The small, enigmatic figures in Daly’s folk-style landscape paintings add to the air of mystery infusing this spare rendition of “The People Could Fly,” retold here in a version handed down from storyteller McGill’s slave-born ancestor. The five serene new arrivals at Ol’ Man Deboreaux’s plantation, just off the boat from Africa, barely speak a word, keep to themselves—and, when the first evening’s meal is over, vanish. Young Jane trails the furious slave-owner and his dogs out into the fields, where she sees all five rise into the air “like [they were] climbing a ladder.” The last, “the one who had smiled at my great-grandmama’s mama, Jane…kept treading air with arms like wings. His feet moved like tail feathers and he sailed beyond the clouds, way up and over everything.” Despite Deboreaux’s threats to sell her down the river if she doesn’t keep silent, she returns to tell the story, both before and after she escapes to freedom with her children. It’s a tale that will have a profound effect. (author’s note) (Picture book/folktale. 7-9)
Pub Date: June 2, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-618-38796-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2008
Trickling, bubbling, swirling, rushing, a river flows down from its mountain beginnings, past peaceful country and bustling city on its way to the sea. Hooper (The Drop in My Drink, 1998, etc.) artfully evokes the water’s changing character as it transforms from “milky-cold / rattling-bold” to a wide, slow “sliding past mudflats / looping through marshes” to the end of its journey. Willey, best known for illustrating Geraldine McCaughrean’s spectacular folk-tale collections, contributes finely detailed scenes crafted in shimmering, intricate blues and greens, capturing mountain’s chill, the bucolic serenity of passing pastures, and a sense of mystery in the water’s shadowy depths. Though Hooper refers to “the cans and cartons / and bits of old wood” being swept along, there’s no direct conservation agenda here (for that, see Debby Atwell’s River, 1999), just appreciation for the river’s beauty and being. (Picture book/nonfiction. 7-9)
Pub Date: June 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-7636-0792-4
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2000
Nolen and Nelson offer a smaller, but no less gifted counterpart to Big Jabe (2000) in this new tall tale. Shortly after being born one stormy night, Rose thanks her parents, picks a name, and gathers lightning into a ball—all of which is only a harbinger of feats to come. Decked out in full cowboy gear and oozing self-confidence from every pore, Rose cuts a diminutive, but heroic figure in Nelson’s big, broad Western scenes. Though she carries a twisted iron rod as dark as her skin and ropes clouds with fencing wire, Rose overcomes her greatest challenge—a pair of rampaging twisters—not with strength, but with a lullaby her parents sang. After turning tornadoes into much-needed rain clouds, Rose rides away, “that mighty, mighty song pressing on the bull’s-eye that was set at the center of her heart.” Throughout, she shows a reflective bent that gives her more dimension than most tall-tale heroes: a doff of the Stetson to her and her creators. (author’s note) (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-15-216472-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Silver Whistle/Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2003
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