Lifestyle Books

This is by far our favorite book for the Fall season; the words perfectly enhance the beautiful pictures. We especially love the picture of the sun setting behind the hickory tree and pumpkin patch. This will make anyone want to pack their bags and move to the country.

[...] Although the text may not be appropriate for a 1 or even 2 year old, as a Kindergarten teacher, I find this book very useful to help the children imagine the breeze blowing against their cheek and to imagine hearing the sounds of the story. They like it! The pictures are so beautiful, but I have read this book just as a listening exercize, pausing after each page to see if they "felt" what was described in beautiful imagery. It's a great book to bolster the imagination and vocabulary of a child.

This book is a great before bed book. The art is beautiful, and the words are full of imagery. Excellent for any child.

We borrowed this book form the library, but may buy it. The first night I read it, my 26 month old asked for it to be read three times in a row. He is fascinated with it and already repeats lines. He also thoroughly enjoys pointing out each of the different types of construction vehicles.

My 3 year old son loves this book. I learned of this author / illustrator team reading "Close your eyes," another good bedtime book. I came across this one on Amazon and noted that it is one of relatively few books that focus on children and their fathers. Mom's feature prominently in most childrens' books. As a divorced fatherwho doesn't get to spend nearly enough time with his little boy, I wanted to find some that focus on kids spending time with Dad. The illustrations are simple but evocative, and the words seem to transport a child into the world of a busy city at night.

I highly recommend this, especially for fathers and sons.

Every night, Papa kisses Alex good night, puts him to bed and then goes off to work. He's an engineer at a construction site and a night worker. While everyone else is home and in bed, sleeping, Papa is at work, doing his job. One special night, Papa gives Alex his own hard hat and together they go out into the night to Papa's job..... Kate Banks has written a gentle, endearing story full of imagery and magic that turns the quiet night into an unimagined busy place...full of street sweepers, delivery men, heavy machinery and cranes that dig holes, move earth, pour concrete and lift steel. Her simple easy to read text is complimented by Georg Hallensleben's wonderful, subdued artwork that will transport youngsters right to the job site, surrounding them with the sights, sounds and construction activity as the night workers go about their work. And as day begins to break, all is quiet and little Alex has gone to sleep, dreaming of becoming a night worker, too, when he grows up.

Once again Crist-Evans has dealt sensitively with a difficult topic. His beautiful words and keen understanding take us on a young boy's journey through loss and rediscovery of family and self. Crist-Evans makes poetry accessible to young adults in a way few others are able to.

My 14-year old daughter couldn't put it down. The neighbor's boy snagged it before my 21-year old son could get his mitts on it. My wife and I both read it. It's moving and compelling and reads like the wind.

Between poetry and prose, this book not only gives voice to the deepest, most personal feelings about abandonment, but also introduces young readers to poetry that talks to them about real things that can happen in life. Just as Crist-Evans did in Moon Over Tennessee, he has made poetry accessible to contemporary young readers.

This book has amazing drawings in it. Carol Jones is very talented. I rarely write reviews for books but this one has definitely impressed me. Not only are the pictures breathtaking, but many of the pages have a circular hole cut out of the middle so you get a peek at the next animal coming up in the tale, and when you look back at the previous page from the other side, you see Old MacDonald. This is truly a gem of a book. My highest praises to the illustrator!

My daughters loved it they go around asking for their E-I-E-I-O book all day long. They even ask to take it to bed. Many fights have been waged between my twins over who will get the honors.

I like the little windows on the pages which give a little away, but not too much, of the animal that is on the farm. Nicely illustrated!

A simple premise for a book...a familiar nursery rhyme song, but Carol Jones has given it a new life with her strikingly detailed illustrations. My son (4) really loves discovering the minute touches she added...a great book to sit and look through together. Definitely one we'll keep!

This picture book is based on a true story of a little boy who lived long ago on Sand Island. His dad is a fisherman and the little boy wants to be like him. He sets out to build his own boat. He has to trade work for supplies and he finally gets his boat made! The whole island meets and has a party to celebrate!
I liked that the little boy used his mind to work out his problems. He didn't have some of the supplies and skills that he needed to build his boat. He went to neighors for help and offed skills that he did have in exchange.

Yes I enjoyed ths book. Kids will learn a lot of the authors note like the site of Carl Dahl's (the boy who the book is based on) home is now being used to house a ranger's cabin for the National Park Service.

This is a wonderful and evocative book. Sand Island is a real place, where real people used to live, and the author does a marvelous job of presenting the way life was like for a curious young boy growing up on this little island in the middle of Lake Superior.

This is based on a true story, a 10-year-old boy whose mother is deceased, living on Sand Island (in Lake Superior), a community of Norwegian's, with his father and with his younger sister. His father is a fisherman and he longs for the day when he can have his own boat. His younger sister tells him he is too young to own his own boat. He decided to make his dream a reality and one step at a time, and does build his own boat. He does not have a full plan at the beginning but takes it one step at a time. He finds male neighbors and friends to help him along the way, by borrowing a tool or bartering his work for their time and labor. I found it odd that he never asked his father for help, a little odd that there was more help from neighbors than his own father, but I assume his father was very busy fishing to support his family! The last step in the process was getting oars and his father did give him some old oars that they had in storage, which Carl had to refinish.

The themes in the book are of independence, hard work, perseverance, and ingenuity. I thought the boys resourcefulness in finding help wonderful. The boy's positive attitude is wonderful. With each step of the boat-building project we see the amount of hard work that he had to put into making it, a wonderful thing to see in a 10 year old.

The book ends first with Carl's peaceful and rewarding solo boat ride then with a party to celebrate the newest boat on the island including music and dancing.

The illustrations are gorgeous, pale paintings that look as if painted atop a canvas laid with sand!

In the author's note at the back of the book, I learned that this tale is set in the early 1900s and is based on a real person named Carl Dahl. In the 1940s sea lampreys came into Lake Superior and killed all the whitefish and trout, essentially killing the fishing industry there. The site of Carl Dahl's home is now being used to house a ranger's cabin for the National Park Service.

This is a wonderful book for preschool age children between the ages of 3 and 5, and for beginning readers! It incorporates humor into the story, which preschool age children love. It has far-fetched imaginative things that give parents an opportunity to discuss what's real, and what's not real with their children, which preschool age children are just beginning to learn to differentiate. It also has beautiful artwork that is realistic enough that it is easy to recognize things, unlike many children's books which have gone to such abstract artwork that it almost gives kids nightmares to look at. The amount of words on the pages are just the right length to keep kids with limited attention spans focused, and there is a little mouse on a paper airplane in each picture for kids to look for, inspiring them to search for details. The artwork fills the pages from edge to edge, and is colorful, with lots of details to look at. I think this is the perfect book for preschoolers, and I'm very disappointed that Amazon is no longer stocking this book.

I bought this book for friends with new babies, and they all loved it. The illustrations are incredible, and the storyline is engaging. Kids love the pictures and finding all the animals. I would recommend this book for both children and parents alike. It is an enjoyable read.

"One Monday on Annabelle's farm, it was so windy, the tin roof banged like thunder. By afternoon the pigs' curly tails were straightened out like rulers..." So begins Amy Huntington's delightful and very descriptive picture book, One Monday. As the week progresses, so do the wind gusts. Carrots and turnips twist out of the garden, sunflower heads spin off like flying saucers, frogs surf on the waves in the water trough, and the big black spots blow off the cows. Finally on Sunday, the wind blows itself right out of town, and everything appears to be quiet and back to normal, until you turn the page. "The next day, Monday, it rained so hard..." Ms Huntington's simple and understated text is full of energy and motion. But she lets her bold, bright and expressive artwork really tell the story, and little ones will enjoy poring over the illustrations and finding all the charming, humorous, and silly details in each two page spread. Perfect for youngsters 3-7, One Monday is an engaging and entertaining treasure that shouldn't be missed.

One Monday Morning is the story of a little prince who each day of the week brings more friends to visit. However the little boy he's coming to visit isn't home. The story is much like the 12 days of christmas with the addition of interesting characters each day of the week.

This book is a great first time reader. It is better than Dick and Jane for several reasons. This book adds people and words as the story unfolds. It is an easy story to follow. It adds words that are pretty common to today's early readers. I am a literacy volunteer and I use this book for my older reading students.

I think the artwork in this book has been underrated, perhaps because only a few colors were used in printing. It's clever: the run-down New York City neighborhood is drawn in meticulous detail. I use it to show Inuit students what a city looks like! By contrast, the royal entourage is cartoon-style, not realistic. Not only does the royal family's entourage grow larger with each repetition of the pattern, but the characters themselves grow larger, until at the end of the book they have to hunch over to fit into the boy's tenement apartment. At the very end, the characters turn into playing cards (only in the art, not in the text) and the royal barber (who, we somehow suspect, is a self-portrait of the author) becomes a doll that has been sitting half-seen on the window sill all along. Lots to look at in this book.

Engagingly written by Susan Bartlett for preschool and kindergarten children ages 3 to 6, "Opening Day" is a 32-page picturebook which is beautifully illustrated in full color oil paintings by Luanne Wrenn. It's the story of a young boy named Sam whose best friend Eric loves to hunt. Eric and his Dad have invited Sam to hunt with them on the opening day of deer season. But Sam's mother is a vegetarian while his own father just wants to buy meat for the family table at their local grocery store. Sam is faced with the possibility of losing out on his friendship with Eric or possibly disappointing his family. A compellingly and skillfully presented story about friendship, "Opening Day" is enhanced with age appropriate information about deer habits and habitat, as well as tracking and hunting. A truly elegant story, "Opening Day" is as entertaining as it is thoughtful and a very strongly recommended addition to family, preschool, elementary school, and community library picturebook collections.

I'm a tofu eater, not a hunter, so I was curious about this children's book. What I found was a really marvelous book that clearly presents two different perspectives--those of the hunter and non-hunter--in an unbiased way. Actually what remained with me most was the sense of nature and the animals encountered in the snowy woods.

For a child interested in hunting or in the question of hunting this is an excellent book.

For me though one of the strongest points in OPENING DAY is the concept that people with different views can nevertheless be good friends.

As the father of a 9 year old who insists on being read to, and enjoys illustrated books above others, I liked this book and so did my son, Zach. I also fit into the almost-vegetarian category of the main character Sam's parents, and the truth is, i find hunters and hunting a bit scary, so i was really happy to share a book with Zach that made being in the woods and friendship the focus of a hunting book. Also, it helped me reflect on what my prejudice might be, like thinking there is something wrong about hunting. But in the end , my favorite part was the message that we all make mistakes, like Sam does, and that is ok, we can just keep trying.

I thought the ilustrations were a bit clumsy at first, but now i have read it a couple of times, i am noting how well they work with the text, and i am starting to like them alot.

With hundreds of photographs and the narration of five kids between the ages of 4 and 18, OUR FARM packs a world of reality into 144 pages. It's a funny, accessible, truly heartfelt visit with a small-farm family that should be a mirror for any farm kid or rural family, or a window for kids who can't quite imagine a life outside a city...a life where chicks grow up in your living room, your backyard is filled with calves and your own swimming hole/fishing pond, your barn is filled with every sort of farm machine (all of which your border collie tries to herd!). Divided into four seasons, the book is a thoughtful chronicle of what it means to grow up living on the land, living with animals (wild and domestic), living without close neighbors or shopping malls, living in a community of generous people, many of whom, have spent their whole lives in the area.
And for middle-grader readers, there's plenty of intriguing and somewhat startling details about the challenges of farm life: animal losses, hauling tons of manure, providing meats for the table--all in the farm kids' voices.
A fascinating book for kids from...third grade through high school, I'd say. A perfect gift for anyone who's connected with 4-H, FFA, or any sort of farm. It's a great addition to classroom curricula on ecology and conservation, communities, Ohio or Appalachian culture and history.

Our Farm: Four Seasons with Five Kids on One Family's Farm is a densely packed, 144-page nonfiction book portraying the many aspects of day-to-day life on an Ohio family farm. From raising chickens and cows, to delivering calves, disposing of manure, showing pigs at a fair, hunting, cleaning and cooking animals for their meat, putting together square bales of hay and much more, Our Farm gives a living, breathing, look at the hard work, good food, fun, and challenges that flows by in the yearly turn of a farm's seasons. Chapters are narrated in quotes of various family members, and illustrated with beautiful color photography on virtually every page. Highly recommended, especially for public and school library collections, Our Farm is a vital educational resource particularly given how today's American society is increasingly estranged from its agricultural roots.

I really loved reading this book! The book is written for children but I enjoyed reading it and I am 41 years old! The book made me think about the dreams that I had as a child of living on a farm when I grew up. That dream never came to fruition but reading this book helped to give me a more realistic idea of what living on a livestock farm would be like. I immediately got into the story and I read in amazement all the kinds of experiences the children have lived through. As a parent, I enjoyed seeing this family working together - everyone has a job and they all seem to enjoy helping to make their farm a sucess. What a wonderful childhood these children are having! Thanks to their family and Michael J. Rosen for letting us share a bit of it.

This would be a fabulous book to use with a Unitarian Universalist curriculum. It does a great job of honoring Judeo-Christian roots while still respecting the diversity of modern congregations.

The story is cute and touching without anything scary. It's suitable for very young children (I have a 3-year-old son). Each page of the story references a specific passage from the Bible in a footnote-style notation, but the story itself doesn't mention God or Jesus at all.

A farm family grows Christmas trees to sell, and the farmer's wife chooses the most beautiful tree for her own family, putting a sign on it, "Not for Sale". But when a poor family comes to the tree lot to see if they can pick out a tree from the free area (trees that have missing branches or crooked trunks), the poor family's little girl sees the beautiful tree and asks if she can choose that one. Everyone is embarrased that she asks, as the adults all know her family can't afford the tree. The farmer's wife responds that she is sorry, the tree isn't for sale...because they'd like the girl's family to have it as a gift. The book ends, "Yes, it was a great sacrifice. But it brought even greater joy. Isn't that just like Christmas?" The illustrations are very kid-friendly and fun. Applicable Bible verses are at the bottom of every other page. A creative and wonderful story.

this book was a suprising enjoyable tale of right living for young children and adults. Read it again, mom!