Soothing things
Aug. 31st, 2016 08:52 pmI just got back from Train to Busan, which was great (thanks ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
china_shop for the rec!) but very very tense and emotionally exhausting, so rather than sit and twitch I am going to review two picture books that I also really liked that did not induce nail-biting states of tension.
Sophie's Squash, by Pat Zietlow Miller & Anne Wilsdorf. Sophie's parents buy a squash from the farmers' market. Sophie decides that this squash is just the friend she's been looking for. ("When it was time to make supper, Sophie's mother looked at the squash. She looked at Sophie. "I call her Bernice," Sophie said. "I'll call for a pizza," said her mother."). Sophie and Bernice do everything together, but winter is coming, and Bernice is becoming softer and blotchy....
Huh. I feel compelled at this point to state that no, Bernice does not become a ravening zombie squash. Still not quite over the movie... Sophie does bury her for the winter on advice from a farmer, and in the spring there are some familiar shoots in the yard. It is a very sweet story and I like Sophie, with her vegetable love, and her parents, who are unthinkingly cruel in a believable fashion ("Let's bake her with marshmallows.") but who do try. And the illustrations are great. There is apparently a sequel in which Bernice's squash offspring (Bonnie and Baxter) attend school.
Nobody Owns the Moon, by Tohby Riddle. "The fox is one of the only wild creatures in the world that can successfully make a life for itself in cities," this begins, and there is a picture of Clive, the fox protagonist, in his apartment in a comfortable armchair with his feet up on the ottoman, a cup on the table beside him, a cityscape through the window and a stack of books by the chair. This is an unconventional picture book in structure and content, and it is also so out of print that I can't even find it on bookfinder.com, which is a shame because I would love a copy. Although Clive does well in the city, his friend Humphrey, a donkey, does less so, and is currently homeless. When they meet one day, Humphrey has found a blue envelope that contains two tickets to the premiere of the play, Nobody Owns the Moon. They attend the play from dress circle seats and love it, and after have cake and hot drinks in the theatre restaurant, all because of their tickets; they go back out into the city and share a moment when they say, "This is our town!" and then they hug, and part.
The friend of mine who read it was offended - "Why doesn't the fox let Humphrey stay at his place? This doesn't change anything!" - but I loved it. It's perfect because it's transient, and because the city can be welcoming and callous at the same time. The art, layered drawings on photos, has the same tension between real and unreal.
china_shop for the rec!) but very very tense and emotionally exhausting, so rather than sit and twitch I am going to review two picture books that I also really liked that did not induce nail-biting states of tension.Sophie's Squash, by Pat Zietlow Miller & Anne Wilsdorf. Sophie's parents buy a squash from the farmers' market. Sophie decides that this squash is just the friend she's been looking for. ("When it was time to make supper, Sophie's mother looked at the squash. She looked at Sophie. "I call her Bernice," Sophie said. "I'll call for a pizza," said her mother."). Sophie and Bernice do everything together, but winter is coming, and Bernice is becoming softer and blotchy....
Huh. I feel compelled at this point to state that no, Bernice does not become a ravening zombie squash. Still not quite over the movie... Sophie does bury her for the winter on advice from a farmer, and in the spring there are some familiar shoots in the yard. It is a very sweet story and I like Sophie, with her vegetable love, and her parents, who are unthinkingly cruel in a believable fashion ("Let's bake her with marshmallows.") but who do try. And the illustrations are great. There is apparently a sequel in which Bernice's squash offspring (Bonnie and Baxter) attend school.
Nobody Owns the Moon, by Tohby Riddle. "The fox is one of the only wild creatures in the world that can successfully make a life for itself in cities," this begins, and there is a picture of Clive, the fox protagonist, in his apartment in a comfortable armchair with his feet up on the ottoman, a cup on the table beside him, a cityscape through the window and a stack of books by the chair. This is an unconventional picture book in structure and content, and it is also so out of print that I can't even find it on bookfinder.com, which is a shame because I would love a copy. Although Clive does well in the city, his friend Humphrey, a donkey, does less so, and is currently homeless. When they meet one day, Humphrey has found a blue envelope that contains two tickets to the premiere of the play, Nobody Owns the Moon. They attend the play from dress circle seats and love it, and after have cake and hot drinks in the theatre restaurant, all because of their tickets; they go back out into the city and share a moment when they say, "This is our town!" and then they hug, and part.
The friend of mine who read it was offended - "Why doesn't the fox let Humphrey stay at his place? This doesn't change anything!" - but I loved it. It's perfect because it's transient, and because the city can be welcoming and callous at the same time. The art, layered drawings on photos, has the same tension between real and unreal.
