 Eleven-year-old Thomasine lives in her great-great Aunt Henrietta’s dusty, dark house with her father and her aunt, uncle, and cousins. The relatives are all troubled in one way or another. There are no mirrors in the house. Except one night, the youngest cousin finds a wardrobe, filled with all the missing mirrors. The mirror images reveal other sides of the old house and a mysterious young girl. Twenty magical black and white illustrations enhance this moving ghost story. mjw |
| Title: A House Without Mirrors Author: Marten Sanden Illustrator: Moa Schulman Publisher: Pushkin Children’s Books Copyright: 2013 Original language: Swedish Translator: Karin Altenberg Original title: Ett hus utan speglar Original publisher: Rabén & Sjögen Original copyright: 2012 ISBN: 978-1782690078 Paperback pages: 192 Age range: 9-11 Genre: Fiction Author’s residence: Sweden Illustrator’s residence: Sweden Subjects: Europe, Ghost stories, Northern Europe, Sweden |
A House Without Mirrors
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Hamda feels left out. She wants to make necklaces, go shopping, and bake cakes like her older sisters do. She has also made up her mind that she wants to wear the veil. She chooses four different scarves and unsuccessfully tries four different ways to wear them. She finally finds her own special way to prove she’s a big girl. Told in five short chapters and illustrated with bold, colorful patterns, this entertaining story focuses on the Muslim experience of wearing the veil mjw
When Stanley Potts’s Uncle Ernie, who cans pilchards, sardines, and mackerel in the living room, tins Stanley’s beloved goldfish, Stanley decides to leave home. He joins a traveling carnival of wacky characters and gets a job washing plastic ducks for the “Hook A Duck” master, Mr. Dostoyevsky. He meets Pancho Pirelli, who swims with piranhas and believes that Stanley could be his successor. Wonderful and quirky things happen to “good and true” Stanley as he seeks his own way. Stylized cartoon drawings add humor. mjw
In 2002, ten-year-old Enaiatollah Akbari’s village in Afghanistan fell prey to the Taliban. His mother sent him alone to fend for himself. Dangerous border crossings, trekking on foot across snow-covered mountains in Turkey, hiding in a false bottom of a truck, and steering an inflatable dinghy to Greece are some of the seemingly insurmountable and unimaginable obstacles he faced on his five year journey to Italy, where he sought political asylum. This is an incredible story of courage, hope, and survival reconstructed from Eniat’s memories by Italian novelist Fabio Geda. A map of Eniat’s journey is included. mjw
Twenty-one emotions that a child encounters are portrayed by fish in this splashy, simple concept book. Each double page spread presents one dazzling fish against a dark, deep sea background, expressing a particular emotion and its name in a font style and color that also conveys the emotion. Fish are curious, proud, loving, confused, shocked, and much more until finally delighted. The red, turquoise, chartreuse, magenta, and other neon-like oil pastel scribbly drawings are radiant. mjw
In these thirteen eccentric fairytales, written by one of the most successful twentieth century French authors for children, quick-witted young people overcome greedy kings, wicked witches, giants, naughty pigs, magical spells, and even silly names like Lustucru. Shoes fall in love, a doll can see everything, and a potato wants to be a French fry. Absurd line drawings illustrate these tales where good is always rewarded and evil is always punished. mjw
While on an expedition to the Himalayas, aristocratic young Lady Agatha Farlingham is kidnapped by a yeti father and his family. She stays to teach the kindly yeti English speech, good manners, and fairytales. Decades later, she transports the yetis back to her ancestral home in England for safety. They journey through Asia and Europe, liberate a zoo, save Alpine rescue dogs, and interrupt a Spanish bullfight. Upon arrival to England, the yetis are met by hateful Abominable snowman hunters. But, British school children and royalty save the day in this whimsical story with its message of human rights and environmentalism. mjw
Detailed, delicate drawings depict the Great Car Race on Mouse Day starting in front of the Mouse Assembly Hall and the grand prize is The Ultimate Piece of Cheese. It’s the biggest cheese anyone has ever seen. Easygoing Taro with his yellow scarf, mechanic Kuro with his knotted tail, young Chibi with her green bracelet, curious Guro with one blue sock, and gentle Shiro with her long tail team up to design an unbeatable racecar. After overcoming many obstacles they cross the finish line and throw the Ultimate Cheese Party, where everyone is a winner. mjw
In this cautionary ecological parable, best friends Hulda and Brimir, live on a beautiful, tranquil blue planet that is inhabited by children who never grow old. One day, a grown-up, Gleesome Goodday, “Dream Come True Maker and joy bringer,” crashes his spaceship on the beach. He sprinkles all the children with sun-activated fly powder, nails the sun in the sky so it can always be play time, and charges them a bit of their youth. When the children fly to the other side of the planet and see sickly, pale, dying children, they realize the Goodday is not all that he seems. mjw
This lively rhyme with bright, avant-garde illustrations tells of a lady who gets on the train with a suitcase, a hatbox, a couch, a painting, a package, a pouch, and a cute little pooch. During the journey, an enormous shaggy dog is substituted for the pooch. When the astonished woman claims her baggage, she is told that her dog grew up on the trip. This is a reproduction in size and layout of the Russian book, which was first published in 1926 to mold the minds of the children of the revolution. The original Russian text is included. mjw
Travel the world and explore cultural similarities and differences in the United States, France, Nigeria, Italy, Russia, Brazil, India, Australia, England, and Japan. Inviting short verses describe the vibrant, busy cityscapes. More than eighty hidden flaps open to reveal lively details. A woman makes a call in a phone box in London, a violinist steps onstage at the Sydney Opera House, ballerinas take class in Russia, and a man rides a camel in Nigeria. The challenge is to identify the many landmarks, flags, and clues.mjw
This small format story is about a child who walks home from school along the same road every day. It builds over seven sequences. The first contains three images: school, path, and home. The next builds to school, street, path, forest, and home. New words and images are added: a blue witch, a pipe-smoking stranger, foxlike bandits, a hot air balloon, a kidnapped queen, and more, until the child’s world has become enormous. Layer upon layer of bewitching silkscreen tableaux grow in strangeness in this allegory of life’s complexity. mjw
