace dancer with an enormous capacity for ice-cream and cake. And it’s this, or more precisely, the resulting increase in the moth’s size that enables Fletcher and Zenobia to finally bid farewell to the tree and take off into the great wide world of beyond …

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So good to see this one available again: a lovely book to share but equally, a good one to offer newly independent readers.

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Rita Rides Again
Rita on the River
Hilda Offen
Troika Books
I remember Rita the Rescuer, youngest member of the Potter family, from my early teaching days when this smart young miss delighted many of my ‘just becoming independent’ readers. Now she’s back with some new adventures to entertain a new generation of children. In the first story, the Potter children accompany Grandad to the castle where he’s a guide and it’s not long before Rita is required to transform herself into rescuing mode and save a valuable vase from destruction. That’s not the only thing she deals with though; there’s a ghost to see off, not to mention a whole flock of furious peacocks and a monster in the lake.

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But there’s still more excitement and rescuing of the Rita kind too, in this book and you can be assured that all the time the young heroine is making good use of her thinking skills.
The same is true in the second story. Herein her superhero tactics are called into play almost immediately on a picnic expedition when she’s left sitting on the riverbank while Grandpa and the older children take to the water in boats. It’s not her family members who need rescuing straightaway however, but a puppy. Before long though Grandpa is up the river without a paddle or rather, up the pole without the punt …

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and there’s only one person fast enough to pull off that particular rescue. But Rita’s work is far from done: people seem to end up in all manner of life-threatening situations on the river, so it’s just as well, she took her special outfit along on this expedition. There’s an Eddie and Jim crocodile encounter and a dramatic waterfall snatch to perform before the whole family finally sits down to share that picnic. And the best thing is – and it’s something readers revel in – that none of the rescued knows the identity of the Rescuer.

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Will & Nill / Donkey Donkey

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Will & Nill
Farhad Hasanzadeh and Atieh Markazi
Tiny Owl Publishing
Will and Nill are two alley cats, both very hungry. That’s about their only similarity though, for while Will is up and about at cock-crow, Nill yawns and continues to doze. Having tried unsuccessfully to persuade his friend to join him, off goes Will alone. Not to forage first though, for he accepts the invitation to play hide-and-seek with a passing sparrow –

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at least it provides a distraction from an empty tummy. Not only that but he is eventually rewarded by a half-eaten fish he discovers poking out from the top of the sparrow’s third hiding place.

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Then having promised another game the following day, Will sets about sating his appetite on the tasty treat that awaits him before returning to an even hungrier Nill, and a contented sleep.
This fable playfully demonstrates that making just a little effort can make a big difference. There are probably elements of both Nill and Will in all of us, but unexpected good fortune seldom comes to those who do nothing: serendipity seems to favour those that have a bit of get up and go.
The flat, almost perspectiveless renditions of both cats and cityscapes are at once arresting and wryly winsome; and despite Nill’s somnolence, Atieh Markazi really does manage to bring both characters to life in her cat portraits.

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Donkey Donkey
Roger Duvoisin
The New York Review Children’s Collection
Meet Donkey-donkey (or maybe reacquaint yourself with same, as this story was first published over sixty years ago). He has plenty of friends and a very kind master …

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and plenty of his favourite food to eat. Everything is as it should be – yes? No actually; for as having caught sight of his reflection in the stream, our Donkey becomes dissatisfied with his appearance, his long ears being the particular cause for a sudden attack of self ridicule. Off goes the tearful creature to seek advice from various other animals as to how best to sport those super-sized sound receptors of his.

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Having consulted all the farmyard animals and done his utmost to alter his appearance with some very amusing and sometimes painful results …

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Donkey-donkey eventually comes around to accepting his ears as the beautiful appendages they truly are.
Self-acceptance and appreciating our own uniqueness are oft-explored themes in picture books but, with its direct narrative and delightfully droll watercolour illustrations, this golden oldie still packs a punch.

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Arthur

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Arthur
Rhoda Levine and Everett Aison
New York Review Books Children’s Collection
When dreamy, thoughtful, Arthur misses the call from his fellow birds to join them and fly South, it seems he’s in for a sorry time spending the winter alone in New York City. Arthur however, is of a determined nature. He finds a home, or two, an old man to supply him daily breakfast crumbs and things to amuse himself with. Observing the rush hour comings and goings morning and evening from his first ‘ perfect solution to his housing problem’ – grating in the pavement – being one of his occupations.

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“New Yorkers are changing shape,” he comments when everyone dons their winter gear against the chilly winds … “People can be entertaining.” … “I am growing. I am learning. I am an acute observer.” And assuredly he is, especially when yogi-like, he stands on his head to help himself think and ultimately find a permanent home.
“Find Arthur.” Is his solution to the potential boredom issue: a solo hide-and-seek game played according to strict rules he invents using the steam issuing from a manhole cover: a great pastime for a private bird like himself.
Highlights of his time include the icy rainfall (Arthur becomes a poet over this), followed by the coming and going of a huge evergreen tree in the square. Arthur takes a holiday among the green branches. Then come the Christmas lights adorning the same and delighting all around, but gone after four days, only to be followed rapidly by snowfall. What fun this provides our feathered pal,

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although the flying snowballs are no competition. “White balls are low on flying power,” Arthur decides about the snowballs that, unlike him, always fall to earth.

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With the melting of the snow, Arthur feels a lightening of his heart as the days gradually grow warmer until finally, there they are once again: his migratory friends returned from southern climes. But do they want to hear all about Arthur’s cold and wonderful time? Oh dear me no: “Think what joy you missed.” they comment to Arthur as …

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We leave Arthur as we found him riding the roads of Central Park , ‘gazing at himself in the taillight of a hansom cab. He was enjoying himself immensely.’
Altogether enchanting and brilliantly witty is Rhoda Levine’s bird’s eye view of a New York City winter from the perspective of one experiencing it for the first time. Arthur is something of a philosopher and his thirst for experiences and zest for life are truly admirable. His time is beautifully visualized too, through Everett Aison’s charcoal and watercolour pictures that have an appropriately stark quality about them.
This book should delight both those familiar with New York winters and those who, like Arthur as the story starts, have no experience of it. To appreciate Arthur’s spontaneous joy in the face of the challenges he meets, readers/listeners would probably need to be at least eight and going right through to ninety eight.

Two other recent reissues of neo classics  for slightly older readers from the same publisher, both of which I loved as a child are the wonderful:

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The 13 Clocks
James Thurber and Neil Gaiman
This fairy tale of a book is one  every child should have in his or her collection.
as is:
The Pushcart War
Jean Merrill and Ronni Solbert

And finally a ghostly read:

last apirit

The Last of the Spirits
Chris Priestly
Bloomsbury Children’s Books
Chris Priestly tells a chilling ghostly tale, one that essentially takes the Dickens original to another dimension. We are transported to the Christmas Eve streets of Victorian London where we meet, cold and starving, teenager Sam and his younger sister, Lizzie. Having begged an old businessman for money to buy food, Sam is filled with rage and hatred at the contemptuous sneer he receives from him (you can guess the character’s identity) and swears vengeance. He is then visited by warning spirits telling/showing him the possible outcome, should he choose to follow that path of vengeance. The question is: will Sam be able to resist his initial urge?
Yes, this book is fairly short and can easily be read at a single sitting – indeed the power of the story drove me to do so – but its haunting power grips me still.
Powerfully compelling: but read it yourself first before offering it to anyone under eleven.

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