Rilla-books
Last week I shared pictures of Wonderboy’s favorite book. This week it’s Rilla’s turn for a books post. I’m going to try to get in the habit of doing this regularly, for our family records as much as anything else. These are the picture books she enjoyed most in the past week:
Big Bad Bunny by Franny Billingsley, illustrated by G. Brian Karas. This was one of the books I received for review as a Cybils panelist in 2008, and it was a hit with my family. Big Bad Bunny is on the loose, and Mama Mouse has just discovered her littlest mouse-baby is missing. She’ll brave any peril to find her baby—even Big Bad Bunny’s long sharp claws and fierce yellow teeth. Rilla loves the repetitive text and watches each page for the chance to shout “No!” when I ask if something will stop Mama Mouse. It’s very comforting, when you’re three, to know that Mama will face danger to find you and bring you safely home.
Alfonse, Where Are You? by Linda Wikler. Scott had the fun of reading this family favorite to Rilla at naptime yesterday. Lucky man. It’s out of print now, alas, but there are used copies floating around. Alfonse is a big old goose, and his fluffy yellow friend Little Bird wants to play hide-and-seek. Trouble is, Alfonse hides too well…all of our small fry have loved this sweet book. Rilla asks for it over and over.
Trubloff, the Mouse Who Wanted to Play the Balalaika by John Burningham. A strange little book with somber, gorgeous, heavy-toned illustrations, all reds, oranges, and blacks, with a vast expanse of snow. Trubloff lives with his mouse family inside the wall of a country pub. He befriends an elderly member of a band of traveling musicians, and the old gypsy makes him a tiny instrument of his own. Rather too text-heavy to hold my littles’ attention, so it requires a bit of impromptu editing, and yet they keep asking for it. Something about the mouse’s passion to learn how to play his instrument—so intense that he leaves his family to travel with the musicians—holds them rapt. And then when the mouse sister strikes out on skis to fetch Trubloff home to see his sick mother—Rilla does that quivering-in-her-seat thing that she does.
“Stand Back,” Said the Elephant, “I’m Going to Sneeze!” by Patricia Thomas, illustrated by Wallace Tripp. Good luck finding this one: it’s long out of print. Ours is Scott’s old Weekly Reader Book Club copy.
—OH!!!!!!!! JUST THOUGHT OF A MEME!!! Let’s do our favorite Weekly Reader books! I’ll move this to a separate post and do a Mr. Linky for it. Just the words “Weekly Reader” evoke such powerful memories for me. Dr. Boox, Sprout, Christina Katerina…OK, yes. Stay tuned.
Back to Stand Back, what a fun read. The elephant is going to sneeze, and all the animals are distressed; the last sneeze wreaked such havoc. The zebra lost his stripes, the alligator’s snout turned inside out, the giraffe folded in half…disaster all around, on this strange savannah where there are both alligators and crocodiles, and North American bears from the looks of it. Delightfully rhyming text. The whole book reminds me a bit of Johnny Crow’s Garden in tone and whimsy. Very glad Scott claimed it from his family’s bookcase.
Well, this only takes us back about two days, but it’s enough for now. I might come back later and add book cover illustrations if time permits.
Mae says:
What a fun post! I’m not familiar with any of the picture books mentioned, but I guess I’ll have to change that!
One of our all-time favorite picture books is MISS TWIGGLEY’S TREE, by Dorothea Warren Fox. Do you know it? It’s a wonderful, rhyming story about an extremely shy, elderly recluse who lives in a tree, relying on her dog, Puss, to run her errands in the town. The townspeople naturally think her quite queer, especially the mayor’s wife who considers her a nuisance. But then a hurricane strikes and when Miss Twiggley rises to the occasion everyone (Miss Twiggley included) learns a valuable lesson.
Btw, I just checked amazon and it looks like “STAND BACK,” SAID THE ELEPHANT, etc. is back in print!
On February 1, 2010 at 10:04 am
stephanie says:
I had never heard of “Stand Back” until we inherited my husband’s weekly reader books a few years ago and my girls (and I) love it as well!
On February 1, 2010 at 11:58 am
kristen says:
I used to read Stand Back to my son when he was younger. My mom had a copy at her house. I can almost recite it by heart!
On February 4, 2010 at 5:03 am
Christina says:
I love your book recommendation posts! We got Big Bad Bunny out of the library and the kids have enjoyed it so much. My four year old had been “reading” it aloud to us with much enthusiasm. We also got the elephant book, which my husband picked up and said was one of *his* favorite books when he was a kid. So… thank you!
On February 20, 2010 at 6:58 am