Salma Writes a Book

Written by Danny Ramadan

Illustrated by Anna Bron

Annick Press

978-1-77321-803-8

120 pp.

Ages 6-9

 September 2023

 

Young Salma, whom we first met in Danny Ramadan and Anna Bron's first picture book Salma the Syrian Chef, is pretty excited to finally meet her uncle, Khalou Dawood, who'd left Syria before her own family to attend university in Toronto before moving to Vancouver. Now he's come to visit, and she is thrilled. But when Salma asks why he has never visited before, things get very tense, and Mama says they will not talk about it.

From Salma Writes a Book, written by Danny Ramadan, illus. by Anna Bron

Though he does not stay with them, her khalou takes her for outings and plays with her, and when her mother has a dizzy spell and Salma is worried, she calls Dawood who comes to help. He is a supportive younger brother, and Salma hopes she'll be a good sibling too when she learns her mother is expecting a baby.

Salma is determined to learn the right way to be a big sister and so she decides to do her research and write her own book titled, "Salma's Guide to Being The Best Older Sibling Ever." Not only does she need to learn how to write a book, but she must also find out from her classmates what is important about being a sibling. But Salma is confused when she sees her mother and her uncle interact. They seem to be close, but Salma wants to know why they have not visited before. Then Mama gets angry when Dawood brings his husband Michael to Salma's apartment for Eid al-Adha dinner. Michael choses to leave, as does Dawood, and Salma is perplexed. 

After a fiasco with her friend Riya's mother's shawl, which the girls cover up, Salma is convinced she doesn't know anything about being a sibling.

She has to learn how to make the right decisions, and how to teach her sibling the same. She has to learn how to guide her sibling, and how to be a role model. And worse of all, she still doesn't know when it is okay to be mad at your sibling, or how to fix things after a fight. (pg. 69)

It's only by understanding their mistakes, that Salma, and even her mother, can move forward and become the siblings they want to be.

While I don't know how many bits of writer Danny Ramadan's own story are the basis of Salma Writes a Book, I do know that there are lessons here that we all need to learn. From understanding "how confusion and fear can lead to mistakes" (pg. 81) and that sometimes it takes time to resolve them. It can mean reconciling confusion between what we've always been told and a new perspective. It could mean taking responsibility and fixing things. It could mean apologizing. Danny Ramadan makes us realize that mistakes can be little things or big things but fixing them is always worthwhile. And by helping Salma see the breadth of mistakes that can be made, from damaging someone else's property, to lying, or to being rude and intolerant, Danny Ramadan has given her opportunities to learn about correcting mistakes and hopefully help her become a more compassionate and supportive older sibling.

Though an early reader with fewer illustrations than Salma's first book, Salma Writes a Book still has more than two dozen black-and-white illustrations by Anna Bron that show us the extent of Salma's experiences, with meeting her khalou and his husband, interviewing her peers, struggling to write, and being part of her family. Young readers will appreciate seeing Salma in all her joys and frustrations, knowing how she might feel as she struggles trying to learn and understand through her own confusion and fears. Fortunately, with a fourth Salma book slated for 2024–Salma Joins the Team–we won't need to wait too long to learn the lessons Danny Ramadan has had Salma learn so that she might be a fabulous big sister to baby Nora.

• • • • • • •

Salma the Syrian Chef (2020)

Salma Makes a Home (2023)

Salma Writes a Book (2023)

Salma Joins the Team (coming in 2024)

Teaching Mrs. Muddle

Written by Colleen Nelson

Illustrated by Alice Carter 

Pajama Press

978-1-77278-131-1

32 pp.

Ages 3-6

October 2020

As a teacher, I know we have a lot to learn from our students. If you're a really good teacher, and I believe Mrs. Muddle will be someday, you listen.

From Teaching Mrs. Muddle by Colleen Nelson, illus. by Alice Carter

 

First day of school can be an exciting day but also a trepidacious one, especially for new students such as kindergartners like Kayla who are already nervous about getting lost and missing their mothers.

Mom didn't look ready to say good-bye. I didn't know what she'd do without me all day.

But Mrs. Muddle is certainly muddled. First she mixes up all their nametags–Kayla is most definitely not Jeremy–and then she reads Kayla's favourite book upside down and tells it wrong. Fortunately, Kayla is very helpful and corrects her teacher without embarrassing her.

From Teaching Mrs. Muddle by Colleen Nelson, illus. by Alice Carter

When they head out for a tour of the school and Mrs. Muddle confuses the library for the gym, mistaking the bookshelves for an obstacle course, and a Gr. 5 classroom for the music room and then must repeatedly ask for directions to the bathroom, Kayla helps the teacher out, though Mrs. Muddle doesn't always recognize her slips.

"Mrs. Muddle, maybe you should let me handle this," I said.

"But it's your first day. You might get lost."

Even on my first day, I didn't think I'd get more lost than Mrs. Muddle!

It's the little ones who listen and follow Mr. Brown's gym rules–Mrs. Muddle can't seem to manage that–and Kayla who comes to the rescue when Jeremy hurts his knee on the playground. Finally, after a full day of guiding Mrs. Muddle, Kayla realizes it's time to go home and she has successfully gotten through the first day of kindergarten along with her classmates but also her teacher.

From Teaching Mrs. Muddle by Colleen Nelson, illus. by Alice Carter

Without making Kayla precocious or Mrs. Muddle outrageous, Colleen Nelson creates a very relatable school situation that is both engaging and charming. It's giving Kayla and every child the opportunity to see that they embody far greater capabilities than they imagine they possess. Though this is Colleen Nelson's first picture book, her impressive repertoire of both middle grade novels such as Harvey Comes Home and YA novels like The Fall, Finding Hope and Sadia have always cheered young people for their ability to face challenges, find solutions and make better lives for themselves than their circumstances might dictate. Even in a light but big-hearted story about finding your own way by helping others, Colleen Nelson drives home the conviction that young people can do so much.

From Teaching Mrs. Muddle by Colleen Nelson, illus. by Alice Carter

 

That brightness of Colleen Nelson's story and message about children's potential to lead is emphatically portrayed in Alice Carter's illustrations. Rich in the primary colours which will appeal to young children, Alice Carter makes what could have been a gloomy story about making mistakes or an incompetent teacher into an energized lesson in helping with heart and being confident.

Teaching Mrs. Muddle should become a must-read for parents sending little ones off to kindergarten but it will be also become a favourite for young children who will laugh at the muddled Mrs. Muddle and applaud Kayla for her cleverness and subtlety, recalling their own first times in new situations and satisfaction at handling them as well.

What If Bunny's Not a Bully?

Written by Lana Button

Illustrated by Christine Battuz

Kids Can Press

978-1-5253-0055-4

32 pp.

Ages 3-7

March 2020

Kitty from Lana Button and Christine Battuz's My Teacher's Not Here! (2018) is still learning to navigate school and to be a part of a peer group. But she's a clever kitty and when she's told about Bunny being a bully, Kitty is determined to understand.

From What If Bunny's Not a Bully? by Lana Button, illus. by Christine Battuz

Elephant tells all the others that Bunny is a bully because she is mean and will make them sad if she gets mad. But Kitty wants to understand so much about Bunny being a bully.

...did she start out friendly,
a kid like you and me,
but ran into a bullybug
whose stringer makes you mean?

She has questions about how Bunny became a bully, whether she will always be a bully, and even whether it's contagious.

From What If Bunny's Not a Bully? by Lana Button, illus. by Christine Battuz

But when Kitty worries that she could become a bully and too be left out, Elephant reassures her that they would never leave her out because then they would be the mean ones. That's when Kitty recognizes that maybe Bunny is not the bully she's assumed to be and they need to change something to make things better.

Lana Button has a keen sense of how young children think and feel. Like many young children, Kitty will tend to follow when she feels that others know a situation better, like the elephant seems to know from experience with Bunny. But Kitty also has an empathetic heart that makes her think about the big picture and discover when that picture may be skewed. From her innocent worries about a contagion to visualizing an elderly Bunny still being shunned by Kitty's peers during a game of croquet, Kitty sees beyond what they are being told and the hurt some of them feel.

From What If Bunny's Not a Bully? by Lana Button, illus. by Christine Battuz

Christine Battuz's illustrations emphasize that innocence of perspective in her use of colour and shape, placing her very softly rounded animals in familiar school yard scenes. Her stylized landscape of patterned balls on trunks for trees, and red flowers dotting the yard, with birds throughout is as the very young often depict their surroundings. Yet there's so much to see in the expressions of Christine Battuz's characters, from discomfort and bossiness, to confusion and surprise, that What If Bunny's Not a Bully? could be an anchor book for lessons about feelings.

For young children, lessons in getting along with others and creating inclusive communities can be challenging. Their needs are often so immediate and egocentric. But what Lana Button and Christine Battuz have done is brought these lessons to their bubble of experience and helped guide them to seeing outside of themselves to understand what others may be experiencing. A valuable lesson for all of us.

•••••••••••

Today 

Monday April 27, 2020

at 2 p.m. EST

listen 

to a reading

by author Lana Button

of

What If Bunny's Not a Bully?

and

 to a conversation about pro-social behaviour in primary grades.

as part of the #CanadaPerforms live presentations.

Just go to Lana Button's Facebook page at

https://www.facebook.com/lana.button.5

••••••••••• 

Ebb & Flow

Written by Heather Smith

Kids Can Press

978-1-77138-838-2

232 pp.

Ages 9-12

April 2018

If you've been reading this blog for a number of years, you'll know what a fan I am of novels in verse. These are stories told in free verse form and the authors who do it well are highly accomplished at writing with impact and few words.  I can now add author Heather Smith to that very short list of accomplished writers of novels in verse.  And she is extraordinary.

Ebb & Flow is the story of twelve-year-old Jett who has been sent to spend the summer with his Grandma Jo. Though he has been sent to stay with her because of a troublesome year, Jett is happy to see Grandma, having many positive memories about her before his move with his mother to the mainland.

I remembered

hugs that were big for her size,

her arms growing

like expandable straws. (pg. 9)

Wordplay is the dialogue between the two who love talking in puns, with Grandma telling her story as if she were a character in a series of anecdotes.  Sadly, because of the mistakes he made over the past year, Jett sees himself as the villain of his stories, deserving of little goodness, including his grandmother's love. Even away from the negative influence of Junior Dawson, a bully and angry classmate, with whom Jett teamed up, the boy cannot shake the bad thoughts about people and the anger he harbours about his own actions.  

In titled chapters of only one or two page verses, Heather Smith subtly reveals Jett's history and the events that led to his relocation for the summer.  In fact, Jett's character development is so subtle that the change in Jett from angry and confused boy to responsive and responsible is as inconspicuous as the tides that come in and go out.

Grandma?

Yes?

Why can't things just stay the same?

Because life is like the tides.
In, out.
Back, forth.
Push, pull.
High, low.
You just have to go with the flow, you know?

Yeah...
(pg. 177)

The reader will sense Jett's progression in increments, as slow as when he and Grandma Jo creep along the beach looking for sea glass, and then he's there, asking to visit his father and telling his own story to his grandmother.

Ebb & Flow may refer to Jett's responses to the ever-changing circumstances that impact him, including his own choices and mistakes, but the book makes a powerful statement about resiliency and the power to ride the tidal motion of life. Sometimes you need a little help, like Jett gets from Grandma Jo who never pushes her grandson to come to an epiphany, though she helps him get there with her love and guidance. Ebb & Flow makes it clear that, with forgiveness to others and self, people and relationships can be salvaged and, like sea glass, taken from sharp edges to soft gemstones.

In Grandma's hand,
five pieces of sea glass –
two white, two green,
one red.

I didn't find anything, I said.

You will.
(pg. 26)

Dingus

Written by Andrew Larsen
Kids Can Press
978-1-77138-661-6
208 pp.
Ages 9-12
May 2017

Dork. Doofus. Dingus.  Variations on a theme.  But Andrew Larsen’s narrator, eleven-year-old Henry will have no problems accepting that final moniker after the conclusion of his fifth grade and the beginning of a summer holiday that seems to hold no promise.

Though Henry likes his Gr. 5 teacher Mr. Buntrock–with his stories, laughter yoga and word-of–the-day–the school year has been one of multiple changes, not the least of which is his growing estrangement from his best friend Max.  Though the two boys have always relished their differences–Max is smarter, taller and wealthier–Max has become so immersed in his winning chess team that he has little time for Henry.  Worse still, Max seems to take pleasure is teasing Henry about wearing Max’s cast-off clothes and more, making Henry the butt of his chess team’s jokes.

At home, things are similarly in flux.  Mom who’d had baby Sam a year ago is returning to work which will require more travel, starting with a trip to Las Vegas the last day of school.  Dad, who’d lost his job just before Sam’s birth, has stayed at home to care for Sam and, by default, Henry. And, of course, there is less money for everything and anything, including a pair of much-admired Chad Baker sneakers.

I was mad at Max. I was mad at his new friends. I was mad at my dad for getting me Chad Fakers instead of Chad Bakers. I was mad at myself for being so mad.
   My life officially sucked.
   I was mad at that, too. (pg. 45)

Adding insult to injury, Max gets to go away to his much-loved chess camp while Henry  sees a summer of nothingness ahead of him.  What Henry doesn’t realize is that Dad’s idea of a staycation will bring him a new set of experiences like outdoors movie night, Elvis sandwiches, and bottle rockets, suggesting that change really is as good as a holiday.

It must be rough being a kid for whom everything feels like it’s going sideways.  What’s worse is when it’s things you can’t control like money, baby brothers, and friends as well as  things you can but don’t because you’re a dingus.  But Andrew Larsen realizes that change, like that of the puberty lessons Henry has to endure at the end of Grade 5, is inevitable and rolling with it rather than fighting it is probably a lot easier.

I know there’s a million middle-graders out there right not who are wondering about their summers, the changes their bodies and minds are going through, and the direction that friendships are heading.  It’s a lot on their plates, especially since things don’t always work out at planned.  But, take solace in that, even if you’re a Dingus–and we are all such goofs some time in our lives–that it’s rarely fatal and often educational, just like mistakes and school.

Phoebe Sounds It Out

Written by Julie Zwillich

Illustrated by Denise Holmes

Owlkids Books

978-1-77147-164-0

32 pp.

Ages 3-7

April 2017

Too many children like Phoebe avoid that which seems difficult or problematic especially in school.  So it’s not surprising that the young girl would prefer to play with her rain boots and a pencil rather than practise writing her name as instructed by the teacher.  Even though she has her name written on her backpack to use as a guide, she knows the letters don’t match the sounds that she is able to distinguish in her name. (Her Mama must have made a mistake.)

From Phoebe Sounds It Out

by Julie Zwillich 

illus. by Denise Holmes

So, Phoebe carefully chooses the sounds and letters that would make sense in her name and, for a child in kindergarten, she is absolutely en pointe!  She’s not copying her name out; she’s sounding it out and spelling it as the sounds dictate.  Moreover, she’s led by her heart to use letters that fit but still she chooses those that might have special meaning or add a little something extra like companionship for lonely letters.

“Maybe she could borrow the letter that was at the end of Nicky’s name.  It sounded right.  Nicky wouldn’t mind.”

And though her teacher could chastize Phoebe for incorrectly spelling her name, she instead celebrates all the children’s attempts with glitter glue and a clothespin display for all to enjoy.

From Phoebe Sounds It Out

by Julie Zwillich

illus. by Denise Holmes

Julie Zwillich’s picture book is based on a very familiar premise though not all teachers and parents would recognize it as so or be as accommodating as the children’s teacher Ms. Martha.  As daunting a task as writing your name for the first time, so is reading. Imagine needing to decipher letters before you can even put the sounds together to form words.  Still the story is very straightforward and told in an uncomplicated text so that young children just learning to read will want to attempt to decipher the words, especially since they’ll see themselves within Phoebe’s story.  Everyone is in this book, courtesy of illustrator Denise Holmes who creates a diverse class with students of different races, ethnicities, abilities and challenges, whether they be eyesight or mobility or spelling.  Judging by the names of students displayed (looks like there’s a Lakshmi, Maria, Finch, Ali, Aaron, Miguel, Hazel, Sam, Nicky, June and, of course, Phoebe), Ms. Martha’s classroom is wonderfully rich in diversity, inviting readers to empathize with her students and  respond to Phoebe’s circumstances with understanding.

There’s a wonderful Teachers’ Guide for download that encourages  activities with reading comprehension, writing, and the alphabet, but just reading Phoebe Sounds It Out will suffice to foster discussions about trying and making mistakes as a part of learning.

The Best Mistake Mystery (The Great Mistake Mysteries, Book 1)

by Sylvia McNicoll

Dundurn

978-1-4597-3625-2

120 pp.

Ages 9-13

January 2017

"I know that if you relax enough to stretch, reach, and risk, the twists along your path will lead to something amazing." - Sylvia McNicoll

Student Stephen Nobel sees mistakes in every turn of his path, past and present, anticipating more in his future.  His days as a Grade 7 student are logged as a compendium of mistakes, though Sylvia McNicoll only shares three consecutive days, of ten mistakes each, in The Best Mistake Mystery, demonstrating that a whole lot can happen in three days, both gaffes and opportunities, depending on how you look at them.

His dad’s new business, Noble Dog Walking, has given Stephen the opportunity to regularly walk the Bennetts’ two dogs: Ping, a small Jack Russell, and Pong, a tall greyhound.

“And we’re off–like a wagon pulled by a mismatched team, a horse and a pony.” (pg. 18)

Just like for the dogs, for whom every step is a new adventure of sounds and smells and textures, Stephen becomes witness to a myriad of happenings which will all become part of a bigger mystery or two.  He finds a bag of poop lodged in a tree.  He meets up with an annoying and relentlessly questioning classmate, Renée, with whom he learns that an earlier school drill was actually a response to a bomb threat.  Ping tackles a skateboarder.  Pong urinates on some bricks being worked by a contractor, Mr. Mason.  Then the teen sees the principal, Mrs. Watier, in the orange VW Beetle he’d seen their former custodian Mr. Sawyer driving earlier.  Later Stephen observes that same VW driving around the school’s parking lot late at night.

The mysteries begin to mount when school is cancelled the next day because that orange car had crashed into the school overnight and, because of a brick on the accelerator, filled the school with fumes.  Worse, the car belongs to Renée’s older brother, Attila, who is questioned, though he denies any role, since his car was at the high school auto shop.  The twists and turns of who did what, who was where and why something happened become a full-blown pot boiler with threatening texts, an impending wedding, a dognapping and ransom demand, and a whole lot of snooping, with and without dogs in tow. 

I love a good mystery and The Best Mistake Mystery is a great one.  Sylvia McNicoll throws in so many red herrings and suspects that readers will be changing their hunches as to who did it and why repeatedly.  Just like the winding neighbourhood through which Stephen walks Ping and Pong, a lovable but unlikely duo of canine champions, The Best Mistake Mystery is bursting with characters, storylines, life lessons and dogs. And readers will love all of that.  

But personally, I adore Sylvia McNicoll’s message, and the premise for this new series, The Great Mistake Mysteries, that mistakes are opportunities that enrich our lives.  They may certainly feel like challenges, even curses, but ultimately most mistakes should be considered serendipitous, providing chances to learn and grow and tweak our lives for the better.  And, if you solve a mystery or two in the process, all the better.

Check back tomorrow for my interview with author Sylvia McNicoll about The Best Mistake Mystery and her new series, The Great Mistake Mysteries (cute logo posted below).

Also, get in on one of the book launches for The Best Mistake Mystery this week for a chance to get a signed copy of the book, and maybe share a doggie treat with your own canine best friend. Details here.