picture books

[review + recipe + giveaway] Awesome Earth by Joan Bransfield Graham and Tania García

~ jama ~ 40 Comments

I’ve always been fascinated by volcanoes. When you grow up in Hawaiʻi, it’s a point of pride being able to claim that your home state has the largest active volcano on Earth (Mauna Loa), and it’s also the only state situated entirely on an archipelago. Kīlauea’s most recent (and ongoing) eruption on the Big Island started in December 2024, while Mauna Loa last spouted off in 2022.

The breathtaking spectacle of molten lava slowly making its way to the ocean and thereafter creating new land is both humbling and awe-inspiring. When I read Joan Bransfield Graham and Tania García’s brand new poetry picture book, Awesome Earth: Concrete Poems Celebrate Caves, Canyons and Other Fascinating Landforms (Clarion Books, 2025), I was reminded of how our home planet is an ever evolving, dynamic entity full of beauty and wonder.

FANTASTIC FORCES

The earth is
unsettled, it would seem,
for here and about it lets off
steam. Lava flows, geysers gush,
canyons are carved by a river's push.
The Earth's old crust cracks and creaks,
shakes and shoves up mountain peaks.
Ice caps recede, glaciers advance,
ever in motion -- a global dance.
Will it ever stand still?
Not a chance!

Fun to read and loaded with fascinating information, Awesome Earth is Graham’s valentine to the planet and a budding geologist’s dream. Her use of concrete poetry to describe a variety of landforms is the perfect way to celebrate their physical attributes, whether Continent or Island, Hill or Valley, Plain or Plateau. After all, landforms are all about size, shape, and structure; they themselves are a kind of topographical poetry.

Kids will find the 20+ poems delightfully accessible as Graham strikes a friendly tone via (mostly) first person point of view and personification to establish a sense of immediacy and direct engagement. Who could resist an amiable Island explaining the difference between his continental and oceanic ilk, or smaller “mini-me” versions of himself? He even invites readers to visit sometime — so charming!

We also get a sense of Mountain’s pride and majesty, as he seeks the sky, “enrobed with snow,” piercing the clouds, and I’m only too willing to forgive Peninsula’s boast: “I’ve got miles and miles of rocky or sandy, dandy coast!”

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Gemma Koomen: Beauty, Joy, Enchantment

~ jama ~ 10 Comments

Come along — let’s enter UK artist Gemma Koomen’s peaceful, gentle miniature world. It’s an enchanting place where fairies, gnomes, birds, bees, and busy little people co-exist, a place where you’re invited to linger, look around, and appreciate nature’s small wonders. Such a welcome balm from stressful, noisy, oftentimes chaotic modern times!

Author-illustrator Gemma Koomen in her studio (photo by Eva Nemeth/91 Magazine).

Having grown up in the Scottish countryside, Gemma has always felt a deep connection with the natural world. Both her parents were artists, and she’s loved drawing since childhood. She distinctly remembers getting lost in imaginative narratives of her own making (many with fairytale motifs), that made her aware of the power of art. She was especially fond of Richard Scarry’s Busy Town books and avidly studied the small worlds and characters in those stories.

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[chewy review] The Mochi Makers by Sharon Fujimoto-Johnson

~ jama ~ 11 Comments

Soft, chewy, stretchy — pink, white, or green — I love mochi!

Whenever I bite into a Japanese rice cake, it takes me back to my childhood in Hawaiʻi. While we often enjoyed store-bought mochi as an everyday treat, it was most delicious when the extended family gathered on New Year’s Day to make a homemade batch.

My uncle (whose wife was Japanese) was in charge of cooking and pounding the rice with a wooden mallet. At first he did this by hand, but in later years he acquired a mochi machine that largely did the work for him. When the mochi dough was ready, my aunts coated their hands with potato starch and twisted off pieces to form small round cakes. Each family took home a good share. How I loved fresh, oh-so-soft mochi dipped in a little honey!

You can see why I was excited to read Sharon Fujimoto-Johnson’s debut picture book, The Mochi Makers (Beach Lane Books, 2024). In this gentle, heartwarming story, a little girl makes mochi with her grandmother, learns about her family’s heirloom recipe, and then shares trays of mochi with family, friends and neighbors.

Told from Emi’s point of view, the story outlines the steps she and Obaachan follow to make this special treat.

First, Emi and Obaachan wash sweet mochi rice — “Obaachan with her strong, wrinkled hands and me with my small, quick ones.” It doesn’t matter if Emi spills a few grains; Obaachan reminds her “we only need clean hands and whole hearts to make mochi.”

While the rice is cooking, Obaachan tells Emi that the recipe originated from Emi’s great-great grandmother. When Obaachan emigrated to America to marry Emi’s grandfather (Ojiichan), she brought the mochi recipe with her “in her heart and hands.”

When the rice is done, Emi and Obaachan transfer the steaming mass into a stand mixer, where it’s pounded into a sticky mound. Next, they coat their hands with potato starch, twist off pieces and make small round cakes.

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[toe-tapping review] Animal Albums from A to Z by Cece Bell

~ jama ~ 21 Comments

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

As a teen I used to love browsing the wooden bins at our local record store. Which LP should I take home for $3.25? Decisions, decisions. It was always a conundrum when parting with precious allowance money.

Of course I had been trained early on by my music-loving dad to treasure the vinyl discs that lived in all kinds of interesting cardboard sleeves (hello, Mantovani, Les Paul, Mario Lanza). As I began building my own record collection, I also grew quite enamored of album cover art — its own genre of inventive graphic design showcasing photos, illustrations, and typography — all on a neat 12″ x 12″ square.

Now that I think about it, some of my fave recording artists have animal names: Beatles, Monkees, Byrds, Steppenwolf, Buffalo Springfield, Iron Butterfly (and later, Eagles). So you can imagine how ecstatic I was to see Cece Bell’s, Animal Albums from A to Z (Walker Books, 2024) — a unique, wildly imaginative, uber creative tour-de-force that easily ranks in my top three favorite alphabet books of all time.

Letters. music. art. song lyrics. quirky. handmade. heartmade. humor. nostalgia. food (soup and pie!). Cece knows me. She’s checked all the boxes. Mind totally blown.

She opens her 64-page, all-ages ABC extravaganza with a tongue-in-cheek Introduction extolling the varied talents of imaginary animal musicians, enthusiastic to share 26 albums from her personal collection. She notes that they date from the 40’s to the 80’s, “the heyday of recorded animal music,” such records being difficult to find today.

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nine cool things on a tuesday

~ jama ~ 16 Comments

1. Hello, December! How quickly you’ve arrived. As we anticipate snowy days and frosty nights, we’re dreaming of snuggling up in a cozy cottage with a warm cuppa and a good book. UK mixed media and collage artist Kate Brazier will transport us to the beautiful countryside with her lovely pictures. 🙂

Originally from Devon, Kate now works from her home studio in Worcestershire. She studied Graphic Design and Illustration at Hereford College of Arts and briefly worked for a Birmingham art gallery.

She’s inspired by the rolling hills and villages around her, and her pieces reflect her keen interest in light, color and texture. I love the delicacy of detail and feelings of peace and harmony her scenes evoke. Idyllic!

To see more of her art, visit her Instagram, Facebook, and Etsy Shop. Check out these bio links to purchase originals, prints, greeting cards, and cross stitch kits.

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