Alice Cary

Charlie is a boy after my own heart, a budding survivalist, ready for anything Just in Case, which is the title of this delightful book. To say that Charlie likes to be prepared is an understatement. If it rains hard, he gets out his raincoat, boots, goggles, umbrella and inflatable boat, just in case it rains so hard that the furniture starts to float. He once has a sudden worry that food stores might suddenly close for a long time, so he gets busy making 117 peanut butter sandwiches. What Charlie probably needs is a psychiatrist, but instead he gets a bossy, mean baby-sitter, when his favorite sitter isn't available. So he makes sure the new one doesn't want to come back by washing his feet in the toilet, wearing his shoes on his ears and painting his face a horrid green.

After describing each of Charlie's amusing antics, author Judith Viorst offers this refrain: Charlie likes to be ready, just in case. When you see Viorst's name on a book, you know you're in for a treat. She's the author of the classic series about a boy named Alexander, the first being Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. Her characters are based on real emotions, but their angst is always presented with immense humor. She's accomplished this balance yet again with Just in Case.

Viorst has paired up with illustrator Diana Cain Bluthenthal, and the partnership is definitely a winning combination. Bluthenthal works in brightly colored mixed media and her humor adds to the fun. We see Charlie lying exhausted on the floor, for instance, after making all those sandwiches. One day Charlie wakes up early on his birthday, and, not surprisingly, he's worried that everyone has forgotten. In fact, he's sure of it, when suddenly the doorbell rings. Boys and girls stream into his house, there for a surprise party. For once, Charlie isn't ready. Viorst reassuringly concludes: But maybe not being ready is sometimes okay. Whether readers are worriers or not, this book will have everyone laughing. Just be sure you find a copy soon. It might sell out. Go quickly, just in case!

Alice Cary writes from Groton, Massachusetts.

Since its publication in 1991, Mama, Do You Love Me? has become a modern children's classic. It is a cherished bedtime read-aloud and the winner of numerous awards. Set in Alaska, it transcends time and place, voicing the universal love between a mother and daughter, in this case an Inuit family.

How could author Barbara Joosse and illustrator Barbara Lavallee follow their huge hit? The title is obvious—Papa, Do You Love Me?—but the setting is not. This time, the author-illustrator team focuses on the Maasai culture of Kenya, where fathers consider their sons their greatest treasure. Author Joosse lives in Wisconsin, but a 1997 trip to Africa left a permanent mark on her heart. The result is splendid in both text and illustrations.

The words follow a pattern similar to the first book: The boy asks his father how much he loves him and how he would handle various challenges. The father's responses include references to the African bush, such as, I love you more than the warrior loves to leap, more than the bush baby loves the moon, more than the elder loves his stories. A detailed two-page spread at the end of the book explains all the Maasai terms and customs.

While the details of these two books are very culture-specific, their magic lies in the simple rendering of unconditional love. When the boy asks, What if I fell asleep anyway and hyenas crept in and killed a cow . . . and it was my birthright cow? The father says, Then, Tender Heart, I would be angry. But still, I would love you. The closing message is perfect for tucking in any young child: I'll care for you, love you, and teach you. Always. Because I am your papa, and you are my Tender Heart.

Lavallee's watercolor illustrations are magnificent, with soft oranges conveying the African heat, the sun and the rich robes and jewels of the father and son. Her images are simple, yet evocative, conveying the familial love and the distinctive Serengeti setting.

If your young readers are fans of the Little House books or any type of "westward-ho" narrative, they're bound to enjoy Deborah Hopkinson's A Packet of Seeds. In this picture book, Pa announces, "Folks around here are getting close as kernels on a cob." His wife doesn't want to leave her family and friends, and the book's narrator, daughter Annie, is attuned to her mother's unhappiness. When they finally arrive by covered wagon at their new plot of land, Annie notes, her mother asks: "This is it?" By spring, a new baby has arrived, but Annie's mother is too depressed to even name the child. As Annie thinks of her mother's garden back at their old home, she comes up with a way to help, remembering: "[Momma] says friends and flowers are a lot alike. No matter how bad your troubles, they gladden your heart." Annie and her brother Jim struggle to dig a garden for their mother, and it's soon ready for the seeds her mother received as a parting gift from her family. The new garden is just the right tonic for Momma, and she even names the baby Janice Rose, after her sister and in honor of a rose cutting given by their new neighbor. Hopkinson [a regular contributor to BookPage] provides a note at the end, explaining that she was inspired by pioneer narratives and by an article about pioneer roses. She adds that women traveling on the Oregon Trail are thought to have brought along about 20 different kinds of roses.

Bethanne Andersen's gouache and oil illustrations are executed in a primitive style that beautifully conveys the vast, empty space of the prairie. This is a perfect little history lesson for older preschool and young elementary students, a book that introduces the idea of westward expansion and gives real insight into human emotions as well.

Alice Cary writes from Groton, Massachusetts.

Winter is all about the juxtaposition of cold and warmth, and Laura Whipple's poetry anthology, A Snowflake Fell: Poems About Winter, is sure to warm hearts of all ages. This collection is one of those rare volumes that I can share with both my four-year-old twins and my 10-year-old son. So, as Whipple advises in her introduction, "pop some corn; put your fuzzy slippers on, and use your imagination to experience the sharp smell of winter air, the sound of ice skates on a frozen pond, the touch of snow on your face and even the taste of the first snowflake as it falls from the sky."

Whipple's book features a wonderful selection of poems about animals and the natural world, including Jane Yolen's "Winter Song of the Weasel," Douglas Florian's "The Winter Tree" and Ted Hughes' "Goose." Marilyn Singer's delightful "Deer Mouse" replicates the rhythms of a deer mouse scampering over the snow to gather food: "get get get get get/get/out of the nest/get/into the cold." Older readers will recall how it feels to be a kid during winter when they read Jack Prelutsky's "My Mother's Got Me Bundled Up." Few poets can rival Prelutsky's humor: "It's hard to move, and when I try/I waddle, then I flop/I'm the living, breathing model/of a walking clothing shop." Richard J. Margolis' "Downhill" is a funny ode to the question of who steers on a sled, while Bobbi Katz's "Skiing" speaks wonders in its quiet simplicity: "Skiing is like being/part of a mountain."

Tying the myriad poems together are the splendid illustrations of Japanese artist Hatsuki Hori. The endpapers of the book swirl with snow falling on evergreens and deciduous trees, and Hori's soft touch captures the bluish shadows of snow and the yellow glow of a warming fire. Whether she's illustrating a deep blue sky over a snowman or the northern lights over a snowbound cabin, Hori makes winter's icy world appealing.

Stash away a copy of A Snowflake Fell for those winter moments when the kids complain that there's nothing to do. Pour some hot cocoa, and you'll be ready for a literary feast.

Alice Cary writes from Groton, Massachusetts.

A Tiger Called Thomas is a sweet story that climaxes on Halloween night, but it's much more than a holiday tale. First published in 1963 and re-illustrated here by Diana Cain Bluthenthal, this children's classic focuses on the heart how a boy named Thomas worries about making friends, and how a tiger costume helps him learn that he is, indeed, liked and known by all in his new neighborhood.

Young Thomas has moved into a new community, where he sees many interesting people, but he simply sits on his stoop, too shy to venture out, because he's afraid he won't be liked. He won't play with young Marie, or say hi to the lady with the black cat, and he's afraid to reach out to a lonely boy named Gerald.

Thomas sits and watches: "He watched the sparrows and the grackles and the blue jays in the trees. He watched the black cat look up at the sparrows and the grackles and blue jays. But he never went off the stoop to play." With lines like these, Charlotte Zolotow a legendary author as well as children's literature editor and publisher advances her story while showing what good writing is all about, even at the preschool level, even when nothing much is going on.

Everything changes for Thomas the night he puts on a tiger costume and goes trick-or-treating, no longer afraid of rejection because of his disguise. He is surprised that everywhere he goes, the neighbors seem to know him already. "That's funny," he says to himself. "She called the tiger Thomas." This goes on at every stop, until Thomas comes home. The story ends with a revelation for our hero: ”I guess they all like you,' his mother said. Thomas looked at her. Suddenly he felt wonderful." Diana Cain Bluthenthal has produced timeless drawings with a modern-day feel. Thomas himself is reminiscent of the lovely young boy in Ezra Jack Keats' classic, The Snowy Day. Bluthenthal brings interest to her simple illustrations by adding wonderful collage-like texture to the pictures. When is a Halloween story not a Halloween story? When it's by Charlotte Zolotow and the emotions and discoveries transcend the holiday. The tale of Thomas is treat enough for any reader.