In Kindness Found

It cannot be sold or purchased for any sum.  It's free.  It starts in an individual's heart, is nourished by attitude and grows stronger daily.  Many times when given the opportunity, even though it costs nothing to acquire, it is not given.  It is refused.

These individuals who chose to withhold kindness sometimes find they are denied compassion from others when it is desperately needed.  Mela and the Elephant (Sleeping Bear Press, March 15, 2018) written by Dow Phumiruk with illustrations by Ziyue Chen is a folktale set in a jungle in Thailand.  It is an adventure with unexpected results.  It is a journey of self-discovery.

Mela set out to explore the banks of the Ping River near her home. Her little brother followed to the edge of the yard, hoping she'd take him along.

Mela told him to return home because he had nothing to give her in exchange for accompanying her.  When Mela reached the edge of the river near the dock, she saw a large fish swimming. She jumped in her uncle's boat determined to catch it for dinner.  She netted the fish but the swift river current took her into the jungle.

Fortunately the boat got stuck in tree roots but unfortunately Mela could not see her village.  When she asked a crocodile to tow her home, he agreed accepting the fish as payment.  As soon as he had the fish, he quickly left her.  Moving from the rock to shore, she started to walk.

When a leopard softly approached, Mela requested help.  She was lost.  The large cat knew the way to her village.  Offering up her sweater to keep the animal warm at night, he stole it and ran.

A trio of monkeys tricked the girl too.  Darkness falls and sitting on the ground Mela cried.  Suddenly noises signaled something large was coming toward her.  An elephant came into view.  Mela had nothing left to give if help was extended.  On this day a generous heart needed nothing.  

Without realizing it readers are immediately introduced to a behavior in need of help when Mela refuses her brother.  Dow Phumiruk quickly places the main protagonist in peril.  The storytelling technique of three is splendidly used bringing us to the point when the elephant comes to Mela.  The integration of dialogue with the narrative text engages us in Mela's every movement during her day.  Here is a passage.

Mela looked around her.  Tall trees blocked out most of

the sun's light.  Leaves stirred overhead and the river rushed at

her side.  She pointed herself upstream and started to walk.

A leopard slinked into sight.

"Leopard, I am lost.

Do you know a way back to the village?"

On the opened and matching dust jacket and book case the use of white as an element accentuates Mela and the elephant.  Using leaves around the title text takes us into the Thailand jungle before we even begin the story.  To the left, on the back, in a smaller image Mela is trying without luck to paddle in the splashing water back to her village.  Jungle is on both sides of the river. 

In shades of green on the opening and closing endpapers illustrator Ziyue Chen has placed darker leaves on a light canvas.  The full two-page picture on the verso and title pages is a view of the jungle, shore and river from the heights of a tree.  Throughout the title, illustration sizes vary between two-page pictures, single pages and several smaller visuals on a single page to promote pacing.  

By the expressions on the faces of Mela, her little brother and the animals we are well aware of their moods.  If we are careful observers we might see hints of their inner personalities.  Whenever we catch glimpses of the sky we can tell the time of day; noting the passage of the hours.

Each illustration is a like a framed moment enhancing the story's text.  One of my favorite illustrations is when Mela has removed her sweater.  She is happily standing in the jungle holding it up in front of her.  Her backpack is next to her in the grass.  The seated leopard has its back to us in the foreground.  It's a hopeful moment but also one filled with tension.  What will the leopard do?

Set in Thailand this tender tale is sure to resonate with readers of all ages.  Mela and the Elephant written by Dow Phumiruk with illustrations by Ziyue Chen reminds us kindness from a pure heart is freely given.  For a thematic story time on kindness this is an excellent choice.  In an author's note Dow talks about Thailand and how gratitude is portrayed there.  You could pair this book with Be Kind (Roaring Brook Press, February 6, 2018) written by Pat Zietlow Miller with illustrations by Jen Hill.  At the post for that title other books on kindness are listed.

To learn more about Dow Phumiruk and Ziyue Chen and their other work, please follow the links attached to their names to access their websites.  Both Dow and Ziyue are on Twitter.  You can find Dow on Instagram as well as Ziyue.  Ziyue has an account on Tumblr. Ziyue is featured at Miss Marple's Musings.  At the publisher's website you can view interior portions of the book.  I hope you enjoy the trailer.

Alone But Not Alone

There is beauty in our world, tiny and delicate, huge and overwhelming, every single day.  Sometimes we don't see, hear, smell, taste or touch this beauty even though it appears right before us.  Our hearts are too full of something else.  Those things of beauty, a hummingbird bending to sip nectar from a flower, a doe nudging a fawn, one child helping another child after a fall, an elderly couple reaching out to hold hands, a father rocking a fussy child in the grocery store, a mom whispering to one of the boys in her son's scout troop during a project, a neighbor's cat purring in your garden, the scent of the first lilac blooming or the feel of the sun's rays as it sets purple, gold and pink, will never be exactly the same again.  The beauty in those perfect moments is gone.

But if we long for beauty which is lasting all we need to do is look in a book.  Every time we open the covers it surrounds us.  On December 1, 2015 publishers Schwartz & Wade Books released a title which made readers marvel page turn after page turn.  It was named one of The New York Times Best Illustrated Children's Book of 2015, an ALSC, Association for Library Service to Children, Notable Children's Books-2016, and a title on the Booklist Top Ten Graphic Novels for Youth: 2016.  A first book by Guojing The Only Child is a title which will leave a mark on your heart, a breathtaking display of visual storytelling masterfully rendered.  In a beginning author's note Guojing writes:

The story in this book is fantasy, but it reflects the very real feelings of isolation and loneliness I experienced growing up in the 1980s under the one-child policy in China.  

A small child awakens and receives a goodbye hug from her mother as she leaves for work.  On her own the child brushes her teeth, gets dressed and occupies herself during the morning, playing with dolls and her beloved toy deer, and looking at a picture album.  These pictures give her an idea.  After writing a note she pulls on warmer clothing, puts coins in a purse and steps out into the winter weather with an umbrella over her head.

Wandering through the city she makes her way to a bus stop, hoping to visit her grandmother soon.  Without meaning to she falls asleep.  When she wakes up the bus is empty and at the last stop in the woods.  She is alone and lost.  At home her frantic parents have found her note and they try unsuccessfully to find her.

Tearful and fearful she wanders through the forest until a large stag appears.  She follows hoping it is leading her home.  After it saves her from deep water, they travel, she on the back of the deer, farther and farther until the landscape changes with a stairway leading them into the clouds.  It is a realm radiating happiness.  The stag patiently endures her playfully tugs and pokes at its body and face.

Another small being seemingly formed from the clouds themselves, someone the child's size, appears.  They make a delightful duo and an even better trio until something gigantic surfaces, breaking through the clouds as if they are waves on an immense sea.  Soon they are spinning among the stars buoyed up by a burst of air.  As this adventure calms a cloud glides into their vision.

A mother has come to claim her child.  The deer comforts the lost girl until she falls asleep.  Two trips are made; one by the stag and the other by the child and her forest friend.  A glowing, guiding light is followed.  Gratitude and love are exchanged as the two fast friends part from each other.


There are no words on any of these pages but they hum forth from the images rendered in pencil and adjusted in Adobe Photoshop by Guojing.  The front of the dust jacket exudes warmth, comfort and security with a very real promise of an extraordinary relationship.  To the left, on the back, are nine small illustrations from the interior of the book in three rows of three after the child and the deer enter the kingdom of clouds.

A deep midnight blue covers the book case with the title placed in a small white label on the front in the center.  The opening and closing endpapers invite us into a luminous country wrought by imagination.  There is a hint of a single dot on the former and the faint shadow of a faithful friend on the latter, as if it's a memory never to be forgotten.  The text on the title page is placed in frames featuring a city and a single window with a light snow falling.

With a skill surely fueled by the intimacy Guojing has with this story, the pacing reveals every emotional instance with a shift in the size and perspective of the images.  A series of pictures create a passage of time followed by a single illustration depicting a mood which goes straight to your soul; a close-up of the child looking at the closed door with her back to us.  For a stunning impact Guojing gives readers a visual spanning two pages; the city with the child, small in comparison walking alone, the child looking in awe upward as she and the stag stand in a circle of light, or the two double-page illustrations bringing us close to the deer and the child as they say goodbye (This is movingly portrayed with a striking impact.)

The child's face is fully animated mirroring everything she feels; her sadness is profound but her joy is delightful.  The regal almost royal carriage of the deer, the details on the antlers and the fine lines of fur make you long for a similar protector.  When the cloud child peeks out from the white billows the first time like a sky bear you know the girl has found another companion.

I have so many favorite illustrations it is impossible to pick only one.  Every time I've read this book though, I've grinned at one particular set of four pictures.  In the first the stag, cloud child and little girl are standing and sitting with their backs to us as the girl looks behind them.  She notices she is the only one without a puffy tail.  Reaching into the clouds, she forms a ball.  In the final visual all three are in a row with tails.  The deer gazes at the girl as her arms are raised in victory.

Your world fades away as you enter the pages of The Only Child conceived and illustrated with exquisite care by Guojing.  We take an emotional journey with this child, hopeful every step of the way.  Most certainly this is a stunning debut for Guojing, destined to be a classic for all ages.

To discover more about Guojing please follow the link attached to her name to access her Tumblr pages. This link takes you to the Creative Authors page for her. Numerous images including my favorite mentioned here can be found at author, reviewer and blogger Julie Danielson's blog, Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast.  Enjoy Scholastic's Ambassador for School Libraries John Schumacher's tweet.

Happy belated book birthday to @guojingart's The Only Child! https://t.co/L7Wms1p46O

— John Schu (@MrSchuReads) December 3, 2015

Update:  April 7, 2016  An interview between Guojing and Lee Wade, the vice-president of Schwartz & Wade is on Nerdy Book Club.  

Have you see the book trailer which is contained in the interview?

Little Girl...Big Dreams, Big Adventures

If you time it right on a full moon night, sitting on the horizon, it looks close enough to touch.  At the darkest hour, when the air is clear, high in the sky overhead, with little stretch of your imagination, you believe it to be closer than it is.  These are the times when visiting the moon for polite conversation seems possible.

In her debut picture book, Red Knit Cap Girl (Megan Tingley Books, an imprint of Little, Brown and Company, June 2012), author illustrator Naoko Stoop introduced readers to one small girl wearing her signature articles of clothing, who takes the time to nurture her curiosity.  This small child has a deep appreciation for the natural world.  This small child dreams big.

In the forest, there is time to wonder about everything. Red Knit Cap Girl wonders about flowers, butterflies, leaves, and clouds.

What Red Knit Cap Girl wants more than anything else is to talk with the Moon.  To get close enough she goes out on a tall branch and has her friend White Bunny lean out over a reflection on the pond.  These don't work, of course, so she asks another friend, Hedgehog how he thinks she can reach the Moon.

His suggestion of seeking advice from Owl, has her approaching his old oak tree in the darker parts of the forest.  He tells her the Moon is much too far away...

"...but if you want, she will bend down to listen to you."

Now Red Knit Cap Girl must do something to get the Moon's attention.  She gathers her friends Bear, Squirrel, Hedgehog, White Bunny and two little white birds, to plan a festive welcome for the Moon that evening.  Each has suggestions and offers of help.

Perhaps small glows of light will let the Moon know Red Knit Cap Girl is waiting for her.  Paper lanterns are made and hung; the merrymaking begins but is greeted only with silence.  In fact, the Moon seems to be absent from the night sky this evening.  Owl and Nature herself provide the answer to making a big dream come true.


Simple delightful sentences surround readers with warmth taking them into the story of Red Knit Cap Girl and her forest friends.  A mixture of narration and conversation tell the tale.  A gentle childlike cadence, perfected by Naoko Stoop using the structure of threes, summons readers to continue.  Here is a single passage.

"The Moon might like decorations," says Hedgehog.
"I can hang them because I am tall," says Bear.
"I can help because I am nimble," says Squirrel.


Readers immediately notice the unique background on the jacket and cover of this title.  Naoko Stoop uses acrylic, ink and pencil on plywood to render her illustrations. If you open the jacket two separate illustrations, the front highlighting Red Knit Cap Girl and White Bunny in a circle of light, the back with the two friends sitting on a branch looking at a large moon, are designed in pleasing symmetry.  The cover, different, has a much stronger wood background depicting each of the characters at play.

Blue shaded, swirled marble-like endpapers, are dotted with varying round white spots...moonbeams?  The pictures move from double page spreads, edge to edge, to single edge to edge pages and to other single pages with large plywood background frames, elements slipping past the edges to depict movement. Colored hues of the backdrop suggest times of day surrounding the delicate-featured characters.  Stoop shows the passage of time with the ever-increasing size of the Moon's shape.  One of my favorite illustrations is a single page.  Red Knit Cap Girl is seated on a branch with Bear, Hedgehog, White Bunny, Squirrel and the two birds, with a single lantern hanging below, glowing, as they long hopefully for the Moon.


I couldn't have been happier to realize this month brought the release of another title by Naoko Stoop, Red Knit Cap Girl To The Rescue (Megan Tingley Books, an imprint of Little, Brown and Company).  If your view of life is optimistic, chances are you will seize opportunities when others might not.  You will see no danger to yourself in assisting another in trouble.

It's a windy day in the forest.  Red Knit Cap Girl and her friends are playing together. 

As Bear, Hedgehog, Squirrel and White Bunny fashion telescopes, hats and kites from paper, Red Knit Cap Girl spies something clearly in distress out on the open water.  A small polar bear cub is floating on a chunk of ice, having strayed from its home and mother.  Without giving it a second thought, Red Cap Girl makes a large paper airplane glider which she and White Bunny use to bring the wayward stranger to shore.

When the Moon rises in the evening, Red Knit Cap Girl chats with her about finding Polar Bear Cub's family.  As the new day begins, it finds her and her friends busily building a boat to sail across the ocean.  Following the Moon's light, hanging on tight during a turbulent storm and under the guidance of a pair of Orcas, the trio, Red Knit Cap Girl, White Bunny and Polar Bear Cub, journey to the cold north.

New wonders flicker in colored hues across a night sky.  A shoreline stops the boat's passage as all gaze at a world filled with ice and snow.  Is this where Polar Bear Cub will find his family?


It is the innocence, kindness and wondering of Red Knit Cap Girl which shines through in her dialogue with her friends in this story.  The response by them to the goodness she embodies is seen in the narrative.  The bond between readers and this book is strengthened by having each of the characters, the Moon, Owl, Hedgehog, Squirrel, Bear and White Bunny (plus the two little white birds) from the previous title reappear.  Here is an example.

They sail north in search of Polar Bear Cub's home.
"I hope it's not too far away..." says Red Knit Cap Girl.
"Follow the light of the Moon," calls Owl.


On the front and back jacket there is a balanced lightness; the blue sky over the pale shades of golden tan (the plywood) is reversed on the back as Polar Bear floats forlornly in the sea.  It's interesting to note the letters in the title are breezing along with Red Knit Cap Girl and White Bunny as they fly to the rescue.  All the characters are enjoying their paper toys on the cover as leaves float by them.  A variegated mixture of greens with tiny white dots above, color the opening and closing endpapers.

The attractive blend in illustrative sizes seen in the first book is repeated in this title with blues, greens and golds being the more predominant colors. When Red Knit Cap Girl first sees Polar Bear Cub, it is through the circle of her paper telescope.  That same size circle is used to frame several more single page pictures rather than the wide plywood frames used in the previous title.  One of my favorite illustrations is the two pages depicting the storm at sea; stylized pointed waves reaching toward jagged lightning bolts as White Bunny, Polar Bear Cub and Red Knit Cap Girl hold on tight squeezing their eyes closed.  Stoop even gives Polar Bear Cub a paper rain poncho to wear.


Red Knit Cap Girl and Red Knit Cap Girl To The Rescue written and illustrated by Naoko Stoop will not only endear readers to the main character and her friends, but will make us all strive to view the world, appreciate life, through her eyes.  Readers of all ages will find these books completely charming.  I thank Naoko Stoop for bringing these books into the children's literature world.

To learn more about Naoko Stoop and her artwork please visit her website by following the link embedded in her name.  She was featured at Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast.  Red Knit Cap Girl was on The New York Times Best Illustrated Books last year.  I was personally thrilled to discover Naoko Stoop's Etsy shop. For an additional interview with Naoko Stoop about Red Knit Cap Girl To The Rescue at Carter Higgins's blog, Design of the Picture Book, follow this link.