Glass Slipper, Gold Sandal - Paul Fleischman

A Worldwide Cinderella
Illustrated by Julie Paschkis
Henry Holt & Co., 2007
$16.95
32 pgs.
Rating: 4,5
Endpapers: Aqua & avacodo world map showing 17 locations that are included in the story - bordered
Author's Note

I'm quite enamored of Paul Fleischman's work (I'm trying to forget that he wrote The Dunderheads), and this beautiful Cinderella does not disappoint. One of the reasons I love Fleischman's writing so much is that you never know exactly what to expect - he always has a clever take on things. Well, this Cinderella draws from 17 different countrys' adaptations of the story. So you'll be reading along, and get a page split into halves, or thirds, or quarters: And on the girl's feet appeared a pair of glass slippers (France)...diamond anklets (India)...sandals of gold (Iraq)....

The colors! The artwork! The book design! All my favorites are included, which make the visual enjoyment of this story even more wonderful. The fairly small amount of text is written in small white boxes that are framed by batik-looking backgrounds. Paschis uses designs and motifs from each of the various cultures that she's depicting. The illustration for each is placed in a rectangle above the text, and she includes as much information from the country as possible. The only thing that never changes is Cinderella's face.

Clever. Visual. A wonderful Cinderella. Read it after you've shared a few of the many, many available that tell the story from another culture's point of view.

The Dunderheads - Paul Fleischman

Illustrated by David Roberts
June, 2009
Rating: 2 (darn!)
Endpapers: illustration of the Dunderheads tacked up onto a blue wall

Big-bosomed Miss Breakbone is a a tyrannical teacher who despises her students -- who she calls "fiddling, twiddling, time-squandering, mind-wandering, doodling, dozing, don't-knowing, dunderheads!" She gives herself a gold star whenever she makes a student cry and confiscates all their stuff to sell.

Then one day the class has had it and decide to retaliate. Using the special, odd skills each of the dozen-or-so Dunderheads individually hold, they create a plan to break into her fortress-like house to get back their stuff.

Told in the first person by one of the Dunderheads, the kid's personalities are well portrayed, and once I (as a teacher and proud of it) got over the hugely negative attributes of Miss Breakbone, I decided she was a hoot.

Now, Paul Fleischman is my favorite author. I actually preordered this book. I'm sure the illustrations are wonderful, but the whole package just didn't work for me. I'm really disappointed - I don't know if it's in myself, the artwork, the story, or the negative portrayal of teachers in general, which is a hugely pet peeve of mine. I'll reread this in a week or two. See how I feel then. (sigh....)

The Birthday Tree - Paul Fleischman

Illustrator: Barry Root
Published: Original 1979, newly illustrated 2008
Rating: 4
Endpapers: Glossy rust with newly planted tree in 2" oval on front, Fully grown (and happy!) in the same oval in the back

Barry Root did a lovely job illustratiing this "second coming" of The Birthday Tree. His watercolors are lovely and fit the story beautifully. The cover doesn't seem particularly enticing, but the corresponding illustration inside works just fine. It may be the font of the title that turns me off.

"Once there was a sailor who fled from the sea. He and his wife had lost three sons to the waves, so they gathered up their belongings in a creaky wheelbarrow and left the water behind them." The went three days away from the sea, built a house, had another son, named him Jack, and planted a tree to commemorate his birth. The tree grew. Jack grew. Jack played in the tree and snoozed underneath it. And soon Jack's parents discovered that when Jack was feeling poorly, the tree drooped. When he was happy, the tree was perky.

"The sailor and his wife never spoke of the sea. Yet sometimes a strong, salt wind would blow in from the ocean and the sailor would notice Jack sniffing the air with curiosity." Jack takes off, and they watch for signs on the tree that indicate Jack's happiness and whereabouts. They "see" him traveling the sea, happy for awhile, then shipwrecked, starving, dying, then being rescued. Just when they don't know what's happened to him, they find him curled up and asleep in his bed - home at last.

Someone said this book is a parable. It's certainly mystical. It's a cool story by one of my all-time favorite writers.

The Animal Hedge - Paul Fleischman

Illustrotor: Bagram Ibatoulline
For: Kids
Pub: 1983, 2003
Rating: 3.5/5
Finished: Aug. 11, 2008

I first read this book when it was illustrated by Lydia Dabcovich. Now out of print, I can't remember the illustrations. The current version is illustrated by a Russian artist using an American Folk Art style, A bit dark, and not my favorite style, it does seem to suit the story. A 19th century farmer lovingly tends his animals and raises his three boys, always singing while they worked. The eldest sang coachmen's songs, the second sang songs of the sea, and the third's favorite song was of a traveling fiddler.

Tragedy strikes in the form of a huge drought. To feed his family, the farmer slowly sells all his animals, then his farm, purchasing a tiny house in which to live. When rain finally reappears and he goes to trim the hedge, his eyes picture animal shapes in the greenery, so he trims it to look like the animals his mind sees. As the hedge grows he continues to trim, adding offspring, creating a yardful of cows and chickens and pigs. However, he no longer sings.

One by one the sons grow up. The father helps each to realize what their aspirations are by cutting the hedges to the ground and letting each boy look for the shapes they see in the growth to guide their career decisions. Not surprisingly they follow the direction of the songs each sang as a young boy - the eldest becomes a coachman, the middle boy a sailor, the youngest a fiddler.

Years later the successful sons come home to visit the father and realize that since their dreams took shape in the hedge, their father's continuous farm menargarie being recreated there is his dream. So they go out and buy him a whole new flock of cows, chickens, and pigs. Alhough now quite elderly, he is quite happy. A sweet story. Magical without any magic. What would MY heart see in the growing hedge?