REMEMBRANCE DAY: September 11Memories/Histories

 On this Infamous date, September 11, many reading this post will have an instantaneous memory of where you were and what/how your reactions unfolded on that morning. For an entire generation, this momentous day is only known as history. Anyone too young at the time to realize what was happening, or born in the last twenty-three years, has learned of the events indirectly, through the consequences of that day's direct and indirect results- decades of distant wars, hyper-patriotism and polarization in politics, an extended recession and family struggles, as well as other shifts, perhaps less directly related. 

There has been no lack of movies and books and documentaries about the time surrounding 9/11 events and subsequent changes in American society. Some are objective, some present points of view that can make hate or anger even worse. Among the objective accounts are books for children. I'll use this day to link to some titles that contain healing and other positive developments from such a horrific time. It's of particular interest to me that many involve trees in various ways.  Prior posts include THIS VERY TREE, HERE, THE TREE OF LIFE, HERE, LEAFY LANDMARKS: Travels With Trees HERE, and WITNESS TREES: Historic Moments and the Trees Who Watched Them Happen, HERE.

CAPSTONE BOOKS, 2016

But here's a  book directly about the events of 9/11 and below this I share a resource related to this particular series of events that day. It reveals the in-the-moment decisions of everyday folks who lacked answers but not heart. Folks who traded safe havens for a sea rescue for desperate people rushing to the harbor. SAVED BY THE BOATS: The Heroic Sea Evacuation of September 11, is written by Julie Gassman and illustrated by Steve Moors. At the time of its release It somehow missed my radar entirely. 

For me, at least, time continues to shift this potent memory deeper onto the history shelves. But I encountered a short documentary video about the boat rescues that day. With SO MANY things to absorb and process, the boat rescue operation had receded in my memory, overwhelmed by other horrific images: falling towers, clouds of ashy debris, and ensuing painful days and weeks and months of personal stories and global changes. This video brought it all back.

It is an aspect of that day, those times, of the people we really are, that compels me to to dip back a few years to share this book, but also to urge you to watch this short (11-12 minutes) documentary, featuring the actual people involved and narrated by Tom Hanks. Watching brought me right back to that day, those feelings, and such powerful emotions keep events like these steeped in meaning. When relegated to historic status, young people need ways to find empathetic connection, which they can get by viewing this video. Please watch, and then find as many others to share it with as possible. As the subtitle says, resilience is at the heart of our hopes for survival as humans, and as a planet. Even the most unthinkable disasters can be responded to with action and hope:

Here's the video link:  BOATLIFT: AN UNTOLD TALE OF 9/11 RESILIENCE

Help make this DAY OF REMEMBRANCE only one day among many, and demonstrate HOPE. And think back to that time itself, and the years before, when we as a society sought out our common ground rather than our differences.

THE LITTLE RED CHAIR: One Girl's Treasure...

 The back story about this new picture book is mentioned in the author's note that follows the main text, but author Cathy Stefan Ogren discussed it further in this terrific interview about story origins and the deep connection to her friends and family, HERE. Beth Anderson shared her website platform with Cathy for her insights into finding and writing the HEART of this wonderful new fiction picture book. Other comments, reviews, and insights about Cathy and this book can be read in sites from her blog tour, with links offered HERE. My reactions to this delightful new story, born from real experiences, follow. 

SLEEPING BEAR PRESS, 2024

THE LITTLE RED CHAIR is written by Cathy Stefanec Ogren and illustrated by Alexandra Thompson. I found this story delightful because the text achieves such a prefect balance of personification of the little upholstered chair without fully anthropomorphizing it. It doesn't speak or dance or have agency, at least none that can be witnessed in the "real" world in which it exists. Readers, though, gain access to its inner wishes, dreams, and worries. The author gives the chair a voice, including the repetitive "Squeakity-squee" of its wheels. Just as with human language, context and inflection can make the same 'words" or "Squeakily-Squees" carry entirely different emotional value, and that is true as the chair reveals its reactions throughout.  The illustrations manage to achieve a similar delicate balance, using angles, perspectives, and relationships in space to underscore those emotional twists and turns. Brilliantly and tenderly done.

(For anyone exploring personification in writing, adults or teachers leading students, this is superb mentor text.)

With that note aside, here's my look at the story itself.

The cover indicates this story's opening, setting a bedraggled, frayed little upholstered chair in a drab store window on a dreary day. What hope could there be for a better life, unless that little girl has a huge heart. She does. Her insistence on taking it home is conveyed with minimal text and glowing expressions. The chair and girl begin a bond built by time, shared experiences, and mutual need. But, as with many things in young lives, the girl, Mia, grows up but the chair does not. Until one day Mia leaves for college, but she continues to hold the little red chair close, even though it's once renewed and spruced up condition has become worn and drab. 

Readers will fear (at least THIS reader feared) that the household would discard the chair, leaving it to find a new family. That would not necessarily be an unhappy ending, and makes a fine circle story. The good/bad news is that chair survives a down-sizing move, but only to the new residence's attic. There, again, racers can access the inner feelings of the chair throughout seasons and passing time, until... 

No spoilers, but THIS circle story is even more gratifying in the best ways. Though this is a relatively simple story and one told with familiar White characters, the concept of a generational circle story about a beloved childhood companion is universal in every sense, with an emotional arc that will resonate around the world. The muted but expressive illustrations and details set it in very specific conditions that enrich the account, but the basics invite multiple retellings among readers, inserting their own tales of discovery, recovery, connection, growth, and reconnection over time. As mentioned above, the text and illustrations offer outstanding mentor opportunities for others to pursue personal, "small moments" stories from their own lives, even ones not spanning a lifetime of change. 

I can't close these notes without mentioning the back matter, in which the author reveals the full story from her own life that inspired this book, as well as a very informative note about small-scale furnishings, appliances, and vehicles that were used by traveling salesmen to provide actual examples of their inventory without lugging full-sized objects across country. These were called "Salesman's Samples", and you may have seen a few if you watch PBS ANTIQUES ROAD SHOW or other programs about such stores and objects. 

With that in mind, I felt a special appeal from the front and back endpapers, which appear as a closeup of the faded, frayed, tufted surface from THE LITTLE RED CHAIR at the start and after it shared its life with Mia and her family. The details are so well rendered that I longed to reach out and smooth the surface, to reassure the chair that love is never lost, that something better was waiting. I hope you'll enjoy it as much as I did, and consider revealing some of your own or family stories with young readers when you share this book with them.

LISTENING TO TREES: Art, Nature, and Purpose

I know, and I admit it...  I adore picture books. The ones I write about here I generally RAVE about. But I hope you've noticed, I also provide specifics about WHY any particular book is so wonderful. Aspects of any two (or twenty) picture books may be similar, but they are distinct to each title, as are the many variables that potentially earn my praise here. In fact, the very nature of picture book formats and range of topics and styles and illustration and text choices means that possible combinations of wonderful-ness are approaching infinity! 

That, my reader friends, is why I deal with such a limited number of picture book recommendations here, selected from among the enormous numbers of new titles released each year. I aim for the best of the best. I do offer analysis and patterns or elements that draw me to each offering, but that still means it is my opinion. Just trust me when I say that a rave about any book I profile here is utterly sincere. 

NEAL PORTER BOOKS, 2024

If you've listened so far (or read along), I feel confident you will also be an avid fan of this new picture book biography. If that category itself makes you raise an eyebrow, wondering about how authentic a rave can be about a biography, I beg you to read on. LISTENING TO TREES: George Nakashima, Woodworker is written by Holly Thompson with pictures by Toshiki Nakamura. 

Stay with me now...

This is an elegant, simple but not simplistic blend of subtle illustrations, poetic lines that launch each double-spread, and lyrical informative text about a creative artisan of distinction. George Nakashima's life lovingly unfolds from his early Pacific Northwoods experiences, revealing his deep appreciation of natural and cultural influences and appeals, leading  to his growing skill and innovation in working with wood in original ways. 

His career choices included architecture, but he chose furniture making, which allowed him to work with unique materials and principles while controlling every aspect of a creation directly. His reputation rapidly grew and he received global acclaim.

The mid-section of his life story includes his family's imprisonment in Japanese internment camps during WWII, his use of his skills to make life there more livable using  random wood scraps, and his decision to accept a move to Pennsylvania- to farm! 

But the decisions he made after arriving did not involve farming. Instead he used the surrounding natural materials, including tree-falls and ways in which those materials inspired him to create works of art that  functioned not only as furniture but as foundations and inspirations for peaceful interactions.

Back matter includes an author note, photo and text examples of Nakashima working, segments about trees and their usable elements, photos of exemplary furniture he made, and more. 

The poetry on each gently-evocative  spread sets the tone for the developments explored on those pages. The entire production and design made me believe that this book would please its subject, as it pleased Nakashima's daughter, who offers an introductory note.

So, chime in and let me know if this appeals to you, too. Do you appreciate the beauty of nature? Do you recognize aesthetic cultural patterns that resonate with your eye and heart? Does poetry call you? Does a talented life inspire you to be more creative and productive?  Are subtle and evocative illustrations the kind you explore and bask in? Other elements of this work that call your name? Whatever your "hook", let this one lure you in and enjoy it fully, as I did.

\

THE TREE OF LIFE: Hope Is Priceless, Timeless

I am a fan of books about nature, especially trees. Okay, books about birds, too, and families, and inspiring people... and animals. It's easy to see why I resist naming favorites among anything, especially books. There are so many wonderful things to read about and learn about. Click any of the above to see that my comments about such books reveal my admiration and appreciation for the talent that created the books but also of the subject being addressed or the story being told.

ROCKY POND BOOKS, 2024

This, then is a book that hits my heart across many waves of "favorites". THE TREE OF LIFE: How a Holocaust Sapling Inspired the World is written by Elisa Boxer and illustrated by Arianna Rozentsveig. It is a storytelling masterpiece, but it's a story from actual events. About an actual tree, and its offspring. About the power of community to serve as family when family is being destroyed. About the continuity of life... and of HOPE. 

The center of this account is a tree, a maple sapling. With subdued and subtle illustrations and text that tells enough, but not too much, encounter life within the walls of a concentration camp during the Holocaust, one of the few camps that allowed a small group of children to continue living, if you could call it that. It portrays the history with a  balance between visible struggle and hardship with aspects that are softened, somehow familiar, with smiles of excitement and hope. When it comes to the prisoners in these camps, modern readers sometimes question: why didn't they rebel or resist? First, those efforts did occur, but nearly all accounts of such were suppressed and denied. In fact, though, this is a story of resistance, offering details that involve helping a sapling grow while helping young children learn about their heritage's celebrate their holidays, and hold tight to their identities. 

And, hold tight to hope. 

Few survived that horror, but those few who did kept that tree, and their hope, alive. When relief eventually reached the few who remained, a five foot tall tree was waiting with them. It became a symbol of LIFE, of HOPE, of WITNESS to the truth of history. That surviving tree became an honored landmark, but it also provided seeds and cuttings to grow into more trees of hope. One of those offspring trees concludes this account in an unlikely place, but one that also witnessed death and celebrates hope. 

A book with this much power and depth could seem an unlikely choice for a picture book, but that assumption would be wrong. The target age here is wide, and welcoming. Readers (or listeners) of many ages will bring to it their own experiences, their own thoughts and feelings about trees, and communities, and hope. And they will take from it what each needs, regardless of age or background. And all will savor the rich illustrations and powerful but accessible text.

In the ongoing public discussions about education, about "what kids need", about grit or resilience or test scores, the truth is that young people need many things, and most of all they need good books and good stories. In this case, this nonfiction treatment of a powerful symbol of LIFE and HOPE is a work of art, and of heart.