How to use this Page

The Story Starts Here!

Written and illustrated by Caroline Merola
Owlkids Books         9/15/2014
978-1-77147-079-7
40 pages      Age 4 to 8

x

“Little Wolf wants to do things his way. And that includes starting HIS story from the back of the book. But Little Wolf’s topsy-turvy day gets a unexpected twist  when someone else decides to join in on the fun.

Play along as Little Wolf turns the picture book on its head!”

Review

Little Wolf is one stubborn little guy.

Oh, wait! I forgot to tell you a very important thing—The Story Starts Here has the ending at the beginning and the beginning at the end.  So flip the book around and upside down, and then open the back “front” cover. Ready?

Little Wolf is one stubborn little guy.

“Because I said so.”

He wants things his way, including with you; you are reading his book upside down and backwards. Little Wolf eats dessert first, puts his pants on his head, and plays piano with his toes. Little Wolf declares today is backward day to his unwilling and objecting parents.

“No, you will not begin with dessert.”
“No, you will not play piano with your toes!”

Sent to his room to think about his contrary behavior, Little Wolf sneaks outside (with his pants still fashionably atop his head). Outside, all the creatures are quickly running away from something. Little Wolf turns around and finds he is face-to-face with a monster. The Story Starts Here had me laughing from the get go at Little Wolf and his backward antics. Little Wolf playing the piano and wearing his trousers’ on his head is hilarious, but not as much as the twist. The monster is feeling a bit topsy-turvy itself. “It” explains this to Little Wolf, who seems to understand . . . until the monster tells Little Wolf to flip the book back over.

Oh, wait! I forgot again. Keep the book open and flip back over so the beginning is the beginning and the end is the end. Now we can finish the story.

Despite the funny goings on the story could be better. Little Wolf is the same stubborn wolf as he was at page . . . the beginning of the story. He does not even think the twist is funny. (Spoilt sport, he is!)  I really like The Story Starts Here and the concept of an upside day. Feeling a little off is a good time to mix things up. Good thing dad understands his son.

I love “Dad Books.” The Story Starts Here will entertain fathers and sons, making a great reading experience for both. Little Wolf is generic and so can be any child; dad can be any father. Kids will love the craziness of flipping and reading backward, then suddenly flipping back. It is one more way to engage and interest them in reading. Kids will also love the surprise ending (a new fashion, which had me laughing, is born).  If the book does not make you dizzy—it will not—you and your child will enjoy a funny story and a great lead into a discussion on how sometimes a story—or the world—has more than one view.

THE STORY STARTS HERE! Text and illustrations copyright © 2014 by Caroline Merola. Reproduced by permission of the publisher, Owlkids Books, Berkely, CA.
x
Purchase The Story Starts Here at Amazon—B&N—Book Depository—Owlkids Books
Learn more about The Story Starts Here HERE.
Meet the author/illustrator, Caroline Merola, at her website:  http://www.carolinemerola.com/
Find more picture books at the Owlkids Books website:  https://store.owlkids.com
x

x

x
Copyright © 2015 by Sue Morris/Kid Lit Reviews
x
x
Last Chance! VOTE for YOUR FAVORITE BEST BOOK for 2014 HERE.

.

I Love You, Too!

By Michael Foreman
Andersen Press U. S. A.            3/01/2014
978-1-4677-3451-6
Age 4 to 8          32 pages
.

“Little Bear doesn’t want to go to sleep, so he tries everything he can think of to distract his father, and in the end it’s an exhausted dad who falls asleep!”

Opening

“Dad finished the bedtime story and gently closed the book.”

The Story

Dad Bear tucks his son into bed, reads him a story, and tells his son he loves him. Little Bear has no intentions of going to sleep and so he starts up a back-and-forth he and his dad have done many times: “I love you, I love you more.” It starts out simply and Dad just wants his son to go to sleep.

“I love you three,” said Little Bear, laughing.

“I love you four. Now go to sleep.” said Dad.

“I love you five,” said little Bear.

“I love you even more than that. Now it’s time to sleep,” said Dad.

No, Dad, it is not quite time for bed. Little Bear continues, bringing in his toys, which he loves his dad more than. Dad replies with a simple I love you more, but it will not suffice his son. The boy loves his father more than leaves and birds, all the snowflakes of winter, flowers of summer, colors of the rainbow, and the stars in the sky. To each of his son’s “I love you more than,” Dad replies, “I love you more,” or some variation of this reply. Finally, Dad says,

“You’re only saying that because you don’t want me to go down stairs.”

“No, Dad. It’s because I love you.”

“I love you, too,” said Dad.

“I love you three . . . “

Review

I Love You, Too is a sweet story between a father and son. Picture books need a few more stories involving Dad, who does not get the representation Mom gets in picture books. Poor Dad is usually off to work and, if he is in the book, it is breakfast time and Dad is leaving for work. “Bye kids,” said Dad.

Little Bear uses his imagination to tell his dad all the ways in which he loves him more than. When Little Bear tells dad he loves him more than all his toys, which are in a corner overflowing out of a toy box, the toys look dejected. The stuffed tiger looks downcast, the donkey appears to have shed a tear, and the others—cat, elephant, panda bear, and bunny,—all look unhappy. Little Bear takes dad up into a tree, into the snow, (where there is a snowbear), into a field of flowers, into the ocean, and onto a sandy beach (where dad is buried under the sand sans his head). In every adventure, Dad smiles and replies that he loves his son and it is time for sleep. Stubborn, but happy, Little Bear ignores his father’s admonitions.

The illustrations, all beautifully done in rich watercolors, welcome the two bears, alone for Little Bear’s love-you-more-than-these adventures. Little Bear’s imagination has these two anthropomorphic brown bears perfectly outfitted in each place Little Bear takes them. As Little Bear finds new ways to love his father more than, the two transport into Little Bear’s imagination to that place, be it a field of flowers,  a rainy day with puddles to play in, or a starry sky to float through, Dad is as happy as Little Bear, wherever Little Bear’s imagination has taken them. I love how Foreman puts the circle of love in motion once more when Dad said, “I love you, too” and Little Bear takes off with his I love you three, but we never find out what those three things he loves dad more than. Dad has fallen asleep on Little Bear’s bed. Little Bear has gotten his wish. Dad is not going back downstairs.  Little Bear picks up the picture book Dad had read him: I Love You, Too!

I Love You, Too makes a wonderful bedtime story, though you may find yourself trapped in the “I love you more” merry-go-round, not this is a bad place to be stuck. The story and the illustrations will evoke laughter, smiles, and many “I love you’s” which one can never hear enough. Children will love this story and will soon be using their own imaginations when deciding how much they love a parent more than. I Love You, Too will send many children off to dream land happy and content. If Da Bear is any indication, parents will quickly dose off to their own happy dreamland, maybe even before the last “I love you more than . . . “is said.

I LOVE YOU, TOO! Text and illustrations copyright © 2013 by Michael Foreman. Reproduced by permission of the US distributer, Lerner Publishing Group, Minneapolis, MN.  

.               First published in Great Britain in 2013 by Andersen Press, Ltd.

.

Purchase a copy of I Love You, Too! at Amazon—B&N—Book Depository—Lerner Publishing—Andersen Press—at your favorite bookstore.

.

Learn more about I Love You, Too! HERE.

Meet the author / illustrator, Michael Foreman, at his wiki page:    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Foreman_%28author_/_illustrator%29

Find more great books at the Lerner Publishing Group website:    https://www.lernerbooks.com/

Find even more books at the Andersen Press U. S. A. website:  http://www.andersenpress.co.uk/

 Andersen Press U. S. A. is an imprint of Andersen Press Ltd.

.

Also by Michael Foreman, released in 2014

Moose

Cat & Dog

Classic Christmas Tales

Oh! If Only…

Friends

The Littlest Dinosaur

Fortunately, Unfortunately

War Game: Village Green to No-Man’s-Land
(ages 8 to 10)

m

m

m
m
m
m
m
m
m

m

m

m

m

copyright © 2014 by Sue Morris/Kid Lit Reviews

5stars Gary only wants one thing – his father’s attention, if for only today’s father-son baseball game.  Dad goes to work, promising to make up for missing the game.  Gary does not want a future promise; he wants his dad to be there as all the other kids’ dads will be.  Gary goes to the [...]

Ben Campbell's life is thrown into turmoil when his dad announces that he is divorcing Ben's mother, and then chooses a boyfriend! Ben is furious that his dad would destroy their family and plots revenge. If he find trouble, he is there. And he brags about it. Make the old man's life miserable. So what does his father do? Plunks him down into population 400 Normal, Montana. Let the games begin. Did I mention Ben arrives with spiked hair? A real hit in a cowboy community. Soon the plot thickens as Ben discovers that even a town of 400 has some secrets.

ENDERS' Rating: ****

Michael Harmon's Website

Brava to BF! In her quest to delve into romantic stories involving dark sides she has concocted a deliciously wicked story with Jekel Loves Hyde. The story is gripping from "I buried my father the day after my seventeenth birthday." That is in the prologue...do not gloss over it by looking for chapter one. Jill discovers that her father's death, her not so delightfully alliterative last name, captivating Tristin Hyde, and a science competition sporting a hefty scholarship are all going to complicate her already sorrowful life. Fans of Jessica Guide may mourn the lack of a sequel of that novel, but not for long. Fantaskey's sense of suspense, shared first person narrations, and episodic tension make a page-turning read that is sure to keep YA readers begging for more.


ENDERS" Rating: Better have mutliple copies in my library!

Beth Fantaskey's Website

In her book, Crocodaddy, Kim Norman celebrates a warm relationship between a father and son. As I collected books for Mother's Day and Father's Day this year, I noticed that there really aren't that many books about fathers and their children. We need more books about the role that fathers play in their children's lives. You can see the books I have reviewed so far on the Father's Day Feature page on the Through the Looking Glass Book Review. More titles are in the process of being added for the June issue of the online magazine. Of these books, I particularly enjoyed Every Friday by Dan Yaccarino.

What I really like about Crocodaddy is that it not only highlights the
relationship between a father and a son, but it also shows readers that the simple things in life are often the most meaningful. In Crocdaddy it is a game that is played in the local pond on a summer's day. These events and traditions are often the things we remember many years later. I remember sitting on the front porch with my father and watching the swallows dipping and diving in the air around us. After I left my parental home I never lived in a place where they have swallows - until now. Now I get to share the dance of the swallows with my daughter. My father 's spirit sits is with me as I share this simple joy with my child.

To wrap up this blog book tour, Kim Norman has kindly offered to give one of my readers a signed copy of her book. If you would like the book please send me an email.