Subway Story by Julia Sarcone-Roach

Subway Story by Julia Sarcone-Roach
Random House Children's Books

Rating: 5 stars

A few weeks ago we read and I blogged about Julia Sarcone-Roach's recent picture book, The Bear Ate Your Sandwich. As I often do, I was so impressed with that book that I checked out every other book our library system had by her. This was how we came across Subway Story. We've had it at home for about a week; I think I've read it out loud about two dozen times. Truly. I'm not exaggerating. My kids (and I) just love it.

Here's the story: Jessie is a subway car "born" in St. Louis, MO, then shopped to New York for a long, busy, productive career ferrying people to and from, from and to. For decades, she takes people and their belongings all across the city. She gets fixed up from time to time, but Jessie is happiest to be on the rails, working hard in her beloved city.

I love how this illustration shows time passing...

Then, something happens that happens to all of us: she ages. She gets outdated. After a few band-aid fixes, she gets pulled into the shop. Jessie quickly realizes that she's not getting fixed up--she's getting taken apart. Sure enough, some workers are stripping her of bolts and chains, seats and screws. She's put on a barge with a bunch of other nervous-looking, outdated subway cars and taken out to sea.

When they are in what seems to be the middle of the ocean, the cars get dumped into the water, one at a time. I admit my kids were a little horrified to see Jessie plunge down, down, down into the deep water and PLUNK heavily at the bottom.

But soon (probably a teensy bit faster than in real life), one fish comes. Then another, and another, and then a whole school of fish. Coral come to attach themselves to poles once gripped by sleepy commuters. Turtles and dolphins stop by and visit.

Jessie once served a city; now a whole city lives inside of her.

The eloquent and spot-on Horn Book reviewer had this to say (quote and more information, including many more illustrations, found here, in this interview with Sarcone-Roach):

Sarcone-Roach displays a discipline not always seen in books about the environment; she allows her theme of reuse and recycling to emerge naturally from a fine story and lets readers draw their own conclusions without adding a heavy-handed one of her own.

I wish I could get inside my kids' brains to understand what about this story so captivates them. Three times this week I've read it to Kiefer, then walked with it to Ben's room and read it to him. (We read separately--not incredibly efficient but allows me some time with each kid at the end of the day.) Is it the unexpected ending? Is it the fact that this is based on a true story? Is it the city landscape, something that is cool but foreign to them? Is it the magical way the fish and coral and other sea creatures cover Jessie at the end? Whatever it is, they LOVE the book.

And, despite the fact that we don't need another book in this house, I bought it. It just had to be a part of our collection of books for now, and forever.

(Such a dramatic ending! I feel like I need theme music or something.)

P.S. Here's an image from real life to show your kids, and click HERE for a little bit of background, too.

Locomotive by Brian Floca

Locomotive by Brian Floca

Rating: 4 stars

I checked this book out easily before it won the Caldecott; after the gold seal shone brightly on its cover, there was a long waiting list both at the library and at the bookstore.  Here's a tiny secret: When I first checked out Locomotive, I didn't read it.  I don't know if any of my kids did.  So we returned it without having read it.  It happens…what can I say?

But then the Caldecott team deemed it worthy of a win, and it became wildly wanted.  We were number 60 on the waiting list!

Finally, it's our turn with the library's copy of the book and we all understand easily why it is Caldecott-worthy.  The book is a huge lap size picture book, with illustrations that resemble a wide screen TV.  Somehow, Brian Floca created a hundred masterpieces in this big, long book--masterpieces of illustration, not just beautiful pictures, but pictures that tell a story of a long-ago way of life.

Slowly, slowly the engineer drives--
the train is so heavy,
the bridge is so narrow,
and rickety rickety rickety!

After a brief show of how the rails were built, we see the iron horse chug up to the station.  In familiar prose, where Floca writes directly to you ("She pulls her tender and train behind her, she rules up close, to where you wait, all heat and smoke and noise.")  That noise of the train jumps out from the page at you with larger and fancier font than the rest of the words.  We, the readers, follow along as one family (a mother and two children) travels from east to west; we also observe and learn all the different people required to run the train smoothly.  Because, of course, it takes a team.

There's a whole lot that works in this book for me and my trio: The illustrations are spell-binding.  Floca's research shines through on every page: from the close-up details of the gaskets or that coal car to the historical map of the United States that shows the path of the train.  (I am curious how many pictures he took of real-life trains to take back to his studio with him.  Surely thousands…)  The family we see travel on the train are excited throughout; we experience what they experience, including going to the bathroom, (which was definitely a highlight for Ben in the book) but not when the train stops!  For there is "no plumbing here, there is only a hole in the floor."

The facts taught in the book easily earn my approval: and not just the team members' roles and responsibilities…  That's important, but so are the little, anecdotal things: For example, the switchman's job is dangerous; the train cars lurch and slam up against each other quickly.  They say "You can tell he's new to the job if he still has all his fingers." Or the mighty Sierra Nevada that "rise like a wall on the edge of a basin" requires an extra engine to pull the train up and over them.

Through the night the engine runs.
Those up late hear her whistle,
her wild and lonesome cry.

The ending works for me, too.  I love it: the mother and two children arrive to their father, who came out west before them.  There's nothing like a homecoming to warm your heart at the end of a story!

What doesn't work for me are all the words.  Oh my gosh even I am thrown off by all the dozens of words on each page.  Lorelei sat and read the book quietly in one sitting but Ben couldn't sit through the whole thing, despite his normally curious mind and the gorgeous pictures that go along with it.  Even I found myself skimming it.  My eyes were more interested in the illustrations than the words.  Because of the number of words, this book is better for an older age group--first grade or older.  It would be great to read right after finishing a chapter book from the same time period, such as Little House on the Prairie or Sarah, Plain and Tall.

Still, it is a masterpiece despite my silly gripes.  If there's a locomotive enthusiast in your family--of any age, your son or your mother or your grandfather!--this is a book for him.  Or her!

What Do People Do All Day? by Richard Scarry

What Do People Do All Day? by Richard Scarry

Rating: 5 stars

A new thing: Throwback Thursday!  Here's an oldie but greatie...

The fact that I've been reviewing and recommending children's books for four years and have not mentioned this book is a crime.  I confess to it.  Right now. I am very sorry; I have been negligent in my duties. I will put myself in time out all day long (with a big stack of books beside me...oh happy day).

Truly, this is a must-have for any three-ish year old child.  Right now, at 2 years and 9 months, Kiefer can't get enough of the book.  Just like Ben couldn't get enough of the book when he was that age.  I sat with Ben just like I now sit with Kiefer, reading each story again and again and again, talking about the water wheel in this story, the special ladder to rescue Huckle in that story... I love the book still.  Which is a good thing, because I'll probably read it to Kiefer again later today.

from A Voyage on the Sea

I like all of the stories, but the priceless-ness is in the pictures: Scarry adds in a hundred little details in his illustrations, which means your child sees something new and different each time they read the book.  Oh--and a note on reading this book: because the illustrations are so intricate, reading isn't necessary to really understand what's going on.  That makes it an excellent choice for pre-readers like Kiefer.

Hopefully your childhood included this magical book.  If not, let me explain a little more about it so that, at the end of this post, you can immediately order it for any 3-ish year old child in your life.

The book is an oversized lap book, and is divided into seven or eight different stories.  I will challenge myself to remember them so I don't have to sneak into Kiefer's room to get it (he sleeps with this book; that, my friends, is book-love):

• Everyone is a Worker 
• How to Build a House 
• Fireman to the Rescue
• How to Mail a Letter
• A Day in the Hospital
• Where Wood Comes From
• How a Road is Built
• A Voyage on the Sea
• Where Bread Comes From

The best illustration in the whole book!
From How A House is Built

Each story is just a handful of pages long, and it uses animal characters to tell the story while also teaching the little reader about the topic.  Ben and Kiefer both love the house building one best--and that's my favorite, too.  I love the step-by-step explanations and the detailed pictures that go right along with it.

At the very least, check this book out to remember a bit of YOUR childhood.  At the very most, order it from your favorite bookseller to share the magic with your favorite reader.



P.S.  Many, many thanks to my godmother Andrea, who gave me this book seven years ago at the book-filled baby shower my sister threw for me.  I can't believe we still have the original!

How to Train a Train by Jason Carter Eaton

How to Train a Train by Jason Carter Eaton, illustrated by John Rocco

Rating: 5 stars

"So you want a pet train?" asks the young boy-narrator.  "Well, of course you do!  Trains make awesome pets--they're fun, playful, and extremely useful.  Luckily for you, this handy guidebook contains everything you need to know to choose, track, and train your very own pet train.  Ready?  Then let's head out and find some trains!"

How can you resist an invitation like that?  I love how, right from the first page, this boy assumes you a) have realized that trains can be pets--and cool ones at that; b) are up for the adventure to find a train for yourself.  By the end of the first page, you're in.  Ready to go find your train.  You've long since forgotten that you once thought that having a train as a pet was a ludicrous notion.

Spend as much time as you can getting to know your train.
Does it like to play fetch?

And so begins a really fun imagination-filled tale of capturing your own train (with careful observation, then sweet luring it over to you, then winning it over with treats and pets in case you're curious).

What do you do with said train once you have it?  Well...lots of things!  You name it, of course, after getting to know it.  (Eaton names two of them after his own sons; I can only imagine their excitement of being in a children's book--my kids would go crazy in a sugar-before-bedtime sort of way.)  You can teach it tricks.  You can take it fishing with you, or take it swimming.

The story is neat and takes your kids on an unexpected, imaginative ride that makes them look around their normal lives and wonder: what else could I make into a pet?  And if a book makes your child wonder a little bit or a whole lot...well, then that's a great book in my book.

Here are some common train names...

But the illustrations!  John Rocco is so fantastic.  He brings to life these huge, heavy locomotives and makes them playful and funny and...just neat.  His trains-as-pets are brought to life, given sweet and kind and caring and even scared expressions on their steel engines in the most creative ways.  It's hard to read this book and not stop and examine the pictures in amazement and appreciation.  He's done our kids such a service here with his own imagination and talent.  (Thanks, John Rocco!)

This is definitely a great book--especially if you're little reader is into trains in just the slightest bit.  And maybe this is the way to persuade your child that they don't really want a puppy...they want a train instead?!

Maybelle the Cable Car by Virginia Lee Burton

Maybelle the Cable Car by Virginia Lee Burton

Rating: 4.5 stars

We just returned from a big ol' family trip to Northern California.  It was the first time I'd ever really  been there (does a two day stint in San Francisco in college for a conference and a ten hour layover in Los Angeles really count?) and I was blown away by the beauty and hipness of the place.  I suddenly realized how uncool I am here on the East Coast!

But rather than go on a tangent about my lack of cool, I'll try and focus on books.   Before this and any trip, I try to find a bunch of books about our destination so to provide a context for the kids.  Since they have few or no expectations and little experience to draw upon, I really think giving them picture-filled books to show them what we'll see is helpful.  Plus sights fly by their window so quickly, I like for them to...pre-steep, if you will...in the city as much as possible.

So, Maybelle the Cable Car.  This is one of my favorite books by Virginia Lee Burton--it is charming, interesting, and informative.  Can't beat that!  In this book, the city fathers are thinking about retiring the cable cars in favor of buses, which are "newer and faster and more economical."  Maybelle is one of those cable cars, and she and her sisters are immediately dismayed at the news.  While some of the people are glad for progress, others are just as sad as Maybelle.  "We'll miss them...what a pity...We'll be like any other city."

So they call a public meeting and put it to a vote!  Obviously the cable cars win, but only after Big Bill the bus, the not-so-horrible enemy in the book, tries to climb the hills in the middle of the night.  At first, he thinks there's nothing to it.  But on a damp and foggy night, he slips, slides, and gets turned around.  He suddenly has a  little more respect for those cable cars.  So he concedes like a gentleman and beeps his horn to congratulate the cable cars as they take a victory climb up the hills of San Francisco.

Lorelei's I'm-on-a-cable-car grin.

After reading this book a dozen times at home and on the plane, all of us were VERY excited to ride the cable car.  We bought our tickets (and lost one...and I might have told a little lie that Lorelei was 4 not 5 so she didn't need one), stood in line, climbed aboard and held on tight.  Lorelei and Ben even got to stand-- though I did draw the line at letting them hang on to the side (see?  I am SO uncool!)--as our cable car noisily climbed up, up, up to the top of the hill.  We got off--where else?--at the Cable Car Museum so we could learn even more about the cable cars.  (Fascinating stuff there...I was eager to learn that Andrew Smith Hallidie, the inventor of the cable car, created it because he was an animal-lover, and he was tired of seeing horses get whipped while struggling up the hills' wet cobblestones.)

Anyway, a really good book even if you're not heading to San Francisco, but required reading if you are!


P.S.  In a man-I-wish-I-had-seen-that! moment, I found a nice little list of children's books (click here) about San Francisco on the blog www.SFKids.org.  But I did find this blog post useful about kid-friendly activities and sites around the city.

Choo Choo by Petr Horacek

Choo Choo by Petr Horacek

Rating: 4.5 stars

Poor Kiefer doesn't get many new books.  But thanks to the library, he now reads some books new to him!  In the "monkey see, monkey do" vein as my friend Felicity says, Kiefer has picked up on Ben's modus operendi in the library: Grab some books and put them in the library bag.  Repeat every ten seconds until the bag is almost too heavy for Mommy to carry.  (Meanwhile, sweet Lorelei has chosen one single book, plunked her little body in a big bean bag, and is reading that one book until we tell her it's time to check out.)

So Kiefer chose this book and I LOVE it!

It's a simple book with cut outs within the sturdy pages--the tops of the pages are shaped like mountains (my heart is happy at the thought of any mountains) and there is even a cut out when the train goes through a tunnel.  The words are simple, the images great, and the tunnels are fun to peek through--Kiefer's an easy laugh like that (shouldn't we all be?).

The Georgetown Loop Railroad.  Sigh.  Gorgeous, ain't it?

I love the book because it reminds me of Colorado, when our young family flew to one of my favorite places on earth to see the mountains last summer.  This trip, taken when Kiefer was just 4 months old, still holds Lorelei and Ben's imaginations.  They talk about it, draw pictures about it, and ask when we're going back.  Not soon enough!

There were many great parts of it, but everyone loved the historic train ride along the Georgetown Loop in Colorado.  Check it out here.  Kiefer slept most of the way on my chest, and my husband snapped pictures of Lorelei and Ben's awe-struck faces as they soaked in the sights and smells as the train chugged along the tracks.

I might have to buy this book for Kiefer...really, for myself...because it brings back such good memories each time I read it.  But the book ends when the train arrives at the beach!  Why?!  It should end somewhere in the mountains, where it begins!

Lorelei reads  Choo Choo to Kiefer.

Choo Choo Clickety-Clack! by Margaret Mayo

Choo Choo Clickety-Clack! by Margaret Mayo, illustrated by Alex Ayliffe

Rating: 5 stars

This book is like an old friend to Lorelei and Ben.  Ok, I realize that "old" is quite relative because we're talking about a 3 1/2 and 2 year old here...but we check it out from the library every few months, and they are always excited to see it.  We've read all of Margaret Mayo's books (click here to read my reviews of her books); they have the same pattern in the poem, so it's familiar to them for many reasons.

This one is so great, especially for Ben, who is crazy about anything with wheels and/or makes sounds when it goes.  (So inspired is he by big trucks, he often beeps when backing up!)  In this book, trains speed, airplanes fly, cars drive, race cars race, sailboats sail, hot air balloons float, motorbikes rev, bikes whiz, cable cars climb, buses go, and ferryboats load.  The book ends with nightfall, which of course I love and appreciate, when all the vehicles rest (and we find them in their "resting spots" across the page).

Maybe some parents are careful with their books, but we are definitely not, despite the fact that it pains me to see a ripped page or a book shoved off a table thoughtlessly.  We believe that it's best to just hand over the books to our kids as much as possible, so they have the thrill of turning the page--or turning back a page--themselves.  These books written by Mayo are so great that theywill definitely be read again and again and again, so the sturdier the pages, the better! 

The Little Engine that Could by Watty Piper

The Little Engine that Could by Watty Piper, illustrated by Loren Long

Rating: 5 wonderful, classic stars

If I could choose one book that every child would receive on their first birthday, this would be it.  It is such a classic--who doesn't know about this?  maybe just the girl in my English lit class in college who had never heard of Star Wars--and it is the most deserving of all the esteemed classics out there.  Every grandparent should make sure their grandchild has this book on his or her shelf.

Just think if every child grew up thinking of the little blue engine chug chug chugging merrily along, stopping to help the little broken down train despite her small size, believing in herself as she pulled them up up up the big mountain, boosting her confidence by saying again and again I think I can I think I can I think I can...  Wouldn't this world be filled with kinder, more confident little beings?  Maybe they'd even grow to be kind, confident adults, too.  It's worth a try.

We started reading this book when Lorelei started a little Mommy and me gymnastics class.  She was pretty nervous about jumping off of things and hanging by her arms like a monkey and climbing up ladders.  We read this and began chanting I think I can I think I can I think I can at those moments when she needed a little bit more courage.  There's no way to tell if this book and this line were the sole cure for her lack-of-boldness problem, but...it definitely helped.

I know this book by heart now--I hope most parents do--and I am a little bummed that we bought an older version of the book.  We have the book illustrated by George Hauman; he does a good job, but the words and the illustrations annoying don't match up.  It's as if there's a time delay...in the picture one engine is chugging off back to the roundhouse but the text says that the funny little toy clown is just greeting him.  Hardly the end of the world, but the book with illustrations by Loren Long is gorgeous and definitely the one to buy.  Look at this picture of all the toy animals feeling sad after being disappointed by the third engine--can't you just feel the disappointment?! 

And, speaking of his or her, the most curious thing about this book to me is the fact that both the little engine that breaks down and the heroic little blue engine are both female, and the three unhelpful engines are male.  A little Google research and come to find out that--shockingly--I am far from the first to have this thought.  Some versions of the book don't attribute any gender to any of the trains, thereby making problem moot.  The versions with the gender difference are hailed by many female critics for applauding the "female pioneer" and maintaining a positive myth of women helping women, though the guys definitely get the short end of the stick--they are "too busy with important, male work" to help.

I don't think Lorelei and Ben are quite ready for literary analysis.  We love the Little Engine that Could because it is fun to read aloud as I have a different voice for each engine and the toy clown, too, and there's nothing better than cheering on a kind underdog that wins in the end!

A Train Goes Clickety-Clack by Jonathan London

A Train Goes Clickety-Clack by Jonathan London

Rating: 4 stars

I need a favor.  Will someone please sneak into my house late, in the middle of the night, and steal this book from us?  And then return it to the library without my son noticing?  I'm not sure he's going to let us return it, and it's actually almost due.  I know I could renew it, but...that's not the point!  I've got to take a break from it!

There's not much to this book, but Ben loves it.  The book follows me around everywhere...because Ben picks it up and follows me around, wanting me to read it to him.  I am, of course, officially delighted that he can now sit through a book or two with hardly a squirm.  But, between you and me, I'd like to get a few other things done during my day than read this book over and over and over and over and over.  And over and over and over again!

But it's a good one.  I can say that after reading it about a hundred times.  It's just your basic, run-of-the-mill introduction to trains book.  My husband wanted Ben to get into trains; he succeeded!  It took a few cool Thomas the Train items (some a bit overpriced for my cheap taste) and a book like this.

One last, more serious thing about it: Lorelei is starting to try to read, and a book like this is great for her.  We play "find the word" and she finds it on each page or I point to one and ask if that's the word we're looking for.  She thinks it's fun and she gets it right most of the time.  I don't want to push reading too much...I just want her to think it's a great pastime. 

So that we can take long car trips and plane rides.  I like to plan ahead.

The Goodnight Train by June Sobel

The Goodnight Train by June Sobel, illustrated by Laura Huliska-Beith

Rating: 5 stars

Sometimes, we just get lucky at the library. Lorelei and Ben have been into trains lately--our little tea table and chair set from IKEA magically turns into a train some days, and we caught glimpses of the Metro while stuck in traffic yesterday. So I ordered up some books from the library after doing a quick search for "trains." We got this book. What a great one!

I don't know about you, but I like books that I read to my kids to put them in the mood to sleep. Crazy idea, I know. This book does just that. I mean, my head is slowly drooping with every page I turn. It is a poem, which of course I love, and after every other stanza there's a train-like sound: Toot toot! Whoooooooooo! Whoooooooo! Choooooooooo! Chooooooooooo! Shhhhhhhhhh! Shhhhhhhhhhhh! then Hush-a, hush-a, hush-a, hush-a, Sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeep!

Ben is not yet train-crazy, but I hear that this phase is inevitable. I'm going to keep this book in mind the next time we've got a little boy birthday party to celebrate. This book might be one we actually buy...I wish it was available in a board book. (I fully believe that all bedtime books should be available in board books, so at a young age you can read them to your little one and then give them the book so they can read to themselves before they drift off. I'd much rather hand Ben The Goodnight Train than Clip Clop, which is wonderful but way too exciting to read before a nap!)

I just read it again. Now I must go take a nap. Good night!