picture books

[whiskery review + recipe] The World of Peter Rabbit: Peter’s Nature Walk

~ jama ~ 13 Comments

Chirp chirp, ribbet ribbet, whoo whoo!

Have you heard the buzzzzzz? Just listen.

This is the time of year when curious bunnies venture out of their burrows for a good look around. Since 2023 is the Year of the Rabbit, who better to celebrate Easter with than our good friend Peter?

He’s very excited about his new interactive picture book, Peter’s Nature Walk (Puffin Books, 2023). Just released in February, it tells about his delightful dawn to dusk amble around the countryside with his mother and sisters, Flopsy, Mopsy, and Cotton-tail. 

What makes this book extra special is that on each page there is a special “Press Here” button, so readers can hear the sounds of birds, bugs, and frogs, along with the rustling of leaves and the rummaging of squirrels! There are ten wonderful sounds in all, including opening music, so it feels like we’re right there with them! 🙂

As the story opens, Peter and his family are greeted by the blackbird’s morning song. After breakfast, they head outside, where Mrs. Rabbit points out several nearby trees – oak, horse chestnut, and sycamore (the ladybirds are eating mildew off its leaves) – while Peter’s sisters make bark rubbings. 

As the sun rises higher in the sky, they wander through the meadow for a picnic by the pond, stopping to admire marching ants. Peter learns how crickets and grasshoppers make their sounds. 

When they finally reach the pond, they’re greeted by Mr. Jeremy Fisher, who is surrounded by noisy animals. Not to worry, as Jeremy loves to hear “the ducks quacking and the gentle fluttering of dragonfly wings.” As Peter and his sisters feast on pudding, pie, berries, and tarts, they’re serenaded by the ribbits and croaks of tadpoles who have finally turned into frogs.

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[guest post] Roxanne Troup on My Grandpa, My Tree, and Me

~ jama ~ 12 Comments

Like many stories, the final product of MY GRANDPA, MY TREE, AND ME is much more than the sum of its parts. And while I don’t know that I set out to write an intergenerational story, it became that through the process of revision.

The first spark of an idea for this story came about when I encountered a YouTube video of a commercial pecan harvest. I watched as a tractor with a padded arm grabbed hold of a tree and shook. Thousands of pecans thundered to the ground like torrential rain!

Though I’d grown up around farming, and knew a bit about mechanized harvesting, I was in awe. I’d never seen pecans harvested by tractor. I didn’t even know they made attachments for that! When we harvested pecans in Missouri, we gathered them by hand like the wild products they were. I was fascinated with the dichotomy of commercial harvesting versus home-harvesting and knew kids would find the process curious as well. But I needed an organic way to highlight both processes. When the phrase, “But not my tree,” came to me, I knew I’d found a story mechanism that could work.

My pre-draft (Yep, I just made that up. It’s the “draft” where all your ideas go—in no particular order.) was messy. It focused on the care and harvesting of pecans but wasn’t really a story. As a matter of fact, I never even finished it. But I also didn’t throw it away. I’d been reading, writing, and critiquing long enough to know it had elements I could work with. It included the refrain—“But not my tree”—that would stay with the story throughout each iteration. It hinted at a seasonal structure. And it had a nice child-like voice. I also never finished my first…or second…or third draft. When something isn’t working, I have a tendency to just stop and start again, taking what I learned in that partial draft to the next one (which I don’t recommend to anyone, but it is part of my process). 

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[sweet review] On the Corner of Chocolate Avenue by Tziporah Cohen and Steven Salerno

~ jama ~ 17 Comments

“One is only happy in proportion as he makes others feel happy.” ~ Milton Hershey

Go ahead: break off a piece of Hershey bar and savor its rich chocolaty goodness as it slowly melts in your mouth. Mmmmmm! Did you know those rectangular sections are called ‘pips’? 🙂

Hershey’s chocolate defined my childhood.

When I was growing up, I simply had to have a Hershey’s Milk Chocolate bar whenever I went to the movies or had extra money from my allowance. So much happiness for just a nickel!

We poured Hershey’s syrup into cold milk and over vanilla ice cream, and I’ll always remember the first time I made and devoured my first S’more at Campfire Girls day camp. Marry me, please. And best of all, every Christmas, Grandma Yang would give a five pound box of Hershey’s Kisses to each of her eleven children and their families. The holidays wouldn’t have been the same without those sweet kisses.

You can see why I was excited to see this brand new picture book biography, On the Corner of Chocolate Avenue: How Milton Hershey Brought Milk Chocolate to America by Tziporah Cohen and Steven Salerno (Clarion Books, 2022). Though a longtime Hershey’s fan, I actually knew very little about the life of America’s Chocolate King.

Through hard work and perseverance, a poor boy from Derry Township, Pennsylvania – one who probably never tasted chocolate as a child – grew up to create a chocolate empire as a pioneering confectioner, resilient businessman, and dedicated philanthropist. 

Hershey’s achievements in mass production and bulk export helped to popularize chocolate around the world, making it accessible and affordable for the average consumer.

As the story opens, we see 8-year-old Milton gazing longingly at the sweets displayed in a shop window. Chocolate is a treat solely for the wealthy, and Milton was from a poor family. Since they moved around a lot, he attended six schools in seven years, barely learning how to read.

At age 14, he left school to help support his family. After a brief stint as a printer’s apprentice, he worked at Royer’s Ice Cream Parlor and Garden, where he learned the basics of candy making (ice cream, taffy, lollipops, marshmallows). Seeing candy’s power to make people happy, he decided it would be wonderful to build his own candy business.

Several years later, he borrowed money from his family to open the Spring Garden Confectionery Works in Philadelphia. Unfortunately, this business, as well as two others he started in Chicago and New York, failed.

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[spicy review] Anni Dreams of Biryani by Namita Moolani Mehra and Chaaya Prabhat

~ jama ~ 15 Comments

Right now I am dreaming of the perfect Indian meal: To start, aloo tikki and samosas with a side of black pepper poppadums to wake up the taste buds, followed by chicken tikka masala or chicken korma with a steamy platter of vegetable biryani. Must also have some warm onion kulcha and garlic naan, and for dessert, gulab jamun. Mmmmm!

via Kuwait Times

Savory and oh-so-aromatic – Indian cuisine is all about the spices, many of which begin with the letter ‘c’: cumin, coriander, cloves, cinnamon, cardamom. Let’s not forget mustard seeds, red chili, garum masala, and turmeric. An added bonus is that many of these also have valuable medicinal benefits.

Though I’ve never cooked Indian food at home, the young girl in this new picture book, Anni Dreams of Biryani by Namita Moolani Mehra and Chaaya Prabhat (Two Lions, 2022), has inspired me to give it a try. I’m impressed by her passion for cooking and determination to make the best version of one of her favorite dishes.

Vegetable Biryani via Piping Pot Curry.

When the story opens, we learn Anni lives with her mother and grandmother across the street  from the Biryani Café in Little India. From her kitchen window, she has a bird’s eye view of the comings and goings of the bustling neighborhood. She listens to the “constant chatter of busy bikers, curious tourists, and weary workers” – all of whom are there to eat café owner Mr. Arif’s (Uncle’s) famous biryani.

It was, after all, the best biryani in the world. 

Fluffy and fragrant. Spicy and succulent. Absolutely addictive.

Anni loves it so much she could eat the savory rice dish every single day. But Grandma deems it should be a once-a-week treat, so they only have it on Fridays. 

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[review] H is for Harlem by Dinah Johnson and April Harrison

~ jama ~ 7 Comments

#63 in an ongoing series of posts celebrating the alphabet.

If I had to choose one word to describe H is for Harlem, it would be “alive” – deliciously, soulfully, jubilantly alive. 

Generous in its carefully curated offerings and beautiful in its execution, this sumptuous abecedarian celebration of Harlem’s rich cultural history pulsates with energy, inviting readers to explore, discover, and marvel.

As author Dinah Johnson writes, “Harlem is a place like no other in the world . . . It is truly multicultural. But for a long time people have called Harlem the mecca of Black America, a place where African American culture is living and breathing, shining and indestructible.”

From “A is for Apollo Theater” to “Z is for Zora Neale Hurston,” we learn about Harlem’s unique treasures – seminal people, places, organizations, communities – making up the fascinating tapestry of this storied New York neighborhood. 

Johnson describes the well known (Harlem Globetrotters, Malcolm X, Harriet Tubman) as well as the less familiar (Mabel Fairbanks, Impact Farm, Opportunity Magazine), with just enough facts to whet the appetite, encouraging further research.

Since I especially love music, I was happy to read about the iconic Apollo Theater, the Boys Choir of Harlem, and the National Jazz Museum in Harlem. It was exciting seeing some of my faves mentioned: Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder, Jackson 5, Jennifer Hudson, Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Wynton Marsalis. Just imagine the convergence of such genius and talent, the creative cross-fertilization among all the arts that continues today!

Johnson also tucked in some new-to-me nuggets along the way. Are you familiar with Cicely Tyson’s role in inspiring the creation of the Dance Theatre of Harlem? Though I was familiar with Zora Neale Hurston’s novels, I didn’t know she was also an anthropologist, or that she is credited by some to have been the first African American to debut a Broadway play.

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