Skink on the Brink

by Lisa Dalrymple

Illustrated by Suzanne Del Rizzo

Fitzhenry & Whiteside

978-1-55455-231-3

32 pp.

Ages 4+

June 2013

This Saturday, Lisa Dalrymple and Suzanne Del Rizzo will be holding a launch for their picture book, Skink on the Brink, and I implore you all to go, pick up your own copy and share in the experience that is Stewie the Skink.

Lisa Dalrymple's text follows Stewie from his early days as a blue-tailed skink whose contentment with his name, appearance, unique defense feature, and his forest habitat adjacent to a pond is evident in the clever little songs he makes up.  Judging by Suzanne Del Rizzo's rich plasticine illustrations of various animals and vegetation in the area, Stewie has many reasons to be happy. 

But, as with all living things, Stewie will grow and mature, and he does, but into a less colourful skink of grey about which he can't find much to sing.  Hopeful for inspiration in a new habitat, Stewie sets out, finding a new pond that has its own set of attributes.  Instead of seeing what he does have, Stewie focuses on what he has lost.  That is, until a wise woodpecker shares with Stewie the nature of his endangered status and that his original habitat was best for keeping him safe.

Skink on the Brink shares the need for self-acceptance and seeing beyond the superficial.  Stewie is so enamoured with his blue tail that he cannot see anything as wonderful once it's gone.  Luckily a woodpecker with great rhythm brings out the song in Stewie and, surprisingly, mating throughout the forest and pond! But, as the title suggests, Skink on the Brink goes beyond the individual and introduces young readers to the concept of species endangerment and the importance of habitat in ensuring the survival of species such as Stewie.  To enhance a young reader's understanding of these concepts, Lisa Dalrymple provides comprehensive notes about endangerment and habitat protection, as well as the life cycle, classification, and defense mechanism of skinks.  And for a little fun, there are the rules for a game of Skink-Tail Tag and Suzanne Del Rizzo's instructions on making Stewie from plasticine.

Though a welcome addition to any primary/junior teacher's collection of science picture books, Skink on the Brink is for young readers who enjoy the texture-rich illustrations of plasticine art done well and learning about the natural world, with encouragement to involve themselves beyond the book.  As such, Skink on the Brink is the best of children's non-fiction in a visually-enhanced fictional context. Be sure to save this one.

Willow Finds A Way

by Lana Button

Illustrated by Tania Howells

Kids Can Press

978-1-55453-842-3

32 pp.

Ages 3-7 

March 2013

I know that school has only been out for a few days but with a relevant and delightful story like Willow Finds a Way, it really doesn't matter whether it's read in school or out of school.  When a child finds the means to deal with a classmate who coerces loyalty with the carrot of a birthday party, this life lesson could be useful for any one of the millions of circumstances in which people behave badly. If an author provides a strategy for young people to deal successfully with such situations, I say we publicize it as much as we can, especially if it is as subtle and non-preachy as it is in Willow Finds a Way.

In Lana Button and Tania Howell's sequel to Willow's Whispers (Kids Can Press, 2010), Willow's classmate Kristabelle announces that she will be having a fantastic birthday party and she has made a list of those who are invited.  Willow and her classmates are relieved to see that on a pink sparkly paper Kristabelle has listed all their names.  But Kristabelle doesn't just make a list.  She holds it over everyone as a bribe to encourage them to do just as she asks:  play on the climber, sit at her table, allow her to be line leader, wear pink.  If anyone doesn't comply, Kristabelle crosses their name off her pink sparkly list.  Around her, children want to do different activities, sit other places, wear different colours and enjoy their own choices, but no one comes to the aid of those whose names are removed so publicly from the list.  As in Willow's Whispers, shy Willow must find her voice again and do what she believes is right and she does, all without hurting anyone's pride.

The austere text and simple drawings by Lana Button and Tania Howells respectively acknowledge the commonality of the circumstances of Willow Finds a Way.  No child wants to be the ostracized by his or her peers, experience friendlessness, or feel coerced instead of compromising. Likewise for adults for whom these same circumstances could be witnessed in any workplace.  Without shaming Kristabelle, Willow finds a way to send her the message that it is not OK to treat others as she does by threatening to take names off her list.  By allowing Kristabelle to examine the situation and amend it herself, every one can keep their frail egos intact.

It's a rare day when you'll read a review of a children's book in Canada's national newspaper, The Globe & Mail, nowadays.  At one time, a "Children's Books" column could be found every second Saturday in their Books section, sharing reviews of a number of children's books, Canadian and otherwise.  So imagine my surprise to see the cover of Willow Finds a Way on a Book page in the June 22, 2013 edition of The Globe and Mail!  A delightful contribution of reviews by author Andrew Kaufman (Born Weird, Random House Canada, 2012) and his children, Frida and Phoenix, starts with Willow Finds a Way.  To have this book win the attention of Andrew Kaufman and company in this rare promotion of children's books should tell readers how special this book is in challenging children to see beyond the obvious and stand up to injustice, even if it is only in regards to a birthday party.  But, as you may recall from your youngest days, birthday parties are a very, very big deal to the young.  By solving these kinds of problems, young readers may be more resilient, all courtesy of Willow, Lana and Tania, when more significant problems arise.

Lily and Taylor

by Elise Moser

Groundwood Books

978-1-55498-334-6 (hc)

978-1-55498-336-0 (ePub)

224 pp.

Ages 14+

September, 2013

Reviewed from Advance Reading Copy

Lily and Taylor is not for the faint of heart.  It is raw and brutal, just as is Taylor's reality.  Seventeen-year-old Taylor had been living with her older sister Tannis and her young nephew Mason when Tannis' boyfriend Bracken beats her to death in just one of his many episodes of physical abuse.  In fact, Lily and Taylor opens with Taylor witnessing her sister's autopsy, compelled to view the finality for her sister's body.

Though Taylor and Mason go to live with their Gram and her partner Douglas, and start at new schools, their old life has not been set aside.   Taylor's boyfriend Devon continues to call her, determined for her to see him.  Of course, it's not like they broke up; Taylor had just moved away.  But for Taylor, the physical space she now has away from Devon gives her an opportunity to let down some of the fear upon which their relationship is based.

She loved Devon but she'd been beginning to feel stuck with him, had begun to gaze jealously at the dork girls with no boyfriends.  The constant gnawing fear -- would he be mad if she said this, would he hate it if she wore that -- had been wearing her down. (pg.18)

Never confident about meeting new people and never having had any friends with whom she could shop or hang out, something that would make Devon angry ("You better not be lying to me." pg. 26), Taylor does eventually meet Lily, a tall lanky girl who has her own domestic secrets.  Lily lives with her mom after her parents' marriage ended.  Though her mother claims it was her father's drunkenness that was the cause, her father explains that it was after her mom's car accident that left her with a brain injury that made her volatile and unpredictable.  Sadly, Lily has been left to deal with her mother's unpredictability, and then her drinking, on her own.  But, just as Taylor notices at school, Lily is very good as deescalating conflict with lightness and humour.  Too bad that Lily sees herself through other people, even dying her bangs purple as "a sign that she had surrendered to her freak status." (pg. 44)

The brutality of Taylor's emotional, physical and sexual relationship with Devon, spiked with the profanities of their vernacular, is magnified when Devon drops by one night before Christmas and forces Taylor to go for a ride with him.  Though definitely unwanted, Lily jumps into the passenger seat and begins to chat up the driver, a stoic guy named Conor.  He drives them to cabin where Devon's controlling and violent nature has him brandishing a rifle to ensure compliance, even from Conor.  As Lily tries to find the means to escape and help Taylor, she draws on a multitude of memories to help her cope and survive.  Likewise, Taylor is rehashing all her experiences with Devon, and with Tannis, Mason and Bracken, and plotting how to help Lily.

The cycles of domestic abuse, from Tannis and Bracken, Taylor and Devon, Devon and his father, and even Lily's mom and her intermittent boyfriends, seem endless, even compounded, with Taylor and Mason.  Elise Moser makes it very clear that one cycle begets another.  The horror of these lives is derived from a normalcy of school, work, groceries, TV, and Christmas, overlain with pervasive abuse and its juxtaposition with caring.  Even Lily recognizes that Devon has Taylor so twisted about her feelings for him that she can't make rational decisions about her own safety.  Not surprising that Lily acknowledges that, "She hated them.  Devon and Connor most of all, but Taylor, too." (pg. 157)

Lily and Taylor brings together the cleverness of perspective and the confusion of the heart as they merge to become a stronger entity that can subdue, if not surmount, abuse, and it all happens because of the strength of friendship.  Brutal, honest, and hopeful, Lily and Taylor speaks for those weakened by abuse who cannot always voice their needs.  It is incumbent upon us to listen to their words.

Book Launch: Skink on the Brink (Toronto)

Join

author Lisa Dalrymple and illustrator Suzanne Del Rizzo

to launch Stewie the Skink 

and

Skink on the Brink 

 

Fitzhenry & Whiteside

978-1554552313

32 pp.

Ages 5-8

on

July 6, 2013

1 - 3 p.m.

at

Story Planet and Intergalactic Travel Authority

1165 Bloor Street West

Toronto

The author and illustrator promise
plasticine fun for children, 

allergy-aware treats, 

books to buy 

and 

lots of FUN!

The Sinking of the Wiley Bean

by Margaret J. McMaster
Mansbridge Dunn Publishers
978-0-981-052557
50 pp.
Ages 7-9
2013

It's very difficult to find engaging reads for children, usually ages 5 to 7, who want to move out of picture books and onto the novels of the older kids.  Although large-format picture books can be just as challenging as lengthier reads, many children see moving up to "chapter books" as a rite of passage.  But too often, they select titles about which they've heard e.g., The Hobbit and Twilight (but totally age-inappropriate) or with recognizable elements e.g., movie, TV or game tie-ins (which can be of questionable quality). A more appropriate choice for a transition book between juvenile picture books and novel-length fiction would be the length of a short-story, with age-appropriate vocabulary and a linear plot.  Margaret J. McMaster's Babysitter Out of Control series would fit well on this bookshelf.

In this fifth book of the Babysitter Out of Control series, our young narrator Stewart is in Mongo Tongo with his care-giver, Mrs. Alice Chairbottom, and Colonel Alfred Peabody to organize the seniors' wedding.  While Mrs. Chairbottom spends endless time with the wedding co-ordinator, Colonel Peabody and Stewart go beachcombing, finding a frightening ship's figurehead which Stewart takes back to his room.  Shortly thereafter, Stewart begins having vivid nightmares of being aboard a ship during a terrible storm in which the ship breaks apart.  And, in his waking life, everything for Mrs. Chairbottom's wedding seems to be falling apart just as easily: the weather is stormy; the airport gets closed; the clothes she's selected for her husband-to-be and best man are unavailable; and her wedding cake is ruined during an earthquake.  Without giving too much more away, the story lines are resolved happily and the premise for the next volume of Babysitter Out of Control is established.

I do love the stories in the two Babysitter Out of Control books that I've read, as they have some intrigue, some humour, and some real-life issues. The Sinking of the Wiley Bean will keep the young readers engaged with the shipwreck scenario, Stewart's nightmares, and the ill-timed troubles impacting the wedding.  I don't know if they will be as concerned as I was wondering who Ronald is, a character who keeps driving Mrs. Chairbottom here and there. Without any reminders or explanations as to his relationship to the other characters in the story, Ronald is a black hole to me, not something you want in a book which should be able to stand alone.

Don't let the triviality of my unease, however, sway you from giving this story a try.  Mrs. Chairbottom is the babysitter with whom most young children would enjoy spending time, as Stewart obviously does, leading him into unusual situations and providing atypical adult responses to most circumstances.  Stewart's parents both trust Mrs. Chairbottom to care and nurture his young mind.  I think you can safely do the same.

Read Me A Story, Stella

by Marie-Louise Gay

Groundwood Books

978-1-55498-216-5

32 pp.

Ages 2-6

August, 2013

Imaginative, inquisitive and compassionate Stella, our youngest Canadian red-haired delight, courtesy of author-illustrator Marie-Louise Gay, has re-emerged as the brilliant reader and sharer of knowledge in Read Me a Story, Stella.  (Many children will recognize Stella and her younger brother Sam and his sidekick dog, Fred, from the television series, but, as all good readers know, great movies and shows always come from books, and such is the case with Stella and her brother.)

As Sam endeavours to create a doghouse for Fred from branches that he has collected, Stella is enjoying the humour of a book that might cover the stories of Stone Soup, Caramba and The Three Little Pigs or versions thereof.  But Sam, knowing that Stella has all the answers, is sweetly relentless in his questioning.  "Are there crocodiles in the pond?" "Caterpillars become butterflies? How do they do that?" "Will the kite get caught on a cloud?"  And Stella does not disappoint, drawing from her vast reading of fiction -- "But there is a big old toad wearing a velvet jacket." -- and non-fiction -- "Here's a picture of a caterpillar in my insect book."  Even after a bountiful day and evening of exploring, sharing, learning and reading, when Fred can't sleep, Stella draws upon her stories to create a personalized one for a little boy and his dog.

Marie-Louise Gay has taken young readers from Stella's first steps (When Stella was Very, Very Small) to her poetic explorations of the forest, sky, sea and snow, and now she shares the endless possibilities and wonder of reading.  With a light touch in her text and watercolour and pencil illustrations, Marie-Louise Gay easily melds childhood romps and sibling exploits together in a world of natural wonder and of enlightening literature.  There's no more cherished place to be a child.

     *      *      *      *      *      *     

If you haven't enjoyed Marie-Louise Gay's Stella and Sam stories in print, definitely the best way to appreciate them, check them out.

Other Stella books:

• Stella, Star of the Sea (Groundwood, 1992)
• Stella, Queen of the Snow (Groundwood, 2000)
• Stella, Fairy of the Forest (Groundwood, 2002)
• Stella, Princess of the Sky (Groundwood, 2004)
• When Stella Was Very, Very Small (Groundwood, 2009)

Sam's books:

• Good Morning Sam (Groundwood, 2003)
• Good Night Sam (Groundwood, 2003)
• What Are You Doing, Sam? (Groundwood, 2006)

New Cover Reveal: STAINED

On October 1, 2013, 

  STAINED 

the newest young adult novel

 from author Cheryl Rainfield 

and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

will be released.  

Cheryl Rainfield,

author of the Scars, Hunted and Parallel Visions

brings readers another compelling read

STAINED

Sometimes you have to be your own hero

The book's tag-line should be the mantra for Sarah, who is targeted for abduction because of her facial port-wine stain and must find a way to rescue herself.

  
EXCERPT
With a new book cover and a new release date, I thought it would be a great idea to share a bit more about Cheryl Rainfield's upcoming YA book, STAINED, including this excerpt (p. 2):

Today is the day I’ve been waiting for my entire life—the beginning of normal.

I reach for the latest Seventeen and flip through its glossy pages until I find the perfect face. The girl is pretty, with wide green eyes, hollow cheekbones, and full, pouty lips. But what I notice most is her smooth, unblemished skin. It’s perfect. I cut the photo out and stick it above my bed, in the last of the space. Now I can’t even see the sunlight yellow of my walls—but the confidence that shines in these faces is even brighter. And today I’m going to get so much closer to that. I don’t care how much the treatments hurt; it’ll be worth it. It can’t hurt as much as the stares and rude comments I get every day.

I know I shouldn’t let people’s ignorance get to me. Mom’s always telling me I’m beautiful; that it’s what’s inside that counts. But she’s not living in the real world. Sure, whether you’re kind or good matters. But pretty people automatically get better treatment. Ugly people get ignored ... if they’re lucky. And me, I get stares, taunts, or people going out of their way to pretend they don’t see me.

I try to think of it as fuel for my comic scripts. All heroes have to go through personal trauma before they find their true strength—and most of them feel like outsiders even after they do.

‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡

Here's what others are saying about STAINED:

"Powerful. I raced through it, wanting to know if Sarah would find a way to escape both her captor and her self-doubts. A real nail-biter!"

- April Henry, NY Times-best selling author of The Girl Who Was Supposed to Die

"A compelling, gutting, and ultimately triumphant read. You won't want to stop turning pages -- Or blink. Or breathe. -- until you reach the very last one."

-Jennifer Brown, award-winning author of Hate List

"STAINED is dark, tense and gripping; a triumph of one girl's heart, soul and will to survive. Sarah's strength during her descent into terror kept me reading way past bedtime!"

-Laura Wiess, critically acclaimed author of Such a Pretty Girl

‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡

VIDEOS

Today, Cheryl Rainfield uploaded a YouTube video about writing STAINED. It is a thoughtful sharing about her own experiences and the courage and strength she found to help her survive and escape abuse.

Uploaded on June 18, 2013 by Cheryl Rainfield on YouTube 

at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miLDs9HfBcI 

And, if you missed it in January, this is the book trailer that she uploaded before the cover and release date had been change.

Uploaded on January 21, 2013 by Cheryl Rainfield on YouTube 
at  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sr0a8pw-csQ

‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡

FREEBIES and CONTEST

To celebrate this cover reveal, Cheryl will be giving away her YA paranormal fantasy, Parallel Visions, as a free Kindle ebook on Amazon, today only.

And she'll be holding a contest on her website http://cherylrainfield.com/blog/ for a signed advanced reading copy of STAINED (old cover), gift card and great book swag (including purple wristbands with the tagline for the book).

‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡

So time to mark your calendar:

 October 1, 2013

 for

STAINED

by Cheryl Rainfield

Young adult suspense is just a few months away

‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡