A simple and lively guide for young writers everywhere.
A writer and her dog team up to offer tips on how to write stories.
Giff’s 70-pound dog, Rosie, is good at flapping her ears, wagging her tail, and shredding the daily newspaper—and, it turns out, she can be a good model for lessons on writing techniques, too. In 80 pages divided into 34 brief chapters, the volume offers a full course on the elements of fiction for young writers. With Rosie’s help and brief, illustrative excerpts from her own novels—Lily’s Crossing (1997), Eleven (2008), Pictures of Hollis Woods (2002), and others—Giff demonstrates how to create characters, establish a setting, give a character a problem to solve, and write dialogue. Many recent well-intentioned guides to teaching writing are big and intimidating, and brevity proves a boon here, making this short, engaging manual that speaks directly to readers the best recent writing guide for young readers and writers. The cover featuring Rosie and her presence as a canine writing prompt skews this guide to a younger audience, but it would be handy in middle school classrooms as well. The final chapter, “Read,” is an ode to the delights and values of reading. The last line: “I begin to read.”
A simple and lively guide for young writers everywhere. (bibliography) (Nonfiction. 8-13)Pub Date: Sept. 15, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8234-3656-9
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Holiday House
Review Posted Online: June 21, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2016
Though usually cast as the trickster, Coyote is more victim than victimizer, making this a nice complement to other Coyote...
Two republished tales by a Greco-Cherokee author feature both folkloric and modern elements as well as new illustrations.
One of the two has never been offered south of the (Canadian) border. In “Coyote Sings to the Moon,” the doo-wop hymn sung nightly by Old Woman and all the animals except tone-deaf Coyote isn’t enough to keep Moon from hiding out at the bottom of the lake—until she is finally driven forth by Coyote’s awful wailing. She has been trying to return to the lake ever since, but that piercing howl keeps her in the sky. In “Coyote’s New Suit” he is schooled in trickery by Raven, who convinces him to steal the pelts of all the other animals while they’re bathing, sends the bare animals to take clothes from the humans’ clothesline, and then sets the stage for a ruckus by suggesting that Coyote could make space in his overcrowded closet by having a yard sale. No violence ensues, but from then to now humans and animals have not spoken to one another. In Eggenschwiler’s monochrome scenes Coyote and the rest stand on hind legs and (when stripped bare) sport human limbs. Old Woman might be Native American; the only other completely human figure is a pale-skinned girl.
Though usually cast as the trickster, Coyote is more victim than victimizer, making this a nice complement to other Coyote tales. (Fiction. 9-11)Pub Date: Oct. 3, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-55498-833-4
Page Count: 56
Publisher: Groundwood
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2017
Gleefully providing ammunition for snarky readers eager to second-guess misguided beliefs and commands of grown-ups, Rondina dishes up the straight poop on dozens of topics from the cleanliness of a dog’s mouth and the relationship (none) between French fries and acne to whether an earwig could really crawl into your ear and eat your brains. Since she cites no readily checkable sources—support for assertions comes in the form of quotations from experts in various fields, but there is no bibliography—it’s hard to tell how accurate some of her claims are—it would be nice to have a citation to the JAMA studies that debunk the sugar-hyperactivity connection, for instance—and too often she provides only an unsatisfying “You Decide” instead of a clear “True” or “False.” Still, it all makes painless reading equally suitable for casual dipping or reading straight through, and Sylvester’s pen-and-ink spot art adds further light notes to every page. An extensive closing catalog of familiar “Parentisms”—“I’m not running a taxi service,” “Because I said so, that’s why,” etc.—adds a chuckle-inducing lagniappe. (Informational ephemera. 9-11)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-55453-454-8
Page Count: 96
Publisher: Kids Can
Review Posted Online: June 28, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2010
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