I Want My Hat Back

“Have you seen my hat?” / “No. I haven’t seen your hat.” / “OK. Thank you anyway.”

I’d like to say that great works of art have been built on less, but I doubt it’s true. However, I Want My Hat Back, written and illustrated by Jon Klassen (who received the 2010 Canadian Governor General’s Award for his illustrations in Cat’s Night Out by Caroline Stutson, and worked on the animated film Coraline), is a lovely children’s book, all the same.

The story is simple: the bear, pictured on the cover, has lost his hat, and wants to find it again. He asks the other creatures he encounters whether they have seen his hat, but none of them have–or so they say.

It’s difficult to convey the humor of the book without simply including the whole book in this post. The simple, sparse illustrations, together with the simple, repetitive dialogue, are charming, and the ending, when the bear realizes where his hat is, and goes to retrieve it, is hilarious. The calm, understated way the bear goes about asking after his hat, and his despair when he can’t find it (“What if I never see it again? What if nobody ever finds it? My poor hat. I miss it so much.”) combine to make a very funny scene, too.

Though I’ve not tested this one with kids myself, the prevailing sentiment seems to be that both children and adults find it very funny. I personally recommend it to anyone looking for a humorous children’s book, and anyone who just wants their hat back.

The Truth About Stacey

Stacey moved to Stoneybrook, Connecticut from New York City. Her friends in New York abandoned her when she discovered that she had diabetes, and until she met Claudia, she didn’t have any friends in Stoneybrook, either. But, she was invited to the Baby-Sitters Club, and now she’s friends with Kristy and Mary Anne, too.

Life’s settled into a pleasant pattern of baby-sitting and hanging out with her friends, when the members of the Baby-Sitters Club learn that a new group, the Baby-Sitters Agency, are moving in on their territory. On top of that, Stacey’s parents want to take her to yet another doctor, hoping for a miracle cure to her diabetes, when all she wants is to go to school and stay with her friends. What’s Stacey to do?

The Truth About Stacey is the third book in Ann M. Martin’s The Baby-Sitters Club series. This time, the story is told from Stacey’s point of view.

I like the story in this one very much–both major plotlines are well-done and have good messages. The Baby-Sitters Agency, in the persons of Liz and Michelle, provides a good ‘villain’ for the story, and when the members of the Baby-Sitters Club begin to suspect that their rivals may not be such responsible baby-sitters as they make themselves out to be, it provides a good lesson about what’s really important: to be responsible and ethical, even in the face of a challenge. To beat their rivals not through trickery, but by being better baby-sitters. Of course, the lesson in corporate espionage writ small is probably useful, too.

The second plotline, with Stacey’s parents dragging her about the country in search of a cure for diabetes is well done, too. As Dr. Graham points out at the end: “Stacey seems incredibly healthy . . . and that comes from one thing only: regulating the amount of insulin in her body.” Seeking miracle cures for diseases is not productive, and I hope that children who read this book will grow up to be skeptical of such things. If everyone were as sensible as Stacey, the world would be a better (and healthier) place.

I must say, I really like the technique of writing each of these books from a different character’s point of view. It both gives us insight into how the characters feel about themselves and one another, and prevents the repetition of the premise in each book from getting too stale. Rather than Kristy telling us three times that she had the great idea for the Baby-Sitters Club, we get to hear instead how the formation of the club affected each of the members. Very well done, indeed.

The Truth About Stacey is, like the other books in the series, a great middle grade book, with both excellent story and characterization, and I’d recommend it without reservation to anyone looking for middle grade fiction.

Also like the other books in the series, The Truth About Stacey is now available as an ebook for the Kindle, so ebook readers can join in the fun, too.

The Berenstain Bears and Too Much Junk Food – Kindle Comparison

When I reviewed the first two Berenstain Bears books, The Big Honey Hunt and The Bike Lesson, I mentioned that although they were available for the Kindle, I wasn’t sure how good a colorful children’s picture book would look on the grayscale e-ink screen of the Kindle.

On account of the recently reduced prices for Kindles, I have just purchased a Kindle Keyboard, which I’m enjoying, so far. After I’d played around with it a bit, I remembered my previous concern for how picture books would look, and decided I’d find out. I looked around a little, and ultimately got a sample of The Berenstain Bears and Too Much Junk Food.

To begin the comparison, let’s first look at the beginning of the print version.

I’ve not bothered to scan the whole right page, but you can see enough for our purposes. Next, let’s look at the sample on Kindle for PC.

You can see (if you click the image to view it full-sized) that the illustration is quite small. However, it has had the top of the tree drawn in, which I suppose is nice. The next paragraph, which, in the print version, is on the same page, has been moved to a new page in the Kindle version.

What exactly has happened, here? These two pages are both showing parts of the original illustration, but in the second, the tree house has been removed, and the illustration from the right page has been joined up with the remaining illustration from the left page. The illustration is, again, quite small.

I suppose that the book looks okay on Kindle for PC, but it’s not the same as the print version. The illustrations are difficult to see and have been redrawn a bit, but not (as far as I can see from the sample) with much creativity–no fun revelations here.

How about on the actual Kindle, then?

I should note that on the actual Kindle, the contrast is much better–the background is significantly lighter than it appears in this picture.

Of course, it looks substantially similar to the pictures of Kindle for PC, which is natural since it’s the same book sample. However, two things are immediately apparent: first, the tiny, grainy images on the Kindle screen remind me of the web circa 1996; second, without the color, these images just aren’t that nice.

In my opinion, these books aren’t really worth purchasing for the Kindle. The artwork is really what carries these books, and it’s simply not reproduced well on the Kindle–neither the actual Kindle nor the Kindle for PC software. This isn’t entirely the fault of the Kindle itself–the artwork looks bad in the file the Kindle is displaying, so of course it can’t make it look any better. Still, if this book is representative of the quality of the Berenstain Bears books on the Kindle, I’d strongly recommend buying paper versions, instead.

Meena

“The children of Fly Street were afraid of Meena. ‘Meena is a witch,’ Christa declared. ‘She eats toads,’ Klaas shouted. ‘She drinks blood,’ Thomas added.”

Christa, Klaas, and Thomas are afraid of Meena, and when they find a girl, Anna, that has clearly been bewitched by Meena, they try to warn her, only for her to angrily reply that Meena is not a witch–she’s Anna’s grandmother! Could the three children be wrong about Meena?

Meena is a children’s picture book by Sine van Mol, illustrated by Carianne Wijffels. Originally published in Dutch in 2010, as Mina lieverd, and English version is scheduled to be published on September 15, 2011 by Eerdmans Books for Young Readers.

The first thing I noticed about this book–surely the first thing anyone would notice–is the unique art style. Or, more correctly, the unique art styles. The book contains two very different kinds of art. The children imagine Meena to be a witch, so we see Meena-as-a-witch drawn in crayon in a simple style by the children. The real events of the story, on the other hand, are drawn in a much more detailed style–especially noticeable are the very detailed patterns of the clothing. Each kind of illustration is very nice and appropriate, and the contrast between the two styles provides a wonderful effect.

The story is pretty simple: the children believe Meena to be a witch, but when they meet her granddaughter and taste her cherry pie, they learn that she is just a kind old woman. It is too simple to be engaging as a story for older readers–I fear that the children at the top end of the 5-9 age range the book suggests may find it slightly dull–but the art is interesting enough, I think, for even adults to find the book worthwhile.

I’d recommend Meena for young children, especially those just beginning to read. Anyone can enjoy the beautiful illustrations, though, so you might consider it for both older readers and children not quite up to reading by themselves, yet.

Disclosure: this review is based on an advance copy received free for review.

Claudia and the Phantom Phone Calls

Claudia, Stacey, Kristy, and Mary Anne formed the Baby-sitters Club a few weeks ago, and since then, things have been going well: they’ve had plenty of business, and no big trouble with the kids they’re baby-sitting. Lately, though, there’s been news of a thief, dubbed the Phantom Caller, who calls people, hangs up, and then later steals their jewelry. And he seems to be moving closer to Stoneybrook, where the girls live.

On top of all this, the boy Claudia likes, Trevor Sandbourne, doesn’t seem to know she exists, and the school dance, the Halloween Hop, is coming up. Claudia’s sister, Janine, is as unbearable as usual, and although Claudia tries to work on their relationship, like her grandmother suggested, there’s just not enough time!

Claudia and the Phantom Phone Calls is a middle-grade novel, the second in the Baby-Sitters Club series by Ann M. Martin. It’s told from Claudia’s point of view.

The change from Kristy’s point of view in Kristy’s Great Idea to Claudia’s in this book is good. Despite Claudia repeating a lot of events that happened in the previous book, it’s still interesting, since we get to heat her perspective on the events and on her friends. It might get a little old if there’s that much repetition in future books, but it’s not too bad, this time.

The story is great. There are several plotlines going at once. Primarily, the girls are trying to be brave and babysit while they’re worried about the Phantom Caller, and this just intensifies when they start getting mysterious phone calls, with the caller hanging up without speaking. This plotline is great, and there’s some real suspense when they’re babysitting and they hear strange noises and receive phone calls like those from the Phantom Caller. You know that they’re bound to be all right in the end, but could there be a thief, waiting to break into the homes, while they’re babysitting?

The second plotline, with Claudia hoping that Trevor will ask her to the dance, gives us plenty of opportunity to see how all the girls feel about the subject of boys, and is a good secondary plot for the novel.

Finally, Claudia’s desire to improve her relationship with her sister, though showing up rarely throughout the book, provides a good reminder that these characters have more going on in their lives than just the main events of the book, and gives a sense that they’re real people with real relationships, rather than just characters in a story, serving only the purpose of furthering the plot.

Claudia and the Phantom Phone Calls is another great middle-grade novel, and a good followup to Kristy’s Great Idea. It’s definitely worth reading, and, like the previous book in the series, will be available as an ebook for the Kindle starting October 1, 2011.

Kristy’s Great Idea

Kristy, Mary Anne, and Claudia are twelve years old, and each of them baby-sits for pocket money. After her mother calls many people, trying to find a baby-sitter, Kristy has a great idea. They should form a baby-sitters club, so that people can just call one number to get access to three baby-sitters.

Claudia invites Stacey, a girl who just moved from New York, to join them, and they set up meeting times, post flyers, and even take out an ad in the newspaper. Calls start coming in, and things are looking up, but there are troubles, too: Kristy’s first job is baby-sitting a pair of dogs, Stacey seems to be hiding something, and to top it all off, Kristy’s mother might be getting remarried! Will the club stay together, or will they be torn apart?

Kristy’s Great Idea is the first book in the Baby-Sitters Club series by Ann M. Martin. A middle grade novel, it focuses on the characters and their relationships, as they’re forming a club.

The characters are really well done. The (one-sided) cold war between Kristy and Watson, her mother’s boyfriend, is an excellent B-plot for the novel, both keeping things moving between club meetings and filling out Kristy’s character. Since the book is told from Kristy’s point of view, Stacy, Claudia, and Mary Anne don’t get as much development, but we still see enough to get a feel for them, and I’m sure we’ll get much more in-depth pictures of them in future books in the series.

I called Watson’s plotline the B-plot, but it really gets about equal time with the establishment of the club and the girls’ interactions. And it works well, that way. When Kristy is interacting with Watson, of course that’s what’s foremost in her mind, so it gets center stage, and so it never feels like Kristy’s a one-trick pony, a babysitter foremost and everything else a distant second, as it can feel when books focus too much on a single aspect of a character. Instead, Kristy seems like a real person, with the several concerns that one would expect of someone in her situation.

As for the club and the girls’ interactions: also great. When Kristy hit on the idea, near the beginning, to establish the club, I realized I’d already begun to become invested in her character, because I felt a little sense of accomplishment on her behalf, for the idea. The relationships between the four girls aren’t identical, either, which is good: Mary Anne and Kristy are closer to one another than to Claudia, and only Claudia is acquainted with Stacey, initially, so there’s a much more interesting dynamic between the four than would be the case if Martin had (lazily) just said that they were all four best friends, and left it at that, as some books tend to do.

The girls are quite self-reliant, for twelve-year-olds. They draw up and distribute flyers for themselves, only relying on an adult to photocopy them, and they (apparently) place the ad in the newspaper on their own, as well. That’s not to say that they have no adult supervision. Actually, the struggles between parent and child form a much larger part of these books than is usual–often, parents are quite absent in middle grade fiction, in order to let the children take center stage, but in Kristy’s Great Idea, the girls must take into account their parents’ wishes when making plans, and the differing rules and expectation their parents have of them. It all comes together to create a set of fairly realistic, admirably self-reliant twelve-year-olds, and their families with them.

I could say much more about the book’s wit or how particular interactions between the characters are well done, but in the interest of brevity, let me say only this: Kristy’s Great Idea is a great book. If you’re interested in a book with well-realized characters and a character-driven story, read this.

Kristy’s Great Idea is also available as an ebook for the Kindle.

More Bones: Scary Stories from Around the World

A haunted bell, made from the armor of a cruel baron who was murdered by the peasants of his village, which foretells disasters. A beautiful woman whose suitors are flee from her, screaming, when she is alone with them. A school of magic with a terrible price. An angry mermaid that grants wishes that turn back upon the fisherman who angered her.

You’ll find these and other frightening folk tales in More Bones: Scary Stories from Around the World by Arielle North Olson and Howard Schwartz. This book retells 22 stories from diverse places, such as Ireland, Germany, Egypt, Spain, Japan, China, and more.

This book is very much in the vein of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, though aimed at a slightly older audience, and with somewhat less frightening illustrations drawn by E. M. Gist. Also like that book, More Bones includes a bibliography listing the sources of the stories retold within. This is a nice feature, especially since the books are generally old enough to be in the public domain, like Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry by W. B. Yeats.

The stories are something of a mixed bag. Some of them are quite good, if simple, like “Youth Without Age” or “The Severed Head,” while others are fairly dull, like “The Haunted Violin.” There are more hits than misses, though.

Some of the artwork is close to being as frightening as that in Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, though I don’t like it quite as well. This may just be a result of nostalgia, though–the illustrations are good.

More Bones is a great book for someone who wants something a little more mature than Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, and the bibliography will provide plenty of additional stories, for those who are interested. Definitely pick it up if you’re interested in scary folk tales.

For those who prefer ebooks, More Bones is available for the Kindle, too.

Barbie and The Rockers: The Fan

Delia wins a contest to spend a weekend with Barbie and The Rockers, for her essay “What Music Means to Me.” Delia is to try out for a place at the Los Angeles High School of Music, and has been practicing hard with her violin. When she sees the glamorous lifestyle of The Rockers, though, she decides she’ll give up violin and learn to play guitar, so she can join the band. The Rockers show Delia that being in a rock band isn’t all fun, though–it’s a lot of hard work, too. So, Delia decides to keep practicing with her violin, and The Rockers promise her a seat at any of their concerts.

Barbie and The Rockers: The Fan, written by Teddy Slater and illustrated by Tom Tierney, features characters from the popular Barbie toys. My summary above makes the book sound like a pretty good book for kids, but it’s got some problems, too.

First, the book (like the toys, I suppose) implies that the kind of ‘glamorous’ clothing worn by the band is something that Delia (and, by proxy, all girls) should be envious of, and that they should feel that ordinary clothing is inadequate. It says that Delia “was dazzled by the glittering clothes and couldn’t help comparing them with her own skirt and sweater. She felt painfully plain–especially when Derek’s eyes lit up at the sight of Diva modeling one of the outfits.” But Delia is wearing a perfectly nice outfit. One might expect the book to give the lesson that it’s not necessary to dress in flashy clothing, and that it’s the person, not the clothes, that matters, but it doesn’t. The message from the book is that Delia is right to be ashamed of her (relatively) simple clothing, and that if girls want to attract the eyes of someone like Derek, they must also dress in fancy clothing. Bad lesson.

As for the lesson that it’s hard work being in a rock band: well, that’s true, but that’s all the lesson is. They just have Delia watch them spend a few hours trying to record an album, and she decides that it’s too much work, and that’s that. They mention that when Delia has a violin concert, they want tickets, because they’re fans of her, too, but that just comes out of the blue. The book doesn’t really push the message that Delia’s hard work practicing with the violin is also valuable, or anything like that. The book just says that being in a rock band and wearing expensive clothing is way better than anything else, but you have to spend time recording music in order to do it. And… that’s it.

The art is weird. The characters are often in very odd poses, with strange facial expressions. Delia has a pretty much continuous blush, and everyone tends to have an odd open-mouthed look, all the time. And their outfits and hair are just hilarious.

Barbie and The Rockers: The Fan isn’t wholly unsalvageable, but it misses plenty of opportunities for good lessons, and seems to teach very bad lessons. I can’t recommend this one.

The Berenstain Bears in the Freaky Funhouse

It’s summer, and Brother and Sister Bear, Cousin Fred, and Queenie McBear can’t agree on what to do. Luckily for them, the circus comes to town. In order to raise money for a new hospital wing, Ralph Ripoff has asked his friend, Captain Billy, to bring his circus to town, and share the profits with Dr. Gert Grizzly, for the hospital. But something seems crooked about this circus. Will the cubs uncover the truth about the circus and save the new hospital wing, or will they be sleeping with the fishes?

The Berenstain Bears in the Freaky Funhouse by Stan and Jan Berenstain is a children’s chapter book starring the Berenstain Bears. Unlike the picture books, which feature full-page, full-color illustrations, this book features mostly smaller, black-and-white illustrations, plus a few full-page, black-and-white illustrations.

The art is pretty good, even without any color. The expressions on the bears’ faces are, as usual for a Berenstain Bears book, odd, but this time the strange expressions are evil grins on the bad guys’ faces, so that’s fine. There are plenty of great illustrations of the circus, including the crooked games. Seeing Cousin Fred struggle to lift the weighted bottle is great.

The story is pretty good. The mystery of exactly who is cheating whom, and how the cubs will save the hospital wing, is very nice, for a children’s book, but the bears’ acting as the authors’ voices is, as usual, annoying. It’s inconsistent, too: here, Cousin Fred insists that video games will rot your brain, and he’d rather do anything than play games, but in The Berenstain Bears Count Their Blessings, we learn that Cousin Fred has a large video game collection, which Brother Bear is jealous of. Of course, in that book, Mama complains about Brother’s desire for video games, so we get an anti-gaming message, either way.

It’s also a bit irritating when Mama insists that she will not tolerate cubs gossiping about grown-ups, and then she and Papa immediately proceed to do exactly that. I’d initially thought that it was going to be a lesson for Papa, that grown-ups, too, shouldn’t talk about others behind their backs, but, no, it was just a lesson that kids should never question adults. Later, when a whole group of the adults are gossiping about Dr. Gert and Ralph, and Sister interjects with a comment, Mama again scolds her for gossiping. It’s just hypocrisy, frankly.

But there are some good lessons in there, too. Always read things before you sign them, for one. Be wary of anyone that claims they’re doing evil for good reasons, for another. Don’t trust carnival games, too.

The Berenstain Bears in the Freaky Funhouse is a fun book. I spent about twenty minutes reading it, so it might provide an hour or two of good entertainment for a child, especially given the interesting illustrations. Definitely a good book for fans of the Berenstain Bears.

The Girl in the Painting

Carla is the new girl at school, and somehow she’s been voted to be in the auction for the Fall Ball. The rumor is that it must be a joke being played on her by Troy Lester and his friends, and Carla agrees. After all, she’s no prize, or so she imagines. But when Troy bids on her–and wins–at the auction, she’s not sure what to do.

Though my last experience with romance novels was somewhat less than satisfactory, I thought I’d give them another shot, though I didn’t want to commit too much time to being so fair-minded. So, I read The Girl in the Painting by Eve Bunting, a “Fastback Romance.” Despite being bound as a single book, it’s really more of a short story–a little more than five thousand words, I guess.

The story was written in 1978, and I don’t know if it’s just me, or that time marches on, but the way the girls were talking about being sold in the auction, and fetching a good price, was distinctly creepy to me. It was also weird that Carla skipped a class to go home and do housework while she tried to decide what to do. Okay, sure, I might clean a room when I’ve got something on my mind, too, but frankly, after all the talk of selling the girls, it just struck me as having unfortunate implications.

These things aside, though, the story isn’t bad. Bunting manages to fit in a little moral ambiguity in the 37 pages of The Girl in the Painting: as it turns out, initially, Troy did have Carla voted into the auction as a joke, but he came to see that she was an interesting person, and ‘bought’ her because he really wanted to go to the ball with her. There’s complication, provided by Lorraine, and the resolution is fairly satisfying.

One further note, regarding the cover. The two people on the cover don’t match Carla and Troy (who I suppose they’re meant to be) at all. Neither is wearing glasses, and, frankly, there’s no way the girl on the cover could be mistaken for being unattractive. I suppose they wanted the cover to be appealing, to sell the book, but it’s a shame, given that the message of the book is that it’s what’s below the surface that counts.

The Girl in the Painting is a decent, quick read, if you can find it, though I wouldn’t go out of my way to get a copy. It reminds me of the short stories that filled the anthologies we used in English classes in middle school–not a bad thing, but nothing worth writing home about, either.