Celebrating Day of the Dead

Today is the celebration of Dia de Muertos, or Day of the Dead. This celebration, dating back 3,000 years ago, is a time for gathering to remember family and friends who have died. Some families build altars, while others take picnics to the graveyards. However they observe the day, people bring favorite foods, treasured possessions, small gifts, and marigolds to lay on the altar or grave.

Clatter Bash! by Richard Keep. Peachtree, 2004

While El Dia de Los Muertos is a day of quiet respect, it is also a day of noisy celebration. There are picnics, parades, and fireworks. The markets are full of flowers (marigolds) and fresh fruits and vegetables for all the cooking that will be done. There are masks and toys and chocolate skulls.

What I like about this book: I like the way Richard Keep combines his cut-paper art with sounds of the day, turning it into a story that spans a single night. At dusk, a Mexican family has left fiesta offerings in the graveyard. As night falls, playful skeletons rise from their graves. They sing, dance, eat the yummy food, tell stories, and play games. And Keep captures it in sounds:knock-knock, Yak-yak, Chitter-chat... 

In one spread the skeletons sit in a group. Keep's text: "Buenas noches! Storytime! Shiver-jitter, gee!" When they sit down to eat, it's "sip-gulp, chomp-crunch, slurp-burp". As daylight approaches, the skeletons clean up their mess and leave no trace of their "clatter bash" behind as they return to their coffins - until next year.

Beyond the book: So many ways to have fun with skeletons. I've posted ideas for art, food and games over to Archimedes Notebook. And tonight, as you turn off the lights and slip into pj's and bunny slippers, take a listen outside. What do you hear?  

Today's review is part of PPBF (perfect picture book Friday), an event in which bloggers share great picture books at Susanna Leonard Hill's site. She keeps an ever-growing list of Perfect Picture Books. Review copy provided by publisher.

Monstrous Reading for Halloween

Looking for some monster stories for Halloween? Nothing too scary - just something in keeping with the season? How about this pair of books written by Danny Schnitzlein?

The Monster Who Did my Math begins with a young boy who has "...some kind of allergic reaction to multiplication... addition... subtraction." Also long division (the bane of my elementary school career) - and when he wishes for his homework to be done, voila! A monster appears who promises to do his homework for him. All is well and good until the teacher, impressed by his A+ answers, asks him to go up to the board and show how to work out a problem. He can't. When he gets home, he yells at the monster who points to the little print in the contract where, in paragraph seven of clause 93 it says: If you don't learn anything, do not blame me!

Schnitzlein's earlier book, The Monster Who Ate My Peas features a similar deal with a monster: you do the work, I pay a price. In that book the kid won't eat his peas. A monster appears who will eat the peas for a price: the kid's soccer ball.

This veggie-eating monster has hair that looks like spinach, a broccoli-green body, eyeballs that look like brussels sprouts, a squash nose, liver-like lips.... all the things kids everywhere don't like to see on their dinner plate. No matter, this monster eats it all. For a price.

If you need another monster book, grab a copy of  Tara Lazar's The Monstore - where one can buy a monster to deal with problems such as pesky sisters. But there's a catch - isn't there always when dealing with monsters? You can read a full review and interview with Tara here.

Happy Halloween Reading!


The Monster Who Did my Math and The Monster Who ate my Peas are both published by Peachtree Publisher. The Monstore is published by Aladdin. Review copies from the publishers.

Library Mouse builds a Home

Library Mouse, Home Sweet Home
by Daniel Kirk
40 pages; ages 5-9
Abrams, 2013

Sam and Sarah live in the library, where Sam writes and Sarah explores. They've got it made: a cozy home, books galore ... but then Sam finds blueprints spread out on the librarians desk. The library is undergoing renovation, and the two friends need to find a safe place to live while the saws whirr and the dust flies.

The attic is far above the din and clutter of carpenters and electricians, but it's too big. So they decide to build a home using materials they find. But what kind of home?

Fortunately, they're in a library - and the Architecture books are stacked on top of one of the boxes. They see photos of yurts and igloos, castles and cottages, and even a geodesic dome. Finally (!!!) the renovations are completed and the mice can move back home.

For kids (and older people) who are interested in architecture, there are three pages at the back chock-full of photos and descriptions of different types of homes found around the world.

Review copy provided by publisher.