Defying The Forces Of Nature

Whether the court is inside or outside, it is there.  It does not matter if you are a member of the team or of the spectators, you sense it.  It is always there regardless of the level of the game, high school, college or professional.  It's there during a three-on-three tournament in a capital city.  When you and the people in your neighborhood play it at the park or in someone's yard, it is there.  You can't hear it, but you feel it.  It silently swirls around the sounds of hands slapping on balls and balls bouncing on hard surfaces.  

It is excitement and anticipation and the possibility of witnessing something unexpected.  This is the game of basketball.  The Legend of Gravity: A Tall Basketball Tale (Farrar Straus Giroux, January 4, 2022) written and illustrated by Charly Palmer elevates the excitement, anticipation and possibility to the height of legend.  You not only want to believe it is true, you believe it to be true.

I've heard you young folks talking about who is the best ballplayer

to ever grace the court.  Like that"King James" someone or

other.  He's not too shabby.

                                      But have you ever heard of Gravity?

An initially unnamed narrator goes on to explain that Gravity is a phenomenal player not the force that keeps everything anchored to earth.  As the story goes, one day toward the end of June, when some players, Liquid, Sky High, and Left 2 Right, were on the local outside court, a new kid strolled up to the group.  He wanted to join them in a three-on-three.

When Liquid threw him the ball, a tad cranky at being stopped in his current discourse, the boy caught it like the superb pass it was not.  The new guy's moves on the court with that ball had the other players standing stone still and quieter than quiet.  When Liquid asked this new player his street name, he said he did not have one.  The narrator gave him the name of Gravity.  And just like that, he was now a member of the playground team, Eagles.

Word spread of his incredible playing abilities.  He once racked up 150 points . . . in the first quarter.  The Eagles through Gravity felt like champions.  They traveled by foot, bike, and bus to other blacktop courts to beat other teams.  Yes, this was a summer to remember!

As the summer came to a close, the "Best of the Best" pickup tournament was to be held in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  For the first time, the Eagles believed they could win.  Their strategy was simple, at all costs get the ball to Gravity.  By Sunday, their hopes were soaring.  The East Side Flyers made it to Sunday, too.  Their players were the stuff of history in the game.

By the time the half of the championship game arrived, the score between the Eagles and the East Side Flyers was tied.  The Eagles's strategy was not working.  Gravity was barely standing.  Not much of a talker, Gravity spoke to his team saying words they would remember for the rest of their lives.  Words which have echoed for decades.  The Eagles were a changed team and that made all the difference.  

You cannot read the words penned by Charly Palmer without feeling a surge of hope.  You know with every phrase, he is building toward the spectacular.  His narrator speaks with the veracity only a firsthand observer could.  This narrator also knows basketball, relating courtside moments like a play-by-play sports commentator.  The decription of the street names of the players on both of the championship teams and what they represent are marvelous.  Here are two passages.

We had always been good, but we had never won a 

championship.  We thought Gravity would be our missing

link.  Truth be told, he was often a one-man show.  Gravity

once jumped so high that we were able to go out for ice

cream before he came down.

EAST SIDE FLYERS

SPIDER

Yusef "Spider"

Woodruff had

hands so quick,

you'd swear he

had eight of them.

When you open the matching dust jacket and book case, you see on the front, right side, a portrait of the young man who defied the norm.  His shy confident smile gives us a hint of his on and off court demeanor.  The planets and stars above him are a testament to his capabilities.  The same deep blue mix of colors on the front travels over the spine to the left, the back of the jacket and case.  Here three sentences from the text invite readers to learn about Gravity.  Between the text is a drawing within the circle of a basketball.  It features the hands of the players in solidarity before a tip-off.

The opening and closing endpapers are in basketball orange.  On the title page, a basketball is at rest on an outside court.  The verso and first page are a bird's eye view of the city of Milwaukee.  The subsequent images are a blend of full-page and double-page pictures.  Sometimes a series of smaller visuals are included on a single page to show a succession of quick moments on the court.  Other times double pages are divided into panels.

The bold, bright colors selected by Charly Palmer work beautifully with the bold strokes of his brush.  His paintings reflect shadows and light drawing our attention to the characters, especially to Gravity.  Charly Palmer might add explanatory words with his images to further define the text.

We are given intimate views of the art of basketball playing.  In one illustration, the foreground shows us tennis shoes and the lower half of Gravity's legs with silhouettes of other players in the background.  In another image we stand back a bit to watch players meeting during a game and devising a plan of play.

One of my many favorite illustrations is a double-page picture.  On the left, five members of the Eagles have collected on the court, holding ice cream cones.  They are looking up at Gravity.  His body is far above them, legs spread in a jump.  One hand is posed for balance.  The other hand holds the basketball.  Some celestial bodies are near Gravity.  To the right of the players and across the gutter is the darkness of space and colorful planets.  Gravity has indeed eluded gravity.

In his debut as both author and illustrator, Charly Palmer with The Legend of Gravity: A Tall Basketball Tale showcases a game many people love to play and watch.  His words and artwork capture the true spirit of this sport, especially as it is played in outside parks and playgrounds.  In an author's note at the end, Charly Palmer speaks about streetball legends and this book being a dedication to them.  This title will resonate with most readers of all ages.  It is read-aloud gold.  I highly recommend you have a copy on your personal and professional bookshelves.

To learn more about Charly Palmer and his other work, please follow the link attached to his name to access his website.  Charly Palmer has accounts on Facebook and Instagram.  At the publisher's website you can view interior images.

Deep In the Hearts of Texans

When his footprints filled up with water the Great Lakes formed.  It was next to nothing for him to lasso a tornado.  She liked to ride the Mississippi on the back of an alligator.  Folks say her holler could be heard from one end of the river to the other.  Paul Bunyan, Pecos Bill and Sal Fink, the daughter of none other than Mike Fink, the keelboat man, are personalities who populate American tall tales.

We enjoy their exaggerated character traits and accomplishments whether they are from the minds of storytellers or people from the pages of history.  With such titles as Swamp Angel (Dutton, 1994, Paul O. Zelinsky, illustrator, Caldecott Honor book), and Dust Devil (Schwartz & Wade Books, 2010, Paul O. Zelinksy, illustrator) to her credit, Anne Isaacs has penned another book, Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch (Schwartz & Wade Books) brimming with larger than life characters.  With illustrations by Kevin Hawkes (Library Lion by Michelle Knudsen, Westlandia by Paul Fleischman) readers can step into a Texas circa 1870.  Of course, this won't be like anything they've ever previously read about this mighty state.

On the Fourth of July 1870, the widow Tulip Jones of Greater Bore, England, inherited thirty-five million dollars and a ranch at By-Golly Gully, Texas.  She moved there at once.

Tulip Jones did not come alone.  Accompanying her were three trusted female servants, Linsey, Woolsey and Calico, and twelve tortoises named for the months of the year.  They must have made quite a sight on the ship sailing across the Atlantic and eventually arriving in Texas.

Despite it being one of the hottest summers on record, the four women got to work planting a garden.  If you think the vegetables from the garden were normal, think again.  The rind from one of their watermelons was big enough to use as a hay shed.  I'll give you one guess as to what happened to those tiny tortoises.

The quiet and calm enjoyed as they settled in was rudely interrupted when word spread of the widow's wealth.  It seemed every man in Texas was single and wanted to marry Tulip Jones.  Can you imagine having one thousand men show up at tea time every day?  The first order of business was to hire a proper baker.  Charlie Doughpuncher became a member of the ranch team.

During the day the widow turned as many suitors away as politely possible.  In her kitchen each evening Charlie would listen to her complaints while offering up his fresh baked goods.  After several days, at her wits' end, Tulip came up with a plan.

Her faithful ranch hands, Linsey, Woolsey and Calico, weren't willing to put all their "tea leaves in one cup" coming up with another secret idea all their own.  Three challenges later the two courses of action collided in an unparalleled feat of sewing ingenuity.  As night fell Tulip Jones found herself the sole occupant of By-Golly Ranch.  This hardly seemed a fitting end to this tale. ....And it was not.


Oh, how I enjoy the tall tales of Anne Isaacs.  She has a way with words whipping up the most outlandish events but making readers believe they happened exactly as she describes them.  Only in her mind could tortoises not only become huge but the bigger they grow the faster they run.  In her stories, the Rio Grande flows backward and cake batter is stirred by paddling in a canoe.  Tulip Jones' nightly conversations with Charlie are hilarious, loaded with her insightful observations.  The characters' names match the place and time and are guaranteed to produce grins galore.  Here is a sample passage.


"That Tumbleweed Thompson is so clumsy he couldn't hit the ground with his lasso," she told Charlie one night.  "And Big Toe Anderson has nothing on his mind but his hat!"
"Try this," Charlie said comfortingly, and he offered her a blueberry scone fresh out of the oven.


Even a casual glance at the matching dust jacket and book case illustrated by Kevin Hawkes, will have you going back for further scrutiny.  It's not every day you see giant tortoises ridden like horses traveling through a cactus covered desert.  On the back framed in a tied lasso are two of the more misguided suitors, downright varmints, with conniving, leering smiles on their faces.   The opening endpapers feature an arid landscape with a stagecoach speeding from one side to the other.  On a post hangs a sign warning readers about exaggeration and the laws of Texas.  A wily vulture sporting a cowboy hat points a claw toward the notice.  The closing endpapers show the hilly ranch lands occupied by the twelve grazing tortoises and a lonely hare watching.

Hawkes uses the title page and verso to start the story visually prior to the narrative beginning, showing Tulip Jones and her trio of friendly servants getting the news of her inheritance.  Every page is teeming with humorous details; the solicitor irked by the bird on his hat, an armadillo and chicken using parasols to keep off the hot Texas sun, an owl has made a hole in one of the suitor's hat's as a home and a rattler has wound around Sheriff Arroyo's hat wearing a smaller version of the same hat.  The Open acrylic and Prismacolor pencil illustrations throughout vary in size and presentation.  They may cover two pages or a portion of one.  Rope is used as a framing and dividing element to good effect.

The line of rather grubby-looking suitors sitting astride all sorts of four-legged transportation is one of my many favorite illustrations.  The details have me laughing every time I look at this picture.  Who could resist a tobacco-spitting guy holding a cactus in a pot rimmed in hearts or a farmer with barbed wire wrapped around his hat holding a dead squirrel?


If reading Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch written by Anne Isaacs with illustrations by Kevin Hawkes, doesn't have you longing for time in Texas, I don't know what will.  This is one rooting, tooting rip-roaring ride of a story as big as the Lone Star state.  It has my highest recommendation as a read aloud treat.

Make sure to follow the links embedded in Anne Isaacs' and Kevin Hawkes' names to access their websites.  Follow this link to the publisher's website to take a peek at more pages from the book.  For more artwork by Kevin Hawkes and a Q & A with author Anne Isaacs, head over to Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast hosted by Julies Danielson.

It's A Whopper!

On many a summer or fall morning in those wee hours before dawn I can vividly remember hearing my Dad's whispered, "Margie, do you still want to go fishing? It's time to get up."  Some days it was harder than others to rouse myself, but I never missed a chance to be out on the lake with Dad.  In my tenth year one such trip will never be forgotten.

It has to do with trolling, letting out too much line, a huge small-mouth bass and a boatload of patience on my Dad's part.  What Dad was able to do with that fish is...well another story altogether.  When I was finely able to read David Shannon's newest title, Jangles: a BIG fish story (The Blue Sky Press, October 2012), I was transported back in time to a day laden with wonderful memories and laughter.


When the sun goes down and the weather's just right, Big Lake gets smooth as glass and a thin mist whispers across it.

It's when the lake's surface is just so, one might catch a glimpse of its famous resident, an elusive trout named Jangles.  As a boy sits in front of the stone fireplace in their cabin a tale unfolds, told by his fisherman father who has just taken out his tackle box.  Heard before, it's when the father was a boy but on this night the tallness of the story defies belief...or does it?

Jangles is a trout of gigantic proportions. You can always hear him coming; having escaped being caught so many times lures of all shapes and sizes hung along his massive jaws.  He has an appetite to match his size snatching unsuspecting eagles from their roosts and the careless beaver who got too close.  He is not without heart though, rescuing a baby from drowning.  What a fish!

Trying to snag Jangles using whole turkeys for bait or dynamite never works out well.  Unaware his boat has drifted to the center of the lake, one evening the boy's father felt something on the end of his line.  It is another fishing rod.

As he is reeling in the line on that rod, he could see a lure rippling through the water as it neared the boat. What he sees next frightened him---a large dark shadow and the unmistakable sound of lures jangling.  He hardly dared to breath.

In a blink of an eye Jangles has taken that bait, pulled the boy over the side of the boat and down into the watery depths.  The impossible happens, stories as old as time are told, and a boy rides back to his boat.  A mistake is nearly made before right reigns with a twist, a twist that is storytelling perfection.


David Shannon writes with the flair in the grand tradition of storytellers of old; spinning a yarn so unbelievable you find yourself wondering if it might not be true.  Hooking readers with the first sentence, painting in our minds the two, father and son, seated before the fireplace and the words "once upon a time", though unspoken, are understood.  Humor, simile, alliteration and descriptive details add to this whale of a tale.  Jangles becomes a character every reader wants to met.


When given the perspective upon viewing of the massive fish spread across the two pages of the dust jacket and book case, there is little doubt in the reader's mind as to the enormity of this story.  Using lures to create the letters for Jangles plus the trout pictured on the boy's ball cap on the title page add to the overall "fishiness" of what lies ahead for readers.  For this story Shannon chooses to use oils rather than acrylics on all his two-page spreads throughout the book.

This use of oils coupled with his color palette lend a special level of emotion to his telling.  The details in the surroundings, clothing, style of the boats and fishing lures, not to mention the characters' facial expressions, gives the story a sense of history, an air of mystery and humor.  By continually shifting from close-up to panoramic or looking down upon a specific scene, readers feel as though they can at any time, if they so choose, step right into the pages.  Two of my favorite visuals are a close-up of the boy hooking the fishing rod, bringing it out of the water and gazing at it in amazement and the other is of Jangles' huge tail taking up most of the two pages, a full moon lighting the sky as the boy stands waving in his boat.


Jangles: a BIG fish story written and illustrated by David Shannon is one catch you won't want to let get away.  It's a keeper through and through.  As a terrific group read aloud or a tale to be loved by two, this book is better than best, ahead of the rest.  If you can locate a copy of Steamboat Annie & the Thousand Pound Catfish by Catherine Wright with illustrations by Howard Fine, it would pair nicely with this book.  I'd be willing to bet the fish and fishing books will fly off the shelves after readers hear this story.  As for me, I'm dreaming of being ten again.


This is a link to an interview with David Shannon about Jangles.  This is a link to the book trailer for Jangles.  If you are considering an author study of David Shannon here is a listing of his books with a short biography.  A series of interviews by David Shannon can be viewed by following this link.