Shrinking Walden into picture book size is somewhat like trying to fit Moby Dick into an aquarium. Still, Lowe's selections from Thoreau's iconoclastic work will give children a brief taste of this classic. Using only quotations from the original work, Lowe tells the story of Thoreau's year in the woods, emphasizing his descriptions of nature,stet comma and action rather than his philosophical musings. Readers see the young Thoreau putting shingles on his roof, hoeing beans, welcoming a stranger; they can revel in the natural wonders he describes--the ``whip-poor-wills,'' in summer, the drifting snow in winter, the ice breaking in the pond in spring. Sabuda's superb linoleum-cut prints lend a hard-edged brilliance to the dark woods--where sunlight is filtered through etched leaves, and moonlight shimmers on the waters of the pond made famous by a young man's experiment with life. All ages. (Nov.)
Daniel Mason’s North Woods follows one house in the woods of New England as it passes through families (with inhabitants both human and not) and endures natural and human history. Mason joins us to talk about how he connected with his setting, writing a novel covering a large timespan, playing with form and more. The […]
Writers are strange folks. This is known. They labor privately on flights of fancy with zero guarantee of financial (or any other kind) of success. Even the ones that attain the ultimate confirmation of their vision—publication—may see very little reward for their efforts. So it’s no surprise that plenty of authors are a little eccentric, and […]
At President Obama’s second Inauguration in 2013, Richard Blanco debuted his poem “One Today,” a tribute to America which examines the beauty and heartbreak that are a universal part of the human experience. Around the same time, author and illustrator Dav Pilkey was working on new books for his Captain Underpants and Ricky Ricotta series. In what may seem at first like an unlikely collaboration, […]