“My Grandpa” is a simple story about the relationship between a young child and his aging grandfather. Written and illustrated by Marta Altes, the story poignantly describes the love between two generations. Grandpa is getting old, but when his grandson is with him they have fun together and share so much. This would be a great book to introduce the concept of aging to a young child. The illustrations are very simple and are all that are needed to tell the story.
Matt Davies is a Pulitzer Prize winning editorial cartoonist. “Ben Rides On” is his first book for young readers. Ben Lukin loves going to school especially since he now has the bicycle of his dreams. He can even take the very long way to school. But when he arrives at school, then trouble presents itself in the form of the world’s largest first grader Adrian Underbite. This is a story of bullying and how anyone can change. Using the drawing techniques that are found in his editorial cartoons, Davies invests the two boys with great facial expressions. This is a story with a moral that all children would enjoy.
We have added two new books to our JNF collection dealing with Shakespeare from the Shakespeare Can Be Fun! series. “A Child’s Portrait of Shakespeare” is an easy-to-read biography of William Shakespeare. Illustrated with pictures drawn by children, the text also incorporates letters written by children that explain important events in Shakespeare’s life. For example, Shakespeare writes a letter to Anne Hathaway asking her for a date. ” Dear Annie, Would you like to go on a date with me? If you would I’d be very flaterd.” (A seven year-old wrote this letter.) This approach would probably capture the interest of a young reader,and with the additional text, the child would also learn a lot about Shakespeare. In addition to this title, we also have added “A Midsummer Night’s Dream For Kids” from the same series. This play will be the next production of the local children’s Shakespeare company. This is a kid-friendly adaptation of the play, also accompanied by drawings by children and explanatory letters that help young readers to understand the action of the play.