A LINE CAN GO ANYWHERE... Come along with Ruth Asawa

 Ruth Asawa is a remarkable American artist, worthy of remembering her name and eliciting examples of her work. If you are already familiar with her, I believe you will adore this account of her life and work for young readers.  If she and her work are unfamiliar to you, this book is even more important to read.

I am a wish-I-could-be-artist who admires and sings the praises of the talents of actual  artists, especially when they are celebrated in picture books. (Put the word ARTIST in the search bar on the right to find any of the many posts I've shared about other artists in the past.) Rarely have I met a child who didn't LOVE to make art, if left undirected or judged. But I have met MANY, across preschool to adult ages, who have precluded even trying to make art by self-assessing that they "aren't good". Others feel that art is only "one thing", whether that is drawing or painting or making identical copies of some image presented to them. Or that art requires a studio or specific materials. If you know anyone (including yourself) who shares those views, this book is a passport to rediscovery of your own creativity and self-expression.

To resist that destructive impulse to limit and turn away from creative impulses or efforts requires a willingness to trust our inner selves, a willingness to give voice to our inner impulses. Ruth Asawa had such a drive, and her inner impulses were wide-ranging, leading to creating work that now hangs or is otherwise displayed in museums. Many of her pieces have been sold for eye-popping amounts. Asawa's art expressions involved two-and three- dimensional images and materials not readily associated with art and she is credited with opening the art world to expand acceptance of, welcoming of, innovative materials and creative insights. 

This variation and expansion of expression began as a child, and her drive weathered injustice and deprivation. She benefited from rare opportunities to learn from masterful artists. That's quite a journey to portray in a picture book, but the lines that marked Asawa's creative life became the thread that pulls readers through this book. 

ROARING BROOK PRESS, 2025

A LINE CAN GO ANYWHERE: The Brilliant, Resilient Life of  Artist Ruth Asawa is a biography written by CAROLINE McALISTER and illustrated by JAMIE GREEN. The author launches the reader into Ruth's life at a young age as this American-born daughter of Japanese immigrants noticed her world before the Second World War. 

Readers enter Ruth's life through her perceptions and fascinations with lines and patterns, as revealed in wagon tracks, agricultural and natural  movements on the land, and geometric waves of horizons and river beds. The beauty and rhythms of what she saw in vegetables, bean strings, calligraphy class. Even the stripes on the American flag spoke to her, called to her, inspired her to mimic and elaborate on the lines and movements in her world. 

You may have guessed by now that she and her family, along with more than a hundred thousand others, would intersect tragically with the unjust incarceration and isolation of Japanese Americans after the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. I was unaware of that aspect of her background, but reading this explains as much about her eventual trajectory in the art world as anything.

It was her incarceration that limited access to materials but led to interactions with artistic mentors whose careers were halted by movement to the camps. Ruth's awareness of figurative lines were not restricted to straight segments and angles, but frequently incorporated spools and loops, waves and curves, symmetry and asymmetry.applying  traditional skills and techniques to unconventional but  available materials. Crocheting with wire and weaving metals resulted in works that instantly intrigue even though they are utterly original and unprecedented. 

Throughout her life, Asawa heard many nay-saying voices (choose between family life and artistic life) but heeded her own path. She married and raised six children while keeping her art production original and powerfully unique. (To view a brief video of her art, try this YOUTUBE clip.)

Once achieving success, she could have used the most expensive or traditional materials, but she chose to incorporate what was at hand, what suited her inner intent, what contributed to the total impact of her work. Her quote below captures that impulse:

QUOTE credit: Ruth Asawa

Illustrations allow readers to connect with Ruth throughout her ages and stages, while hinting at many of the extended voices and drives which led her to such acclaim. She called the disruptions of her family and childhood "interrupted lines", which are suggested throughout the illustrations, as are other visual details that can find echoes in her masterpieces. 

You'll do yourself a favor to read and explore this picture book biography. It includes back matter that extends information about Asawa's life and art. Both the main text and that added information combine with remarkable illustrations to submerge readers into a life worth learning about. 

Apologies Analyzed, and more: I'M SORRY YOU GOT MAD

 Oh, how I wish I had this new picture book while I was in the classroom daily. For preschoolers, for elementary kids, for middle grade and high school kids.For preservice teachers. 

Well, for everyone. 

Little ones need to learn to regulate their emotions and take accountability for their actions and consequences. They need to empathize with the feelings of others, especially when their own actions caused them. And adults (not just teachers) need to learn how to help that growth in the process take place. One version or another of  meaningless apologies seem to be everywhere these days, from a mindless "sorry" in passing to a publicly issued version of the title. A sort of "sorry you're a snowfake" statement.

DIAL BOOKS FOR YOUN G READERS, 
2024

I'M SORRY YOU GOT MAD is written by Kyle Lukoff and illustrated by Julie Kwon. (click on each creator for some interesting background, but especially to note the delicate handling of facial expressions in sample of art by Kwon.)

The gist of this book is what I assumed before reading. Namely, that someone had been unfair or unkind and then was not good at accepting responsibility for their actions. The cover offers that premise well, including that such a person being asked to write an apology will likely make them even angrier and in a deeper state of denial. Art on the back of the book jacket shows that the infraction was not a major one or irreparable and could have been resolved rather easily. 

So far, so good, and so anticipated. 

What unfolds in the first several spreads and page turns is a nearly wordless account of Jack's successive attempts, retries, and the growing fury he feels as well a the growing awareness of him among others in class. The few words used on successive attempts are scrawled on crumpled note paper  (SORRY... SORRY ZOE -JACK.... DEAR ZOE, I'M SORRY YOU GOT MAD   JACK...) with that last note adding writing in a different hand: Dear Jack, Please try again. Love, Ms. Rice)

That format and book design continues throughout, allowing readers (young or old) to read and understand a model of the ways in which intervention, allowance for time, persistence, and gradual growth to acceptance of responsibility can achieve long term change. 

Jack goes through stages of composition that are first intended to deny everything, to satisfy the teacher, and to put this behind him. If left without further expectation, the experience would confirm his view of himself in relation to others. By reprocessing the request for a real apology, readers can view the visual account of a normal progression of a day in class with Jack's intense drama in the background. It does not separate him from the group, but allows him to see the event in perspective with the full day and the magnitude (or lack of it) of his actions. His letters become more sincere, including empathy for Zoe's sadness, while still dodging accountability.

Eventually, Jack's letter incorporates what we see to be Ms. Rice's support: Three things an apology must include. 

What I did.

That I'm sorry.

And I'll help you to fix it.

This takes into account the adult's recognition of and respect for Jack's improved effort at writing something meaningful, then structuring an acceptable response for his success. His letter does what was asked.

That, my fiends, would be what I expected and would welcome in this type of book, one that might even be called "didactic", although necessary, and handled in a realistic way. But, there's more.

If it ended there, we'd assume that Zoe received the note. But then we see that Jack is furious that she and friends built something and did not include him. He demands an apology although he knocked their new project down again. I won't reveal the closing pages because they are quite clever, realistic, and worth reading for yourself.

While this is, in fact, a picture  focused on writing or providing a good apology, one that means something, it is also a exploration of what and how we learn, of how we grow and use what we've learned, of the "big feelings" that can lead us to acts that we then want to deny and do not regret. Actions that hurt others and yet we feel justified in choosing to do them. That's often because we can't free ourselves of the shame and/or anger that surround our actions. It is also a manual for pre-service teachers (or those already in classrooms, or for parents with squabbling siblings) to manage such emotions and growth in a way that allows time and space for change.

I was certain I'd want to read this, and consider if it should be included in my reflections in this blog. I can't begin to post about every picture book I read. This "second level" of story tipped the scale in favor of featuring it and sharing my reactions. This basic story AND second level serve as a constructive model in familiar circumstances but also move into the realm of the WHY of hurting others, the HOW of fixing, and the WAYS to become able to manage our own feelings and respect those of others. It modeled self-regulation not only in children but in adults. It moved from demanding apologies (and acceptance of those) to genuine personal development. 

And it moved my reaction from a strong recommendation to a rave. Please check it out.

 

102... Lots To Think About Here!

 I'm so eager to dive into picture books that I rarely read the back blurbs or jacket copy before diving into the book itself. That isn't the kindest news to those who labor so seriously to find exactly the right text to lure readers in. I realize that, and always go back to read that material eventually. In the case of 102, written and illustrated by Matthew Cordell, I found in that later reading of jacket copy the use of the book's opening line, a line that I'll include here: 

LITTLE, BROWN, & Company  2025


Those twists continue throughout.

The opening spread remains anchored in the familiar; A kid is sent home with a fever of 101, a stray mouse scurries across the floor, and a debate ensues about getting rid of it or keeping it.

The reassuring line, "You'll be safe with me" provides a hint about issues that quickly arise.

This is an ideal place to elicit ideas about what, exactly, will happen next. I'd wager (money I don't have) that brilliant ideas will follow, but none with get it right, at least not in total. The child narrator attempts to follow a calling grasshopper, shrinking to hole-in-the-wall size himself. Readers join him for a journey inside the walls of the house. Who and what he meets there are both curious and informative, but must not delay him on the quest led by the grasshopper. Eventually, they reach the source of the truth about those beans, and about that mouse, and about the boy himself.

I've already given away so much of the story, but that should not deter you. The best continues on, and each page provides Cordell's color-drawn line art in ways that underscore this nighttime adventure, a quasi-reaslitic adventure, and the tenderness of a mother for her ailing child. 

Even in the final pages, this beans, those 102 repetitions, that gentle recognition of kindness toward others all resonate on the page. What part is realistic? What happened and what didn't happen? That's for you and young readers to decide. 

JUST ONE OAK: A Nonfiction Treasure

An oak tree is a world unto itself. 

Although it isn't. 

A mature oak is interconnected with everything else, from the animals who use it as residence or food source or more, to the carbon dioxide and oxygen exchange that is so essential to every other life form, including us, to the microbial and fungal lives interacting underground. From the simplicity of  "I think that I shall never see... a poem lovely as a tree" to the nearly overwhelming complexity of that one tree could be a jarring journey if not treated masterfully.

Mastery is exactly what happens in JUST ONE OAK: What a Single Tree Can Be.

BEACHLANE BOOKS, 2026

It is written by Maria Gianferrari and illustrated by Diana Sudyka. The magnificence of the oak in this story plays the role of honoring all oaks. That parallels the magnificence of this nonfiction picture book with contents of such an extensive topic but such a poetic presence. The facts about this symbolic tree are specific and important, graceful and inspiring. The illustrations have a similarly expansive blend of beauty and details. 

This impressive treatment of a seemingly familiar but bottomless topic is managed by combining the main text in larger, friendly font, with smaller text shadowing the creatures and structures within the image, while more small print appeared in informational insets on various spreads. 

This approach offers a range of science and nature facts with a magical realism that makes the content understandable and intriguing. Shifting perspectives from close-up to distant, from above ground to underground, from leaf to trunk, readers remain focused on that OAK, but in fresh and informative ways. The illustrations allow younger readers to recognize and connect with other picture books about trees and woods and animals, but  the sidebars and image labels invite further reading or returns to these pages over and over. 

Back matter provides resources, additional detailed content, and diagrams. There, too, I admired the masterful decisions about what to remove from the main text, what to include in the expanded materials. This is a great example of a picture book that offers something for everyone at every age, while never losing the celebratory awe conveyed in learning more about ONE OAK TREE.

The first home I owned was built at the edge of an oak wood. I moved in during the winter and welcomed the coming of spring. Because the oaks were now my neighbors, I longed to see them leaf out and show new life. Instead, those oaks were the last of all the plants in the woodland to show any indicators of greenery. I feared that the woods were dead, that a strong storm would bring them crashing down on my new roof. 

Eventually, though, I saw that patience pays off, and the noble oaks were verdant and vibrant, that the related lives shown in this picture book abounded among my oak neighbors, and that those oaks would outlast me and my house. My respect for and love of oak trees and all that they foster in our natural world exploded, and continues to grow. This book allows readers to share that experience and respect.