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Tetralogue by Timothy Williamson is a philosophy book for the commuter age. In a tradition going back to Plato, Timothy Williamson uses a fictional conversation to explore questions about truth and falsity, knowledge and belief. Four people with radically different outlooks on the world meet on a train and start talking about what they believe. Their conversation varies from cool logical reasoning to heated personal confrontation. Each starts off convinced that he or she is right, but then doubts creep in. During February, we will be posting a series of extracts that cover the viewpoints of all four characters in Tetralogue. What follows is an extract exploring Zac’s perspective.

Zac wants everyone to be at peace with everyone else, whatever their differences. He tries to intervene and offer a solution to the conflicts that arise between the other characters, but often ends up getting dragged in himself.

Sarah: It’s pointless arguing with you. Nothing will shake your faith in witchcraft!

Bob: Will anything shake your faith in modern science?

Zac: Excuse me, folks, for butting in: sitting here, I couldn’t help overhearing your conversation. You both seem to be getting quite upset. Perhaps I can help. If I may say so, each of you is taking the superior attitude ‘I’m right and you’re wrong’ toward the other.

Sarah: But I am right and he is wrong.

Bob: No. I’m right and she’s wrong.

Zac: There, you see: deadlock. My guess is, it’s becom­ing obvious to both of you that neither of you can definitively prove the other wrong.

Sarah: Maybe not right here and now on this train, but just wait and see how science develops—people who try to put limits to what it can achieve usually end up with egg on their face.

Bob: Just you wait and see what it’s like to be the vic­tim of a spell. People who try to put limits to what witchcraft can do end up with much worse than egg on their face.

Zac: But isn’t each of you quite right, from your own point of view? What you—

Sarah: Sarah.

Zac: Pleased to meet you, Sarah. I’m Zac, by the way. What Sarah is saying makes perfect sense from the point of view of modern science. And what you—

Bob: Bob.

Zac: Pleased to meet you, Bob. What Bob is saying makes perfect sense from the point of view of traditional witchcraft. Modern science and traditional witch­craft are different points of view, but each of them is valid on its own terms. They are equally intelligible.

Sarah: They may be equally intelligible, but they aren’t equally true.

Zac: ‘True’: that’s a very dangerous word, Sarah. When you are enjoying the view of the lovely countryside through this window, do you insist that you are see­ing right, and people looking through the windows on the other side of the train are seeing wrong?

Sarah: Of course not, but it’s not a fair comparison.

Zac: Why not, Sarah?

Sarah: We see different things through the windows because we are looking in different directions. But modern science and traditional witchcraft ideas are looking at the same world and say incompatible things about it, for instance about what caused Bob’s wall to col­lapse. If one side is right, the other is wrong.

Zac: Sarah, it’s you who make them incompatible by insisting that someone must be right and some­one must be wrong. That sort of judgemental talk comes from the idea that we can adopt the point of view of a God, standing in judgement over every­one else. But we are all just human beings. We can’t make definitive judgements of right and wrong like that about each other.

Sarah: But aren’t you, Zac, saying that Bob and I were both wrong to assume there are right and wrong answers on modern science versus witchcraft, and that you are right to say there are no such right and wrong answers? In fact, aren’t you contradicting yourself?

Have you got something you want to say to Zac? Do you agree or disagree with him? Tetralogue author Timothy Williamson will be getting into character and answering questions from Zac’s perspective via @TetralogueBook on Friday 13th March from 2-3pm GMT. Tweet your questions to him and wait for Zac’s response!

The post Trains of thought: Zac appeared first on OUPblog.

        

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by Ann and Paul Rand (Chronicle Books, 2009; originially published in 1956.)

You might remember how much I love this pair’s Sparkle and Spin, and this one is just as playful and just as true. That case cover surprise is an a delight, and complementary-colored endpapers start this book with a bang.

Paul Rand’s graphic genius is so well-matched by the simple and spare words of his wife, Ann. The text and the pictures both glide through that magical reality of childhood. Things that might seem daunting to someone bested by time are small and accessible. Things that may seem obvious or forgettable are ripe for play and adventure.

It’s a reminder to slow down, listen, and watch. The world is built of wonderful things. The big picture is as beautiful as the details.

Here, the sentiment is the whole of this person. I’m not sure there’s an ending more perfect, not for kids or their grownups. There’s so much more to know, but what you carry with you can stay.

by Nicola Davies and Laura Carlin (Candlewick, 2014)

The Promise is on this year’s New York Times Best Illustrated Books list and I’m so glad it captured a spot. I imagine weeping and gnashing of teeth to pare down a year into a handful of notables, but they got this one so right.

Here you have bleakness. Bare and raw. And a girl who doesn’t have much but the desolate things. The words themselves pierce the brightness.

The people, too, dry and dusty.

And then.

Some seeds and a promise and a reluctant okay.

I pushed aside the mean and hard and ugly, and I planted, planted, planted.

Everything works in this book. The text is exquisite. The pictures haunting and heartbreaking and hopeful. The paper is luxurious. The case cover differs from the jacket itself. Dig in. Look around. Don’t miss the endpapers that start as stone and end as spring.

There’s a little Frog Belly Rat Bone here, in this fragile world in need of color and life.

(Also, there’s a lot of great stuff about this beautiful book here, and this post is so, so lovely as well.)

And PS! Add a comment by Wednesday, December 3rd to this post for a chance at winning all ten of those books from Chronicle. Don’t forget your pledge to #GiveBooks this year!

by Eric von Schmidt (Houghton Mifflin Company Boston, 1964)

Okay. It’s time for a teensy bit of name dropping. I have this cousin who is a brilliant singer and songwriter and he’s racked up a few Grammys as well. (Do you say Grammies? I don’t think so.) If you are into good, old-fashioned bluegrass and Americana, check out Jim Lauderdale. Musicians are such great storytellers, don’t you think? Sometimes I wonder if I can pack the same amount of heart and soul into a 500-word picture book that he can in a 3-minute song.

That’s partly why I was so drawn to this book, The Young Man Who Wouldn’t Hoe Corn. And that was even before I realized that there were all kinds of connections to song. That title begs to be picked and strummed, right?

I purchased this book a while back from Elwood and Eloise on Etsy. The owner, Mallory, also runs an excellent illustration blog, My Vintage Book Collection (in blog form), which is an incredible archive of gorgeous out of print materials. Thank goodness she sells some of her collection, cause I’ve added some sparkle to my own thanks to her shop. (Also, the images in this post are courtesy of her post here.)

This is the story of Jeremy Sneeze. Where he fails as a farmer he succeeds at making children laugh. (Which is to say by wiggling his ears.) He replaces fallen birds nests and makes pictures and poems. And so, of course, the elders of his town denounce his slack and shifless ways. A town meeting. A crow. A spell is cast. A sneeze. A surprise.

This book’s design is reminiscent of a song. Here’s what I mean. That color—washes of analogous color in oranges and yellows and greens, those are the harmonies to the stark black’s melody. It’s steady and rhythmic like the downbeats of an upright bass. Unless they are splashed and chaotic like a mandolin’s intricacies.

On top of stellar bookmaking, the story itself is a sweeping epic wrapped up in the short pages of a picture book. Listen to some of its lines:

Just about then he would get to puzzling about other things like “How high is up?” or “Who plants the dandelions?” or “Where do the stars go during the day?”

And every year all Jeremy had to offer was a big weedy field filled with assorted brambles and unchopped briars, bounded by dirty broken boulders.

Flap-flap, past bats that watched with eyes like razors, past lizards, toads, and laughing spiders, down past rats and rattlesnakes and monkeys dreaming evil dreams of moons.

We have specials today on stars that dance or boiling oceans, and a bargain rate for setting mountains into motion.

He hurled himself at the brambles and flung himself at the weeds with such speed you couldn’t tell which was hoe and which was crow.

True enough he is a sorry farmer. But in his head dwell pictures and in his heart are poems.

The listen-ability, the meter, the storytelling grumble. It’s all here. What a gem.

P.S.—A bit of poking around online still left me slightly confused about the history of this book and the similar-ly titled song. Did the book inspire the song? Did the song know about the book? I think the song inspired the nitty-gritty backstory of the young man who wouldn’t hoe corn. I can’t really tell, so I’ll just be sitting here enjoying both. Hope you are too.

by Misty Copeland and Christopher Myers (Penguin Young Readers Group, 2014)

When you open a book to sweeping, fiery endpapers, it’s almost as if you can hear the symphony begin. The author, Misty Copeland, is a principal dancer with the American Ballet Theater. The illustrator, Christopher Myers, is a Caldecott Honoree for Harlem and the son of the legendary Walter Dean Myers.

We are in stellar storytelling hands.

(image here // Copeland dancing the Firebird)

(image here // Copeland dancing the Firebird)

Christopher Myers’s art captures the lines and shapes of a dancer’s movement. Intricate, suspended, and dizzying.

Misty Copeland’s words are fire and poetry to a timid youngster’s soul.

I adore the anticipation in this spread, the dancer waiting for the curtain to rise, and I imagine a lump in her throat and a belly full of as many swoops as the folds in the curtain.

Each page turn reveals a composition that is even more striking than the last. This is a pairing of musicality, movement, and a jaw-dropping array of colors and feelings. The way her words and his pictures create an animated harmony is exactly how music and movement do the same in the ballerina’s world.

A perfect pas de deux.

For more on Misty Copeland, take a look at this. She is a lovely storyteller, both in her books and with her body.

Review copy provided by the publisher.

By Ann and Paul Rand

{originally published 1957 by Harcourt, Brace, and World. Reprinted 2006 by Chronicle Books.}Sometimes pictures are just that: eye-catching and whimsical, without being packed with meaning or message. That spirit dances across the page in Sparkle and Spin, written by Ann Rand and illustrated by her husband Paul.

Paul Rand is an iconic American graphic designer. A problem solver. A storyteller. A communicator.

He said this about design:

“Good design adds value of some kind, gives meaning, and, not incidentally, can be sheer pleasure to behold.”His biographer, Steven Heller, said this:

“Paul Rand did not set out to create classic children’s books, he simply wanted to make pictures that were playful. Like the alchemist of old, he transformed unlikely abstract forms into icons that inspired children and adults and laid the foundation for two books that have indeed become children’s classics.”

Maybe he didn’t intend to be a creator of legendary books for kids, but his love for beautiful work shines in this one. That’s the magic of Sparkle and Spin: harmony, wit, and playfulness.And Ann’s words are a delightful match to Paul’s pictures. There’s a rhythm, song, and honor to these words that represent the joy of learning. Harmony, captured perfectly.

In graphic design, harmony is the magic that happens when all of the individual elements complement one another. It’s when small parts of pretty make up a more lovely whole.Here’s a detail I really love. This bold, graphic ice cream cone comes at the beginning, and with the inscription: To all children who like ice cream. And at The End, that scoop’s been slurped, chomped, and devoured. That’s what the experience of this book is. Tasty.

The book sparkles and spins. You’ll see what I mean.

Tagged: ann rand, chronicle, color, harmony, pattern, paul rand, shape, sparkle and spin, wordplay

Oh, Day 12 has arrived. What a joyous thing! You've been working hard, and I want you to take a minute and think about all you have done. Amazing, isn't it. It's so satisfying -- that little stack of completed stuff. I hope you take a minute and pat yourself on the back. Being kind to yourself is oh so important to have a successful journey.

No clue what a Golden Coffee Cup is? Click here.

Today's high five comes from the catalogue of Georges-Pierre Seurat, a working-hard-on-the-art five.



The thing that I love about Seurat is his ability to understand the emotion of light. I just have no other words for it. On these fall days, I see the warm hued-light that bathes the whole world in enchanted glow. Seurat and his dots capture that light. He just figured out how to pour living light onto a page.

I'm telling you now. I've never seen a photograph that can capture whatever it is that Seurat got on to his canvases. When I've seen his work, I've had to quickly review why I didn't become an international art thief. Uh, I'm clumsy, I've moral inflexibility, I'm a rotten liar, and I've an extreme dislike of alarm noises. But for these small obstacles, I'd be snatching original Seurats left and right. I'd so do it, man.

So this brings me to the big thought of the day, you have a unique perspective. You have a specific harmony of skill that no other person has. Bring that genius out of the nether reaches of your thoughts, your heart, and splash that stuff all over some pages. Be brave.

That's your cup of java for the day. I will be back tomorrow with some more of the piping hot stuff. Time keeps slipping into the future. I'll meet you there.

Originality depends only on the character of the drawing and the vision peculiar to each artist. Georges Seurat

Author: Vaunda Micheaux Nelson (on JOMB)
Illustrator: R. Gregory Christie (on JOMB)
Published: 2009 CarolRhoda Books (on JOMB)
ISBN: 9780822567646

This true tale of swindlers, slayers, smarts and skill will lasso listeners of all stripes.

Other biographies on JOMB:

• It’s A Snap! George Eastman’s First Photograph
• One Beetle Too Many — The Extraordinary Adventures of Charles Darwin
• Neo Leo (the Ageless Ideas of Leonardo da Vinci)
• The Fantastic Undersea Life of Jacques Cousteau
• The Value of Believing in Yourself: The Story of Louis Pasteur

More of the wild west on JOMB:

• Buffalo Music
• Smoky Mountain Rose (An Appalachian Cinderella)
• Sing, Sophie

More freedom reading on JOMB:

• Let Freedom Sing
• Night Running: How James Escaped with the Help of His Faithful Dog
• Priscilla and the Hollyhocks
• Freedom Child of the Sea
• Follow the Drinking Gourd

We’d love to hear your thoughts on a favourite children’s book. Leave a voice message on our JOMB listener hotline, +1-206-350-6487, so we can include your audio in our show.

Author: Vanessa Newton (on JOMB)
Illustrator: Vanessa Newton
Published: 2009 Chronicle Books (on JOMB)
ISBN: 9781934706909

Spot-on sixties-style illustrations, simple, springboard text and a soulful, sing along refrain shine a celebratory light on 18 individuals who stood tall and opened doors for generations.

More freedom reading on JOMB:

• Night Running: How James Escaped with the Help of His Faithful Dog
• Priscilla and the Hollyhocks
• Freedom Child of the Sea
• Follow the Drinking Gourd

We’d love to hear your thoughts on a favourite children’s book. Leave a voice message on our JOMB listener hotline, +1-206-350-6487, so we can include your audio in our show.

Author: Thad Krasnesky (on JOMB)
Illustrator: David Parkins (on JOMB)
Published: 2009 Flashlight Press (on JOMB)
ISBN: 9780979974649

Cute only gets you so far in the real world. Capturing the glee of victory and the sting of defeat, this hilariously illustrated rhyming book lets us laugh at our own (and our little sibling’s) attempts to prove otherwise.

Mentioned in this episode:

• Dusan Petricic
• David Roberts

Pop over to The Boy Reader for today’s full menu of poetry offerings. Poetry Fridays are brought to us by Kelly Herold of Big A, Little A.

HOTLINE VOICES: Cathy Miller, “The Literacy Ambassador”, alerts us about Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes (by Mem Fox and Helen Oxenbury).

We’d love to hear your thoughts on a favourite children’s book. Leave a voice message on our JOMB listener hotline, +1-206-350-6487, so we can include your audio in our show.

Author: Kristen Tracy (on JOMB)
Published: 2009 Random House (on JOMB)
ISBN: 9780385736879

A big thanks to guest host Lucy (10) for joining Andrea today to discuss this book.

Life can be challenging and fair’s got nothing to do with it. Parents are people. Friendship’s a worthwhile risk. There’s a lot to think about when you’re ten in the real world. Which is why I’m so glad Lucy (10) and I read this fun and fabulously thought provoking book.

Mentioned in this chat:

• Life Without Limbs: Nick Vujicic
• Don’t Need Friends
• Horrid Henry

More books including less-than-perfect families on JOMB:

• The Grandmother Doll
• When-I-was-a-little-girl
• My Dad’s A Birdman
• Mummy Never Told Me
• more here.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on a favourite children’s book. Leave a voice message on our JOMB listener hotline, +1-206-350-6487, so we can include your audio in our show.

I’ve known since I was a kid that I liked music.  But it was only recently that I realized I am truly a music dork.  You, too, might be a music dork if:

1. You know how to play more than five instruments.
2. You take every music theory quiz around, hoping to prove that you are the smartest of all your musical friends.
3. You knew you would marry your date when he pointed out the composer (John Williams) of the movie score (The Lost World) at the same time as you.
4. You loved going to church just so that you could harmonize, and your absolute favourite church songs had the alto (or whatever you sing) lead.
5. You know all the intervals by song, your favourite being the minor seventh, “There’s a Place for us” from West Side Story.
6. You own this shirt: http://www.zazzle.ca/music_dork_shirt-235093160855329110
7. When you refer to deceased musical geniuses, you say that they are decomposing.
8. You spent a good portion of your childhood harmonizing with your Nintendo.
9. You are now extremely proud of your son for his ability to harmonize with his Wii.
10. You’re mentally (and proudly) making your own list to add to mine.

Image via Wikipedia

I’ve known since I was a kid that I liked music.  But it was only recently that I realized I am truly a music dork.  You, too, might be a music dork if:

1. You know how to play more than five instruments.
2. You take every music theory quiz around, hoping to prove that you are the smartest of all your musical friends.
3. You knew you would marry your date when he pointed out the composer (John Williams) of the movie score (The Lost World) at the same time as you.
4. You loved going to church just so that you could harmonize, and your absolute favourite church songs had the alto (or whatever you sing) lead.
5. You know all the intervals by song, your favourite being the minor seventh, “There’s a Place for us” from West Side Story.
6. You own this shirt: http://www.zazzle.ca/music_dork_shirt-235093160855329110
7. When you refer to deceased musical geniuses, you say that they are decomposing.
8. You spent a good portion of your childhood harmonizing with your Nintendo.
9. You are now extremely proud of your son for his ability to harmonize with his Wii.
10. You’re mentally (and proudly) making your own list to add to mine.

Image via Wikipedia

Author: Christine Ford (on JOMB) & Trish Holland (on JOMB)
Illustrator: David Diaz (on JOMB)
Published: 2009 Golden Books (on JOMB)
ISBN: 978-0-375-84752-3

Warmth and well being radiate from stylized Inuit seascapes and gently lapping prose in this soothing bedtime confirmation of safety, connectedness and parental love.

More bedtime reading on JOMB:

• I Need My Monster
• Go to Bed, Monster!
• Darkness Slipped In
• But If They Do…

Pop over to Carol’s Corner for today’s full menu of poetry offerings. Poetry Fridays are brought to us by Kelly Herold of Big A, Little A.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on a favourite children’s book. Leave a voice message on our JOMB listener hotline, +1-206-350-6487, so we can include your audio in our show.

Author: P.J. Bracegirdle (on JOMB)
Published: 2008 McElderry Books (on JOMB)
ISBN: 1416934162

Chapters.ca Amazon.com

Hard-core horror meets sumptuous simile in this gripping exploration of siblinghood, self-destruction and sanitized sameness.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on a favourite children’s book. Leave a voice message on our JOMB listener hotline, +1-206-350-6487.

Author: Eileen Spinelli (on JOMB)
Illustrator: David Slonim (on JOMB)
Published: 2009 Marshall Cavendish (on JOMB)
ISBN: 0761455256

Chapters.ca Amazon.com

Rhyming triplets and edge-to-edge smile-inducing illustrations follow the carefree foolishness of an unconventional goose and remind us to savour the spice of life.

More independent thinkers on JOMB:

• Willow
• Odd Velvet
• Suki’s Kimono
• Ruby’s Wish
• Getting to Know Ruben Plotnick
• more here.

Pop over to Under The Covers for today’s full menu of poetry offerings. Poetry Fridays are brought to us by Kelly Herold of Big A, Little A.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on a favourite children’s book. Leave a voice message on our JOMB listener hotline, +1-206-350-6487.

Author: Maxine Trottier (on JOMB)
Illustrator: Paul Morin (on JOMB)
Published: 1999 Fitzhenry and Whiteside (on JOMB)
ISBN: 1550051520

Chapters.ca Amazon.com

Dazzling light glows against darkening shadow as this warmly told memory of friendship and fortitude peeks into a dim chapter in Canadian history.

Other books mentioned:

• Gleam and Glow
• Naomi’s Tree
• Naomi’s Road
• Baseball Saved Us

For more information about the Japanese Internment of 1942-1945, visit Vanishing British Columbia, Canada: A People’s History, and Canadian Nikkei.

You can read about more of our favourite Canadian, Asian-themed children’s books in this essay by Andrea at Paper Tigers.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on a favourite children’s book. Leave a voice message on our JOMB listener hotline, +1-206-350-6487.

Life is also very insistent when it needs attending to and easily distracts one from creative pursuits no matter how much one procrastinates ... :) I've had so much to attend to lately that I find myself slightly (or hugely depending on how I want to view it) blocked where art is concerned at the moment. So I've been fiddling around more with typography lately and this is one of the results.

I hand-draw into my sketchbook first now, as my tablet PC seems to have given up on me, and then scan the drawing in and polish it up in photoshop. After which I transfer it into Illustrator to fine tune the lines as it's the smoothest way of changing the colours on the letters if I wish to do so. 

I'm considering opening up a new store on zazzle devoted entirely to my play with fonts and type design, as they seem to be getting increasingly popular. It's also fun and almost as therapeutic as drawing, so I won't be giving up on it anytime soon. Cheers!

Author: Laurie Friedman (on JOMB)
Illustrator: Ofra Amit (on JOMB)
Published: 2008 CarolRhoda (on JOMB)
ISBN: 0822587394

Chapters.ca Amazon.com

Dark, heart wrenching yet beautiful images and aching, intimate first person narrative tell the true tale of holocaust prisoner Herman Rosenblat and the young girl who saved his life, twice.

HOTLINE VOICES: Thanks to author/illustrator Lee Edward Fodi for telling us about Strange Happenings: Five Tales of Transformation (by Avi).

We’d love to hear your thoughts on a favourite children’s book. Leave us a voice message on our JOMB listener hotline, +1-206-350-6487.

Author: Alexis O’Neill (on JOMB)
Illustrator: Laura Huliska-Beith (on JOMB)
Published: 2008 Scholastic (on JOMB)
ISBN: 0545010233

Chapters.ca Amazon.com

Sunny school-yard action, frisky text and heaps of humorous details propel us through bliss, boastfulness, betrayal and back again in this spirited tale of friendship lost and found.

Other books mentioned:

• The Recess Queen

HOTLINE VOICES: An unidentified JOMB listener/author/illustrator recommends Kiss Good Night (by Amy Hest) and Dig Dig Digging (by Margaret Mayo and Alex Ayliffe).

We’d love to hear your thoughts on a favourite children’s book. Leave us a voice message on our JOMB listener hotline, +1-206-350-6487.

To those of you celebrating Yom Kippur, G’mar Chatimah Tovah.

Author: Mark Greenwood (on JOMB)
Illustrator: Frané Lessac (on JOMB)
Published: 2008 Candlewick Press (on JOMB)
ISBN: 0763639133

Chapters.ca Amazon.com

Deceptively simple looking folk art illustrations, uncluttered narration and sparse, intimate utterings deliver some of the dark, disturbing details of war in this eye-opening, true tale of courage, carnage and camaraderie.

More war and peace on JOMB:

• A Poppy is To Remember
• Gleam and Glow
• Janusz Korczak’s Children
• What We Remember
• Lugalbanda: The Boy Who Got Caught Up In A War

HOTLINE VOICES: Bobby (a grade two teacher in Phoenix, AZ) describes a difference of opinion between he and his fiancée (a grade one teacher) and asks the question, what is the best way to read books to a group of children?

Author: Laurie Keller (on JOMB)
Illustrator: Laurie Keller
Published: 2007 Henry Holt and Co. (on JOMB)
ISBN: 0805079963

Chapters.ca Amazon.com

Cluttered with comedy, melodrama and earthy, Looney-Toonesque artwork, this brilliant guide to social success is as hilarious as it is helpful.

(…er…actually….maybe more hilarious than helpful, as we now hear our girls screaming at each other “DO UNTO OTTERS, REMEMBER, DO UNTO OTTERS!!!!!”)

Other books mentioned:

• Lady Lupin’s Book of Etiquette

HOTLINE VOICES: Michelle Mitchell from Scribbit: Motherhood in Alaska shares her thoughts about The Little Golden Book Anthologies.

Author: Aaron Zenz (on JOMB)
Illustrator: Aaron Zenz
Published: 2005 Dogs in Hats Publishing
ISBN: 1594450331

Chapters.ca Amazon.com

Frantic antics and logically nonsensical rhyme make this hiccup-halting tactic extravaganza an addictive pick for preschoolers and poets alike.

Be sure to enjoy all of the amazing artwork in our Love of Reading Gallery.

Pop over to A Year of Reading for today’s full menu of poetry offerings. Poetry Fridays are brought to us by Kelly Herold of Big A, Little A.

Author: Sarah Ackerley (on JOMB)
Illustrator: Sarah Ackerley
Published: 2008 Blooming Tree Press (on JOMB)
ISBN: 1933831073

Amazon.com

Quiet absurdity and understated text relay the hilarious tale of a unique young penguin who swaps stigma for stupendous in this inspiring invitation to embrace our traits.

Podcasts mentioned:

• LD Podcast
• Stuttering is Cool

Author: Johnathan Allen (on JOMB)
Illustrator: Johnathan Allen
Published: 2005 Hyperion (on JOMB)
ISBN: 0786837209

Chapters.ca Amazon.com

Caustic scowls and harried helplessness take turns on the face of an overtired owlet in this hilariously endearing tale of naptime nastiness and unconditional love.

Other books mentioned:

• The Gruffalo
• Cuddly Dudley