Author: Eileen Spinelli
Illustrator: Nancy Hayashi
Publisher: Harper Collins
ISBN: 006029423X
Ages: 6 to 8
A great book for all kids who love the changing of the seasons. This delightful book invites you to enjoy the sights, sounds and fragrances (smells) of autumn. Crackling and falling leaves, honking geese, warm coats and socks are just a few of the seasonal things mentioned.
Book Excerpt:
I know it's autumn when
we rake the leaves into piles,
when doorstep jack-o-lanterns
wear their crooked smiles...
The girl in this book knows the season is changing when she sees her dad take her jacket out of storage and when she makes acorn art at school. Her family goes on an apple picking adventure, takes an evening hayride and listens to a Native American storyteller tell tales while sitting around a campfire. Autumn has arrived.
The rhyming text and watercolor illustrations make this book a special autumn treat. You will want to read it again and again.
Title: The Stranger
Author: Chris Van Allsburg
Illustrator: Chris Van Allsburg
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Company
ISBN: 0395423317
Ages: 8 to 10
If you enjoy a good story full of suspense and clues, this is the book for you. The beginning is eerie. Farmer Bailey is driving his 1940s pick-up truck down the road when he hits something. Thinking it is a deer, he gets out of his truck to take a look. To his surprise, a man is lying on the road.
Farmer Bailey takes the man home to recuperate (get well). The man has lost his memory and cannot talk. Weeks pass. The stranger seems content to stay on the farm and gives Farmer Bailey a hand with the fall harvest.
While the leaves all around the farm begin to turn color, the farm still continues to look as if it is summer. Then one day, the stranger sees wild geese flying south and he knows it is time to leave the farm. Once he is gone, the leaves on the farm turn color and the weather turns cool. Who was this stranger?
Within the text, the author has left a scattering of clues to the identity of the stranger. Could he have been Jack Frost? The answer is given in an awesome illustration alone. No text is used, but you will have no doubts as to whom the stranger was.
The author has turned the natural incident of Indian Summer into a mysterious and suspenseful event. The warm pastel illustrations add much to the sensitivity of the book. An awesome read.
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