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Taruja Parande,
My Grandfather, Aajoba
Tulika, 2010

Ages 5-8

A granddaughter’s tribute to her beloved grandfather, My Grandfather, Aajoba invites young readers to share in the very special bond portrayed, and perhaps to refer it to their own lives. The book’s author Taruja Parande has created a portrait of her grandfather through a series of anecdotes set off by illustrations that are an effective and attractive blend of photographic collage and original artwork.

Each double-page spread presents a different chapter in Parande and Aajoba’s relationship, with extra, playful asides, such as inviting readers to “flick a bunch of these pages quickly to hear the flapping of pigeons’ wings”. The book begins with pages from both an old and a more recent photograph album. The overlaid narrative conveys a contrasting description of Aajoba as a “tough” young man (“everyone was afraid of him. He was afraid of nobody.”) and as a “lovable” old man (“He was amused by everything I did […] I was never afraid of him”). From then on, the visual and verbal narratives both revolve around the grandfather and his grandchild – from Aajoba’s recipe for buttered toast, illustrated photographically step by step; through activities such as attempting to wash the cat or evading homework; to stamp albums and lists. A chapter is also dedicated to “the secret” – how Aajoba and Aaji met. Here the tone of secrecy is perfect for young readers and it is easy to imagine delighted, conspiratorial giggles at this point: after all, isn’t this just the kind of family story children love to hear?

Although the perspective is clearly that of an adult looking back and remembering, the matter-of-fact tone never drifts into nostalgia. The narrative is past tense so most young readers will know, even if it’s subconsciously, that Aajoba is no longer alive. In fact, this would be a special book to read with children coping with the loss of a grandparent. And it would also come as no surprise to find that after reading My Grandfather, Aajoba young readers set about creating their own grandparent storybooks: for not only does this delightful book draw readers into the solid reality of the relationship portrayed, but it also provides space for those readers’ own imaginations to come into play.

Marjorie Coughlan
May 2011

There is something special about grandparents sharing stories with their grandchildren, especially when those stories come from their own lives (though young children can be disconcerting in their definition of the olden days and their grandparents place in them…). Over the next few weeks, I will be highlighting books that draw young children into that special bond through stories narrated by grandmothers from around the world.

Whereas many anthologies of traditional stories can be dipped into and individual stories extracted at random, I recommend several bedtimes in a row be spent immersed in Frances Carpenter’s Tales of a Korean Grandmother and Tales of a Chinese Grandmother (both published by Tuttle). Although subtitled as 30 and 32 Traditional Tales respectively, they are much more than that. The stories emerge from the daily lives of the Ling family in China and the Kim family in Korea as the two grandmothers tell their grandchildren stories arising out of events and traditions or objects around them. Black and white vignettes and full-page illustrations are scattered through the books, with Malthe Hasselriis as the named illustrator of Tales of a Chinese Grandmother.

In Korea, we join the Kim family and become friends especially with Ok Cha and her brother Yung Tu; in China we meet Ah Shung and his sister Yu Lang, and the rest of the Ling household. Both grandmothers are deeply loved and respected, and have a wealth of stories to tell and retell – and the time to tell them. Young readers/listeners will be just as interested in the children’s antics as in the stories themselves.

The books were first published some 70 years ago and have lost none of their appeal in the intervening years – indeed, much of their attraction to today’s audience, whether younger children sharing the stories as a readaloud or older children reading the book alone, must be the blend of historical detail combined with the magic and fantasy contained within the stories themselves. Through the device of telling stories within a narrative, today’s readers/listeners are more readily drawn into their cultural contexts and the warmth of the bond between the grandmother and her grandchildren is the thread which brings all these stories together.

Marla Stewart Konrad,
Grand
Tundra Books, 2010.

Age: 4-8

Grand is one of a series of photograph illustrated picture books designed for very young children published by Tundra Books in conjunction with World Vision. Here, the focus is on grandparents, hence the title. But ‘grand’ also means ‘great’ or ‘wonderful’ too, and this special book focuses on why grandparents are indeed ‘grand.’ The book’s point of the view is that of a child; “Grandma and Grandpa love me” is the way it opens, and the reader is led through the book as a child experiencing life with his/her grandparent. The range and diversity of cultures present in the book make it a really rich multicultural extravaganza of images. This is a great book for a young child to cuddle up with his/her parent or grandparent to read.

The World Vision Early Readers Series of which this book is a part is the brain child of author Marla Stewart Konrad, who worked for several years for World Vision. Her work with the organization enabled her to draw on a store of images from the World Vision photo library. Although some of the pictures were taken by professional photographers, many were taken by World Vision team members. The archive is a treasure trove amply providing Konrad with scores of photos for the series. Grand provides some stunning and moving images of children and their grandparents that show, as Konrad intends, the joy, dignity and universality of human relationship.

For readers inclined to Grand and the other books in the series – I Like to Play; Mom and Me, and Getting There – , there is also a free curriculum available on-line that accompanies the books. It is worth checking out. As well, royalties from the series go to World Vision, an organization dedicated to the well being of children all over the world. Currently, they are actively at work in earthquake and tsunami stricken Japan.

Sally Ito
April 2011

Tony Johnston, illustrated by Yuyi Morales, photographed by Tim O’Meara,
My Abuelita
Harcourt Children’s Books, 2009.

Ages 5-8

“I live with my grandma. And she lives with me. I call her Abuelita.” So begins this lively love-filled story of a boy and his grandmother going about their morning routine. Tony Johnston’s masterful language and Yuyi Morales’ trademark vibrant palette turn the most prosaic of daily events – getting ready for work – into a magical adventure. As Abuelita bends, stretches, baths, yodels, hums, eats, and packs, the reader turning pages with anticipation: what job could possibly require a scarf like a cloud that flows down to the ground, or a skeleton and plumed snake, or a temple and a crown of stars?

Children and adults alike will delight in discovering Abuelita’s job, even as they revel in unexpected joys and surprises sprinkled throughout the text and images. Johnston’s figurative language perfectly compliments Morales’ intricate, impish visuals, which defy any notions of grandparents as elderly or aging. Abuelita wakes up with the sun and is round “like a calabeza, a pumpkin,” with “hair the color of salt and a face crinkled like a dried chile.” After she takes her morning shower, she looks like a great big bee wrapped in her black and yellow towel, and when they sit to breakfast, she eats fried eggs that look like stars.

Each step in the morning routine flies off the page in this 2010 Pura Belpré Honor book. Award-winning illustrator Morales builds on her former success by introducing a new illustration technique, building and staging puppets and taking photographs of the scenes. With the help of Tim O’Meara, she finishes each illustration digitally, which gives the whimsical, exuberant images a three-dimensional quality akin to a Pixar film. Family love wafts from words and pictures alike, as the narrator assists his grandmother in each step of their familiar morning routine, and confides he wants to be like her when he grows up. Magical realism, traditional iconography, and sprinklings of Spanish all root this story in its Mexican context, while its themes of love, family, and dreams make it immediately and intimately familiar to all. A joyful tale for readers and non-readers alike, and an ideal read-aloud for teachers, families, and friends.

Sara Hudson
April 2011

Joanne Schwartz, illustrated by Laura Beingessner,
Our Corner Grocery Store
Tundra Books, 2009.

Ages 5-8

In Our Corner Grocery Store, Joanne Schwartz’s tribute to neighborhood and family, a little girl spends Saturdays with her Italian-American grandparents, who run the store referred to in the book’s title. We spend the day at the store with Anna Maria, as her Nonno and Nonna manage to fit looking after their grandchild into the many chores and relationships that their business brings. Anna Maria helps out, too, making the rows of vegetables neat and displaying the breads in their bins.

It’s not all work, though; the child also finds time to make chalk drawings on the sidewalk with her friend Charlie. After the lunch rush, Nonno makes her a special sandwich. “I bite into it and crumbs scatter over my shirt. The creamy cheese and salty meat taste fresh and delicious.” When Nonna puts together stuffed mushroom caps for dinner, young readers learn how to make the dish along with Anna Maria.

Laura Beingessner’s delicate illustrations document the waves of customers who come and go, the charming little store itself, even the steps in Nonna’s recipe. The tone of the text and pictures provides mesmerizing, relaxing encouragement to slow down and appreciate each simple task. There are no crises or plot complications in this sweet picture book. The pace is slow, the relationships are warm, and life is simple—not necessarily easy, but still, simpler than the lives of most families these days.

For parents reading to very young children, the book offers many opportunities to identify grocery items pictured individually, as well as to talk about the scenes and the people in the full page illustrations. The text is also a good challenge for precocious young readers to try out on their own.

Our Corner Grocery Store may read like a report from another world, or at least another era, for overscheduled, urban, twenty-first century parents and children. Perhaps spending a little time in such a tranquil world will bring some of its almost forgotten pleasures to precisely the harried kids and adults who need them most.

Charlotte Richardson
March 2011

Ashley Wolff,
I Call My Grandma Nana
I Call My Grandpa Papa
Tricycle Books, 2009.

Ages 4 and up

The grandparent/grandchild relationship is universally special. While grandparents play specific roles in many cultures and tradition often dictates certain rituals for the elder generation, this unique bond that skips across a generation is felt by grandparents and grandchildren everywhere.

Ashley Wolff, the versatile author and/or illustrator of more than 50 picture books including Stella and Roy Go Camping, Only the Cat Saw, and the well known Miss Bindergarten series (illustrator), celebrates this relationship with rhyme and warm, colorful collages in the books I Call My Grandma Nana and I Call My Grandpa Papa.

A Chinese elementary school teacher, Miss Alexandra May, brings her grandmother and grandfather to meet her students on separate occasions and explains that she calls them “Nai nai” and “Ye ye” respectively. The class has prepared for the event by drawing and writing about their own grandparents called Abuelo, Babu, Nonna, Yia-yia, and other titles–including Grandmasaurus and Grandpasaurus–by their beloved grandchildren.

A single poem is threaded throughout each book with each student taking a turn at telling how her Abuela is teaching her to sew a doll, how his Lola plays trains, how Dedushka does magic, how Ojii-San puts his grandson on his shoulders to watch a parade, and even how “Next-Door Nana” and “Papa-T” fill in as surrogates for children whose grandparents have died or live far away.

The book offers children a spot to place photographs of their own grandmothers and grandfathers with a space below to write about what they call them. At the end Wolff lists more than 30 names for the respective grandparents from cultures and languages all over the world as well as a paragraph-length list of favorite ‘pet’ names for grandparents including my personal favorites Grammy (with which I christened my maternal grandmother) and Bapa (the title my niece has bestowed upon my father—“Bop” for short).

These inspired books are sure to please grandparents, grandchildren and the generation in between with their depictions of lively, joyful grandparents and grandchildren celebrating life and the fact that they get to share it with each other.

Abigail Sawyer
February 2011

In honor of the release of its latest children’s book, Our Grandparents: A Global Album, The Global Fund for Children invites everyone to submit an endearing, funny, or memorable story about your grandparents by posting a comment on their Facebook fan page by April 15. The author of the winning story will receive a $50 gift certificate to Amazon.com.

To learn more about The Global Fund for Children, read our interview with Maya Ajmera, founder and president of the organization.