Two very different but equally delightful books from Tulika (India) provide a treat for catlovers to share with their children.

The cover of Where’s That Cat? (Tulika 2009/2011) shows a cheeky wee ginger kitten peeking from behind a curtain (and this is mirrored on the back, but Pooni the cat is no more than a cut-out outline) – but it offers no clue as to the rich detail of the book’s Indian setting.  However, I was sure it would be a treat because it is written and illustrated by Manjula Padmanabhan, who created the wonderful I Am Different. Manjula gave some background about Where’s That Cat? in a blog post for Tulika when it was first published in 2009.

Little girl Minnie comes home from school and can’t find Pooni. She goes into the garden but, funnily enough, Pooni doesn’t come when she’s called! Minnie asks people all along the action-packed street if they’ve seen the cat, and meanwhile young listeners/readers will be eagerly hunting her out as she goes about her business, practically under Minnie’s nose.  Unusually for this kind of book that plays hide-and-seek with the reader, there comes a point when it really does seem that Pooni has disappeared, and readers’ dismay may equal Minnie’s – but, of course, by the end there is general relief from everybody both inside and outside the book.   Pooni has the last word – “Prrr” – and the final illustration shows Minnie cuddling Pooni, who is no doubt completely unaware of the trouble she has caused.  You can almost hear her purring!

The second book is Miaow! by Alankrita Jain.  There are no humans in this story, just two cats, one black, one white; both with green eyes.  The story is short and whimsically charming.  A black cat falls into a can of paint and becomes a white cat – until it rains and the paint all washes off.  Then it meets a white cat and they become friends… maybe even fall in love, but that is left to readers to infer.  The simple story is told elegantly, and the stylised cats in the illustrations capture beautifully the elegant (yes, there’s that word again!) stretches and shapes that cats manage to make with their bodies.  An added bonus are the absolutely gorgeous inside covers that are filled in the manner of traditional Warli art (see Tara Books’ Do! for example) with little black cats doing all sorts of (human) activities.

Do take a look inside both Where’s That Cat? and Miaow! via Tulika’s website (click on “Look Inside” under the cover image).  Like all Tulika’s books, both books are available in several languages, and Miaow! is bilingual with English – the copy I have is English/Hindi, translated into Hindi by Sandhya Rao.  Both these books are perfect for young children, especially if they are at the stage with their reading that they want you to read to them, and then pick the book up for themselves.

For me, it was a case of love at first sight, the first time I came across Bronwyn Bancroft‘s artwork. So in this Books at Bedtime post I’m going to highlight three titles all by different authors but illustrated by Bronwyn. The first two fit neatly into our current Water in Multicultural Children’s Books theme; and the third provides an accent to it with its Alice Springs desert setting – no, not a lot of water there…

First up is Big Rain Coming, written by Katrina Germein (Clarion Books, 1999). The text is snappy and there’s plenty of expansive detail in the illustrations to pore over with a child. Everyone, but everyone is waiting for the rain to come, from Old Stephen, to the kids; from the dogs to the frogs. The clouds gather, and still they wait, right through each day of the week, until finally, on Saturday, it rains. It won’t be long till the child you share this book with knows the words by heart and is jubilantly shouting out the last couple of pages before you get a look in! My favorite illustration: the children swimming in the blue/green billabong, surrounded by tall pink flowers – gorgeous!

Next is Malu Kangaroo: How the First Children Learnt to Surf written by Judith Morecroft (Little Hare, 2007), which again is a finely tuned synthesis of word and image. Malu the Kangaroo boldly tells the people, “I will show you how to play with the ocean.” And then he shapes and polishes a piece of wood into a surf-board. As he tells them how it will feel to surf, Bronwyn’s illustrations underscore the joyous lyricism of Malu Kangaroo’s words, with birds soaring and dipping into the surf, fish flying, and dolphins leaping. The patterns and swirls that have their roots in aboriginal art, coupled with Bronwyn’s characteristic bright pallette are simply (yes I am going to use that words agian!) gorgeous. My favorite illustration: the birds that ‘sweep and fly’, breaking up the horizontal bands of sand, surf and sky.

And lastly, Ready to Dream written by Donna Jo Napoli and Elena Furrow (Bloomsbury Children’s Books, 2009). Young artist Ally’s Mamma is taking her to Australia for the first time. At Alice Springs, Ally meets Pauline, an artist who, with just a few gentle words each time, teaches Ally to get closer in her art to the animals and nature she sees and experiences on her excursions. In their last meeting they draw together in the sandy earth, and Ally’s reaction shows that, in Pauline’s culminating words, she is “ready to dream”. There is much for young people to ponder in this gentle story that will appeal especially to budding artists – and there’s no doubt that they could be trying their hand at something in Bronwyn’s style as a result. My favourite illustration: Ally throwing high the stone on which she has painted a kangaroo, so that it can hop free.

Author Ting-Xing Ye’s mother used to say, “It’s typical! Three Monks, no water!”  whenever she or her brothers and sisters tried to get out of doing something.  Three Monks, No Water (Annick Press, 1997) is the story behind that enigmatic expression – and since reading it, I can see it becoming a useful phrase in our home!

A young Buddhist monk lived alone at the top of a mountain.  Every day he had to fetch water from the foot of the mountain, using a yoke and two buckets.  That provided him with enough water for his personal needs and to water his small vegetable garden.  One day, he was joined by an older monk.  Their attempts to bring water up the mountain together, stringing a single bucket on a pole carried between them, were not very successful; and each felt it was the other’s task to fetch more water, so neither went.  The vegetables in the garden began to die.  Then a third monk arrived, and the situation worsened.  As each monk refused to give way, or compromise his stance in any way, the outlook became bleaker, and certainly none of them was composed enough to meditate or pray.  Then one day, disaster struck… Would they be able to let go of their antagonism and work together to put things right?

Three Monks, No Water is just the kind of fable that will appeal to young children with a strong sense of right and wrong.  The narrative certainly makes no excuses for the monks’ unreasonable behaviour, but leaves plenty of scope for young listeners to react.  Illustrator Harvey Chan’s background of acrylic on gessoed board gives the illustrations an interesting texture for the colored pencil drawings in soft, muted colors; and I love the monks’ facial expressions.  And on every page, like a heavy watermark, a line of calligraphy conveys the expression of the title.  Plus there’s a specially designed seal inside the front and back cover, with a short explanatory note, and together these add a nice extra touch.

This is a great story for conveying the importance of dialogue and reciprocity, giving as well as expecting and taking – and it can be applied to a directly parallel scenario of three individuals, or on a global level, or anywhere in between…

A chee-lin is a Chinese mythological creature, “a horned beast with the body of a deer, the tail of an ox, and the hooves of a horse”. When a giraffe was brought to China from Africa in the 15th century it was considered to be a chee-lin, bringing good fortune. We learn this at the beginning of James Rumford’s beautiful picture-book Chee Lin: A Giraffe’s Journey, alongside a beautiful ink drawing by Shen Du (1357-1434) showing a contemporary portrayal of the chee-lin/giraffe. What follows is Rumford’s interpretation of Tweega the giraffe’s story, from his birth in East Africa, through his incredible journey to China and his long life in the imperial palace gardens, including the visiting artist painting his portrait, to his mysterious disappearance on a summer’s day.

You can read more about the book in Charlotte’s review for PaperTigers- I totally concur with her concluding words: “Chee-lin is superb.”  The book is visually stunning, with bordered paintings in casein on the right hand page and text on the left, set against a rich array of backgrounds reproducing “African baskets and cloth, Persian tiles and India rugs, Chinese brocades, porcelain, and cloisonné.”  At the end, there is a fabulous map showing Tweega’s journey, and an Author’s Note giving more information about Shen Du’s painting and poem, including Rumford’s own calligraphy and translation.

Chee-Lin is also one of those precious picture books written for older children.  It would make a perfect bedtime book for sharing, where children and grown-ups are taking it in turns to read; or if you’re looking for a longer readaloud to last a few days but don’t want to forgo quality illustrations: each double-page is like a chapter with its own heading and separate episode in the story. It’s also just the kind of book that children will then pick up to read again on their own.  That’s what’s just happened in our home!

Another of Rumford’s books, Rain School has recently been selected as one of our 2011 Spirit of PaperTigers book set.  Do also read our wonderful interview, in which you can find out more about Chee-Lin, and find some of the illustrations in our Gallery.

The image of little Azad and his camel curled up together fast asleep on the title page of Azad’s Camel by Erika Pal (Frances Lincoln 2009 (UK)/2010 (US)) certainly lends itself to a bedtime story.  The rather jaunty narrative, coupled with the visual impact of cartoon-like characters set against the ochres and browns of the desert landscape, carries young listeners through the story to its happy ending, rather like a fairy tale in which the wicked stepmother is outwitted and the characters we’ve been rooting for all live happily ever after. Except here, Azad is sold by his uncle to a rich sheikh who spots Azad’s handstands on a goalpost and decides he will make a good camel rider. Waking up after his first night in the desert, Azad asks for something to eat, only to be yelled at: “Here, you have to earn your breakfast!”  He is immediately put onto a camel and indeed, his balancing powers come in most useful. But Azad doesn’t like riding camels at full speed, even if he does win lots of races. And one night his camel tells him that he doesn’t like racing either… So the next day, they run in their race, they win it, and then they simply carry on going, on and on until no one chases them any more. They wake up after a cold night in the desert (and there’s some sweet help at hand here) and find themselves surrounded by Bedouin, who give Azad and his camel a loving welcome – they have “found a home at last”.

I don’t usually like to give away the whole story when I’m talking about books but it’s important here to understand that this special story will endear itself to young readers/listeners, despite some harsh realities that provide it with its backbone. As is fitting for the story’s targeted audience (4-8), the emphasis is on one little boy’s quest to find a happy home, and his achievement of that goal thanks to the assistance of a talking camel. However, the illustrations especially root the story in its contemporary setting – an airplane flies overhead, the young riders wear modern riding helmets, and the urban environment is clogged with traffic and highrise buildings. These provide the opening for later discussion with older children of the information given in the afterword: a succinct, hard-hitting outline of the exploitation of children in camel racing in the Gulf States of the Middle East, as well as some hopeful news of how attitudes are changing.

This may be a story in which winning is certainly not everything, but Erika Pal’s perfectly tuned story about Azad and his camel is itself a winner, whatever time of day you choose to read it.

I received a scrumptious parcel through the post this week – some gifts and goodies from Corinne and Aline’s time at the Asian Festival of Children’s Content (AFCC) in Singapore. I’m going to unpack them slowly and with relish here on the blog so that you can enjoy them too.

First up is picture book The Book that was Handed Down, which won the inaugural Hedwig Anuar Children’s Book Award, announced at the AFCC. Written by Yixian Quek, illustrated by Grace Duan Ying and designed by Goh Caili, it was published in Singapore by Straits Times Press in 2008. We can certainly be grateful to the Award for raising the profile of this extraordinary book.

On the surface it’s the simple story of a little girl Ping, our narrator, who is pretty disgusted about how she always has to have hand-me-downs… The book is no different: it used to belong to her brother, and certainly carries the imprint of its previous owner. But, of course, this is a book we’re talking about here – not clothes that are grown out of and forgotten. When Ming sees his sister with the book, he remembers how much he loved it and starts reading it aloud. Ping is then captivated in her turn, and together they share the adventures held between the book’s covers.

Complimenting the text perfectly are the illustrations, which cleverly blend the actual “Book that was Handed Down” with a depiction of the narrative. Ping is so serious and earnest and cross at the beginning, you can’t help feeling for her – but, as is so often the case, once she gets beyond superficial appearances, she finds her life is enriched both by the actual story contained within the book, and by the opportunity it affords for her to connect with her brother. The uncluttered effect of the strongly delineated illustrations also belies the number of details that will delight children as they make unspoken connections while listening to the story.

The simplicity of The Book that was Handed Down makes it immediately appealing; its complexity means that it will endure. Now I wonder whom I can hand it down to? I’ll just have to muss it up a bit first…

Barefoot Books can always be depended on for their wonderful anthologies of stories from all over the world, and Grandmothers’ Stories: Wise Woman Tales from Many Cultures (Barefoot Books, 1999/2006) is no exception. The eight stories included are retold by Burleigh Mutén in wonderful prose that just begs to be read aloud, and vividly illustrated by Siân Bailey. They are framed by an introduction in which three grandchildren ask their grandmother to tell them a story, and a conclusion in which (it will be no surprise) the two older children have fallen asleep but the little one is wide awake, asking to hear them all again.

And no wonder! From the first story from Senegal about “The Midwife and the Djinn” we are captivated. In fact, when we listened to the story recently, Little Brother was in stitches of laughter, anticipating the next stage of the story while disbelieving that it could possibly be so. We were listening to Olympia Dukakis reading on one of the two accompanying CDs. I have to say, at first I thought it was going to be a terribly labored narration, she begins so slowly – but in fact, it was perfect: as the pace of the story picked up, so did the reading; and I realised that if she hadn’t read it slowly at the beginning, she wouldn’t have been able to get the words out by the end!

The other stories are just as engaging – “The Old Woman Who Was Not Afraid” introduces us to the grotesque and greedy little Onis from Japan; there is a cross between Baba Yaga and the well-known “Hansel and Gretel” from Russia (“Grandmother’s Basket”); the beautiful Hawaiian legend of old Heena, “The Woman in the Moon”; the bewitching story of La Bruha, “The Beautiful Crone of Córdoba” in Mexico; an Irish Wise Woman who helps a widow and her daughter get a band of “small spirit people” out of their house; the magical Mother Holle from Germany; and “The Old Woman Who Was right” from Sweden.

All the stories have that timeless quality of the traditional story that is sure to make them popular for being read and listened to again and again – and they have the added appeal of resonating with stories from other cultures too. Mutén’s retellings here hold firm to their oral origins, which makes them such a joy to share.

There is something special about grandparents sharing stories with their grandchildren, especially when those stories come from their own lives (though young children can be disconcerting in their definition of the olden days and their grandparents place in them…). Over the next few weeks, I will be highlighting books that draw young children into that special bond through stories narrated by grandmothers from around the world.

Whereas many anthologies of traditional stories can be dipped into and individual stories extracted at random, I recommend several bedtimes in a row be spent immersed in Frances Carpenter’s Tales of a Korean Grandmother and Tales of a Chinese Grandmother (both published by Tuttle). Although subtitled as 30 and 32 Traditional Tales respectively, they are much more than that. The stories emerge from the daily lives of the Ling family in China and the Kim family in Korea as the two grandmothers tell their grandchildren stories arising out of events and traditions or objects around them. Black and white vignettes and full-page illustrations are scattered through the books, with Malthe Hasselriis as the named illustrator of Tales of a Chinese Grandmother.

In Korea, we join the Kim family and become friends especially with Ok Cha and her brother Yung Tu; in China we meet Ah Shung and his sister Yu Lang, and the rest of the Ling household. Both grandmothers are deeply loved and respected, and have a wealth of stories to tell and retell – and the time to tell them. Young readers/listeners will be just as interested in the children’s antics as in the stories themselves.

The books were first published some 70 years ago and have lost none of their appeal in the intervening years – indeed, much of their attraction to today’s audience, whether younger children sharing the stories as a readaloud or older children reading the book alone, must be the blend of historical detail combined with the magic and fantasy contained within the stories themselves. Through the device of telling stories within a narrative, today’s readers/listeners are more readily drawn into their cultural contexts and the warmth of the bond between the grandmother and her grandchildren is the thread which brings all these stories together.

When I was about eight, I wrote a poem about Silly Billy, well more of a ditty really – but it has stayed with me. I therefore knew I had to read UK Children’s Laureate Anthony Browne’s picture book Silly Billy (Walker Books, 2006) as soon as I saw it… It is, as my children will tell you, so much better than my juvenile work; Little Brother and I have really enjoyed sharing it together.

Billy is a worrier – or, as it says at the beginning of the story, “Billy used to be a worrier.” The story takes us through some of the things Billy worried about, and his parents’ attempts to reassure him – but it is only when he goes to stay with his grandma that a solution is found. She presents him with a set of tiny Guatemalan worry dolls, who will “do all the worrying for you while you sleep.” And so all is well, until Billy starts to worry about the effect of all those worries (in extra large letters) on the poor dolls… but then he comes up with the perfect solution.

Anthony Browne’s story is narrated simply and eloquently, with words emphasised in larger font all the way through. This format calls out for the words to be shared and since this is one of those books that is likely to be in demand again and again, small people will love shouting out those larger words, which they will soon know by heart. Browne’s illustrations are as virtuoso as one would expect – from the (not too nightmarish) worries to the larger-than-life image of grandma’s hand holding out the brightly colored worry dolls. The reassuring past tense at the beginning means that young readers/listeners experience the story from a secure perspective – and any small worriers might be tempted to follow Billy’s idea for themselves too. There’s also a well-pitched description of worry dolls and their Guatemalan origins at the end of the book. Read what the judges of the CILIP Kate Greenaway Medal had to say about Silly Billy here.

Take a look at Sally’s recent Books at Bedtime post for other books by Anthony Browne, as well as Aline’s comment about her daughter’s love of The Shape Game on this post.

Master story-teller Laurence Yep took his inspiration for his magical version of the Beauty and the Beast fairy-tale from a traditional Chinese tale with a Southern Chinese setting. His The Dragon Prince (HarperCollins, 1997) has some satisfying twists and turns in the narrative and an impressive dragon in the role parallel to the Beast: visually too, thanks to Kam Mak’s powerful illustrations. We just love the noble, enormous, golden dragon, and completely empathised with Beauty/Seven’s inherent trust in the beauty she finds in him, that goes deeper than the fear – even when the Dragon insists, “But you really should be afraid” – yes, Little Brother especially loved that line!

Seven is set apart from her older sisters from the start: while they work in the fields, she does beautiful embroidery, which is then sold at the market, thereby providing the family with the sustenance the rocky ground cannot. The symbolism of this carries the narrative through to its conclusion (it’s a fairy tale so it’s irrelevant to question the point of the other sister’s activities, farming land on which nothing will grow). Three is jealous of Seven – and never more so than when, instead of suffering a terrible fate after agreeing to marry a firece dragon in return for her father’s life, Seven arrives on a visit to her family on a ‘chair of gold and coral’ and with all her maids behind her, descending from the sky in a ‘glittering procession’.

Three therefore tricks Seven and takes her place, preparing the Dragon Prince for a change in his wife’s appearance by saying she’s been ill – which makes for an interesting take on Beauty and the Beast: the Prince “didn’t care. In that short time, Seven had come to mean everything to him, not for her beauty but for her kindness.”

So do they live happily ever after? Well, I highly recommend you get hold of this great story and find out for yourself, and enjoy some cultural nuances along the way. For example, one bit that made me chuckle and served to show the Dragon Prince’s state of mind as he searches deperately for Seven: he buys at a market “without bargaining”!

Gathering Books also featured The Dragon Prince earlier this year, as part of a wonderful series of in-depth posts about Chinese fairy-tales – in case you missed them, here are the other links; they’re definitely worth a read: Lon Po Po: A Red-Riding Hood Story from China (which Little Brother read for our Reading the World Challenge in 2008) and Yeh-Shen: A Cinderella Story from China (which I have also featured as a Book at Bedtime in the past)…