Water Is . . .

The wind has been gusting between twenty and thirty miles per hour for more than twenty-four hours.  People in our area have been warned to stay out of the water due to high waves and strong currents.  Despite the wind chill currently at below fifty degrees, surf boards can be seen in vehicles at the park along Michigan Beach.  Lake Michigan, at the tip of the Mitt, has been wild and beautiful today. (September 22, 2022)

There is something soothing about the proximity of a large body of water, calm or wild.  It is essential to life on our planet, especially to those creatures living within or around that large body of water.  In their sixth book, author Kate Messner and artist Christopher Silas Neal give us the lovely Over and Under the Waves (Chronicle Books, September 13, 2022).  For those who have rarely traversed or never been in water larger than one of the Great Lakes or inland lakes in the United States, this book takes us on a memorable exploration.

Over the waves we paddle, away from

the beach to the water's deep blue.

Two red kayaks glide. In one is a mother and child.  In the other is the father.  They first encounter a group of sea lions basking on a cluster of rocks.  One leaves and dives into the water.

When the child questions where the sea lion goes, their mother speaks of the world beneath their kayaks and the plants and animals living there.  As they continue to paddle, under them different fish of different sizes and colors swim.  In the sky, pelicans search over the kayaks.  

As their kayaks slide into a

forest of kelp

the child holds tight to some to stay in place.  Their mother notes sea otters do the same thing.  A female otter floats, with her child, on top of the water and another swims through the kelp in search of food.

Slicing through the water, the family notices sea birds above them looking for their next meal as a leopard shark does the same below them.  In the distance, whales have surfaced.  Can they move closer to the whales?  Will they surface again?

Homeward bound the kayaks move.  They cannot see the giant octopus under them, but they do see the abundant life in the small tide pools and along the sand. Now home and near sleep, the child can still hear the sea.  It moves and lulls life under the waves in a timeless melody.

Author Kate Messner has the adept ability to bring the magic she encounters in her adventures to the printed page for us.  Her word choices are highly descriptive, fashioning a portrait of the place.  She includes a bit of dialogue and sound effects to heighten our participation.  Throughout the book, she names specific plant and animal life and their habits. Here is a passage.

The bay has gone quiet.  We wait,

rising and falling on the swells.

     Under the waves, pale moon jellies

     float and sea nettles drift, swinging

     with the slow current.

"We should head back," Mom says, but then . . .

As you look at the stunning image spanning left to right, back to front, on the matching and open dust jacket and book case, you are truly over and under the waves.  The illustration crosses the spine flawlessly.  To the left of the spine and above the kelp forest, a school of tiny fish moves from the left edge to the spine.  The bay water rises to nearly the top of the left side.  On the front, the position of the pelican and other shore birds is impeccable. Look at the comparison of the kayaks with the whale!  Wow!

The opening and closing endpapers are a brilliant blue.  It is the kind of blue when the sky is crystal clear and reflected in the water.  There is a pattern of starfish, scallop shells, and fish with air bubbles in white on that blue canvas.   

Artist Christopher Silas Neal begins his pictorial interpretation on the verso and title pages.  Here we see a panoramic view of the cottage where the family is staying.  It is at the top of a grassy hill with a triple staircase leading down to the beach and the red kayaks.  In front of this is the bay and along the bottom of the pages, we see beneath the water.

Each of the double-page pictures and single-page pictures

rendered in mixed media

involve us deeply in the family's excursion.  We are treated to breathtaking seascape views.  Sometimes we are close to the family as they are noticing the world around them.  We see vast scenes under the water and sometimes we move close to the residents there.  At times we are looking down on the kayakers as if we are one of the sea birds.  Often we are able to see over and under the waves at the same time.  Careful readers will notice the sky changing as the day comes to a close and dusk descends.

One of my many favorite images is a single-page picture.  We are looking down on a pelican in flight that fills a large portion of the page.  Beneath the bird are two other pelicans, much smaller and much lower to the water.  On the water are the two red kayaks; the family holding their paddles at rest.  Pelicans in flight invite our attention; silent sentinels that they are.

For those who have never visited the sea or an ocean or who have and wish they could be there again, this book, Over and Under the Waves written by Kate Messner with art by Christopher Silas Neal, is the ideal title.  At the close of the book is an Author's Note.  This is followed by several pages of information about the individual twenty-two flora and fauna mentioned in the text.  There is also a page dedicated to a list of books and websites for further information about Monterey Bay and what you might find over and under the waves.  This book is a stellar addition to a fabulous series.  You will want a copy in both your personal and professional collections.

To learn more about Kate Messner and Christopher Silas Neal and their other work, please visit their websites by following the link attached to their names.  There are interior images from this book at Christopher Silas Neal's website.  Kate Messner has accounts on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.  Christopher Silas Neal has accounts on Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Tumblr, and Twitter.

Water Wonders

Early Monday a sound was echoing over the fields and gravel pathway.  As a puppy Mulan was hearing it for the first time.  For me it was the sound of a new season coming once again.  The spring peepers were back.

Throughout the park are wetlands and ponds with the Grand River running along one of the boundaries.  Canadian geese use the river has a highway and a new mallard and hen have taken up residence in a pond.  Cardinals, blue jays, robins, pileated and downy woodpeckers, chickadees, and crows are frequent flyers throughout the area.  Deer, seven in number, keep their distance but stop and stare. A haunting cry draws our attention.  Looking upward we see two herons in flight.  Later a hawk circles looking for supper.

Water is essential to all life.  An abundance of life surrounds it and lives in it, even in a park close to a bustling suburban community of 24,000.  Over and Under the Pond (Chronicle Books, March 7, 2017) written by Kate Messner with art by Christopher Silas Neal is the third book in their collaborative series.  It invites us to journey into this marvelous domain.  (Over and Under the Snow and Up in the Garden and Down in the Dirt are the first two titles.)

Over the pond we slide, splashing through lily pads, sweeping through reeds.

A mother and her son come to a stop on a pond.  He asks her what is below them. She replies:

"Under the pond is a whole hidden world of minnows and crayfish, turtles and bullfrogs.  ..."

Like the peaceful exhaling and inhaling of a living being as they move over the pond, we are privy to what they see on the surface and what moves beneath them.  Mother and son notice beetles scooting on the water as minnows do the same under their boat.  Of course the minnows need to be wary.  Hungry trout are ready to gobble them up.

Some creatures can sun themselves on a log and dive into the pond.  What are they?  Materials above and below the surface form homes for birds and larva.  Food is found around and in the pond by land and water dwellers; a moose munches and a beaver grabs.

New life above the pond is ready to take flight leaving the comfort of a nest.  Along the bottom of the pond tails turn into leaping limbs.  As the hours pass a bright sun is drifting downward, painting the sky with peaches and pinks.  Smooth, slow strokes with a paddle move a boat toward home and a restful evening as darkness dictates a new cadence for life in the watery world.


When you grow up and live in Michigan with parents and friends who enjoy the out-of-doors, you are likely to spend a great deal of time near or on the water.  After more hours than can be counted in a canoe, you are remarkably aware of the sensory perceptions experienced on the water.  Kate Messner depicts this with such clarity she transports you to the boat with the boy and his mother.

Her choice of words, splashing, sweeping, skim, loop, twirl, dart, rustle and shush, create scenes like the brush of a painter.  She easily moves us from the above to the below varying the length of the discussion to create a pace like a boat gliding over the water.  Sometimes one sentence for over the pond will be immediately followed by a sentence for under the pond.  Other times she will expand to two sentences followed by two sentences.  Then she will completely change it to multiple sentences followed by a single sentence.  Like life over and under the pond she shifts the cadence.  Here is a sample passage.

Over the pond, we lift and dip and pull past a row of painted turtles on a waterlogged tree.
        One-two-three-
they slip off and away-
splash-gurgle-sploosh!-under the pond.


When you first look at the opened, matching dust jacket and book case for this title you are soothed by the scene you see.  You can easily imagine holding your breath and swimming along the bottom of the pond over the sand and pebbles and through the grasses and reeds.  In your mind's eye the boat grows, but not too much, so you can carefully but still cozily, join the mother and son.  I don't know about you but I can feel the whisper of a breeze, hear the call of birds and gentle splashes as animals move over and under the pond.

Christopher Silas Neal's color palette of cool and calm hues, subdued but natural, are a perfect selection for this narrative.  On the opening and closing endpapers he has created a pattern of rows of silvery minnows.  The verso and title pages are a close-up of lilies and lily pads, a dragonfly and frog.

Nearly all of the images, rendered in mixed-media span two pages.  Neal repeatedly alters his perspective, giving us a panoramic view or zooms in.  We may see the world as passengers in a boat or as a turtle looking up at the boat from underneath the water.  Careful readers will observe the passage of time portrayed by the shades of the sky before the text draws our attention to the day's end.

One of my many favorite pictures is near the beginning of the book.  It's a close-up of the boy and his mother in the boat.  Their backs are to us as they look over the side of the boat.  Reeds and lily pads frame the water on the left and right.  You can see the shadow of a fish swimming.  The reflections of the people shimmer in front of them.  There is something extremely natural and personal about this moment in time.  It's about connections; mother to son, people to nature and us to both the people and nature.


If you want to feel the calm of spending a day on a pond, gliding over the water leisurely in a boat, quietly watching the animals and realizing how linked we are to one another, Over and Under the Pond written by Kate Messner with pictures by Christopher Silas Neal is a book for you.  It's a tribute to an ecosystem and a call to honor and protect it.  At the close of the book Kate Messner includes an author's note and small paragraphs about eighteen animals.  She supplies us with further reading choices and websites.

To learn more about Kate Messner and Christopher Silas Neal and their other work please follow the links attached to their names to access their websites.  Christopher Silas Neal maintains a Tumblr account. Kate Messner has created a Pinterest board for this book.

UPDATE:  There is an author and an illustrator interview about this book at Elizabeth Dulemba's website, March 23, 2017.

Outside And Up Close To Mother Earth

For several months now they've been arriving in my mail; tantalizing in their promise of spring.  Filled with full color photographs of fruits, vegetables, flowers, shrubs and trees, they offer a sharp contrast to bare branches and ground covered with snow.  Turning page after page in each of these catalogs marks the arrival of the awakening. The pause is nearly over.

Keepers of gardens are already looking for buds on bushes and shoots poking through ground thawing in the warmer temperatures and sunny days.  Added voices are joining the daily birdsong chorus.  Up in the Garden and Down in the Dirt (Chronicle Books, March 3, 2015) written by Kate Messner with illustrations by Christopher Silas Neal, a companion to their Over and Under the Snow, explores our natural world in the realm of a garden for three seasons of the year.

Up in the garden, I stand and plan---
my hands full of seeds and my head full of dreams.

A girl and her grandmother kneel in the dirt. When Nana says they need for the underneath to become drier and warmer, her granddaughter is curious about things below the surface.  In all shapes and sizes

earthworms and insects

are scurrying around sifting and shifting through the soil.

While unseen workers go about their business, the gardeners clear away the remnants of a previous year, reusing every dried piece and adding nutrients.  Little critters stir in their residences.  Soon the dirt is ready; seeds are planted, and watered.  Beneath their carefully tended rows, a special bug waits.

As summer replaces spring tiny bits of green poke through the top, growing bigger and bigger.  Above insects fly about completing their tasks as below others keep cool and busy.  A sudden shower thanks to a mischievous Nana cools down the girl and quenches thirsty roots.

In the garden, from the garden and below the garden all find an abundance of food.  Even when most of the world sleeps, another eats.  Sometimes an unexpected visitor strikes taking a treat.

As the months pass the air and breezes cool.  Colors change in the garden.  Early sunshine illuminates the work of an artist using frost as a medium.

It's time for the gardening duo to work gathering all the goodness grown.  It's time for

earthworms and insects 

to scuttle, squirm, burrow and slumber.  It's time for thoughts to be filled with another garden in another spring.


With her marvelous command of language Kate Messner leads us from the inside of winter to the outside of spring.  She wraps us in each of the seasons with her vivid descriptions.  Through a blend of conversation between the grandmother and granddaughter, the voice of the girl and an unseen narrator we move gracefully from the work in the garden and the joy shared by two, at play and rest, to the world of animals above and beneath the dirt.  It's as if Messner has captured the rhythm of the natural world and placed it on the pages of this book.  Here are two sample selections.

Spring sun shines down to melt the sleepy snow.
Wind whistles through last year's plants, and mud
sucks at my rain boots.

Down in the dirt earthworms tunnel deep.
I'm jealous of their cook, damp, dark.


Upon opening the dust jacket you can see Christopher Silas Neal's piece of art spanning flap edge to flap edge.  The view of the top layer, up and down, on the front expands to show a raised garden box with the tops of vegetables, the roots beneath and the tiny creatures around them.  The book case is an identical image.  On the opening endpapers vegetables and herbs along with a garden trowel are outlined in a pattern.  Flowers along with a watering can and clippers are highlighted on the closing endpapers.  In both sets the images are labeled as if handwritten. The verso and title page feature a close-up of the trowel stuck in the dirt.

All of the illustrations rendered in mixed media extend across two pages with the exception of eight single pages.  Not only do they enhance the narrative but beautifully depict the changing seasons.  A realistic but softened color palette allows you to join the gardeners in their activities.  Neal may take us close to a particular portion of the garden then give us a larger encompassing view.  He has a knack for knowing exactly when to do this.  We become the rabbit, the earthworms, the robin, the granddaughter and Nana.  His attention to details in the portrayal of all the creatures is exceptional.

I really have many favorite illustrations.  The single page with the dusky background, the girl standing, scarf blowing in the wind, arms wrapped around her as milkweed seeds fly from the pods is gorgeous in its limited color selections.  Another peaceful representation is of Nana and her granddaughter reading in the garden.  Their backs are to us, the book page showing s is for sunflower.  The two are seated on the ground among the sunflowers, several tied together to make a house.  Orange pumpkins are growing in the foreground.  Leaves float on a gentle breeze.  You want to join them.


Up in the Garden and Down in the Dirt written by Kate Messner with illustrations by Christopher Silas Neal is a lovely tribute to the beauty we can add to the natural world.  Two artists, one with words and the other using mixed media, have combined their talents to create a garden you can carry with you everywhere.  All you have to do is open the pages.  This book speaks to the companionship of generations, gardening, the seasons and being aware of the creatures living on and beneath the dirt.


Please visit Kate Messner's and Christopher Silas Neal's websites by following the links attached to their names.  InkyGoodness conducted an interview of Christopher Silas Neal, Interview: Chris Silas Neal. One of the illustrations from this title is pictured there.  This book is one of three featured at author Julie Danielson's blog, Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast.  Here is a link to a drawing based upon this book at Christopher Silas Neal's Tumblr.  Here is a post Christopher Silas Neal did for the Chronicle Books Blog, Down In The Dirt.  Kate Messner is a guest on teacher librarian Matthew C. Winner's Let's Get Busy Podcast.  



Please be sure to visit Kid Lit Frenzy hosted by educator Alyson Beecher to discover other titles listed by bloggers participating in the 2015 Nonfiction Picture Book Challenge.

Dusk And Dreams

As if on some internal clock, a stiff breeze blowing throughout the day will calm as dusk descends.  Squawking blue jays, save further chiding for tomorrow.  Bright blooms fold their petals until the sun welcomes with warming rays in the morning.

A busy pace is slowing. In Go To Sleep, Little Farm (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, September 2, 2014) written by Mary Lyn Ray with art by Christopher Silas Neal readers are gently lead about the farm, surrounding fields, and nearby woods as night falls.  Inside the house a little girl mirrors the animals and their activities as she and her family welcome bedtime.

Somewhere a bee
makes a bed in a rose,
because the bee knows day has
come to a close.

A beaver builds a bed of branches, a bear snuggles inside a log and mice burrow to hide from a hungry owl. Kits heed the call of a mother fox.  Horses, cows and a single rooster come to rest.  A peaceful pastoral scene is unfolding.

A clear sky supplies a canvas for twinkling stars.  Rabbits run for home.  Deer come out of hiding to eat their meals.

Having finished for the day a farmer father turns out lights, heading to tuck in his daughter.  A book is opened. A story is shared.  A mother bends to whisper words as a daughter drifts into dreams.  Outside the world heads further into slumber.


Simple lilting words by Mary Lynn Ray lead readers into the soothing softness of the dark.  Her rhymes pave a path for us to follow from creature to creature.  Through a selective use of language she shapes a lullaby balancing between the inside and outside worlds.  Here is another example.

Somewhere a worm sleeps in the dirt.
Somewhere a pocket sleeps in a skirt.


It's impossible not to feel a sense of calm when looking at the illustration spanning the dust jacket and cover.  Christopher Silas Neal's color palette, here and throughout the book, reflects the fading light of sunset to the shadows of twilight and the deep hues of night.  The rusty barn red, shades of blue, gray and black, green and pale yellow, cream, brown and white mingle on a matte-finished paper to convey emotion and mood.

Neal alters the size of his illustrations to heighten the meaning of the text; taking readers close to an item, moving back to give a greater perspective or showing a cut-away underground, underwater or inside (the log) to bring us into the story.  It's interesting how he interprets the text by showing a comparison of the animals engaged in getting ready for bed on the left with the young girl doing something similar on the right; the beaver building a pile with sticks as she builds a pile of toys on her bed.  Careful readers will note the passage of time through not only the change in background colors but in the time conveyed on the bedside clock.  Neal meticulously places series of the letter z adding to the tranquility.

His two-page picture of the brown rabbits clustered together in sleep with a seventh hopping to join the group is one of my favorite illustrations.  They are gathered in a flower-dotted clearing surrounded by bushes and trees.  The barn, farmhouse, fencing and a single horse are featured on a rise in the distance.  This is the accompanying rhyme.

Already, trees sleep the way that trees sleep.
Brown rabbits snuggle in a sleepy heap.


To settle a group, to close a day of classroom work or send your children off to bed, Go to Sleep, Little Farm written by Mary Lyn Ray with art by Christopher Silas Neal is a stellar selection.  I guarantee everyone, readers and listeners alike, will feel the calming comfort of the combined text and pictures.  So get comfy, snuggle with your friends and family and read this book.  It's sure to become a often-requested title.

For more information about Mary Lyn Ray, her life philosophy and her work visit her website by following the link embedded in her name.  At Christopher Silas Neal's website, linked to his name, he includes nine interior illustrations.  Information is also supplied about the process used to create other artwork.

Soothing Slumber

If we trust our instincts, follow a hunch, the results are frequently surprising in the best possible way.  It's almost as if some unseen hand is guiding our way.  Untold treasures await us.

Twenty years ago, Amy Gary, editor of the Margaret Wise Brown Estate, on a whim asked Brown's sister, Roberta Rauch, if she knew of any unpublished works.  Can you imagine hearing an affirmative reply? Stacked in a trunk kept in the attic of the barn on her Vermont farm were pages and pages of poems, stories and musical scores.  Last week some of those gems were released into the world, collected in a title, Goodnight Songs: Illustrated by Twelve Award-Winning Picture Book Artists (Sterling Children's Books, March 4, 2014).  The words of Margaret Wise Brown have been visualized by Jonathan Bean, Carin Berger, Sophie Blackall, Linda Bleck, Renata Liwska, Christopher Silas Neal, Zachariah OHora, Eric Puybaret, Sean Qualls, Isabel Roxas, Melissa Sweet and Dan Yaccarino.

Appealing to the inherent musical nature of children these twelve lyrical poems cast a gossamer net pulsing with a gentle cadence around all who read them.  They encourage dreams of playful fantasy uninterrupted by nothing until the morning dawns.  Any cares of the daytime will float away as evening falls through the text and pictures.  Margaret Wise Brown's simple repetitive phrases float and dance off the pages.

Readers find themselves traveling by balloon in the company of a bear, baboon, monkey, troll and mole.  They are lulled to sleep by a very particular melody or in following the nighttime rituals of a goat, or a rabbit and a bear.  I'll wager most readers are unaware of the man in the moon's youth.

Safety on the seas is found in the arms of another.  They learn of those who see what others do not.  Roads travel vertically through an abandoned town constructed entirely of wood.  One by one a donkey, a monkey, a sheep, a pig, birds, a black cat and a child are asked to close their eyes.

What do you see when you close your eyes?  What do you hear in the night?  What might a mouse ask for in a prayer?  Blissful peace is assured.

Two pages are dedicated to each song; illustrations extending edge to edge on heavy matte finished paper.  While the color of the font may vary the same is used in all the text.  The text is tucked within each picture, noticeable but not a distraction.  Tiny white stars seen on the dust jacket and matching book case pattern the opening and closing endpapers.

Renata Liwska captures the soft slumbering characters of The Noon Balloon nestled in fluffy clouds suspended in a pale blue sky.  Intricate lines, exquisite architectural details and a boat riding the waves beneath a full moon ease a child into dreamland drawn by Sophie Blackall in Mambian Melody.  Goats with teddy bears and stuffed toy rabbits and drinking from large pink tea cups populate mountains and hills where skunks carry lanterns and hedgehogs huddle in Goat on the Mountain visualized by Linda Bleck.

Sleep like a Rabbit illustrated by Isabel Roxas pictures a pig-tailed girl in a red dress sleeping near a bear and a rabbit adrift in a sea of stars.  This is also the jacket and case illustration.  Unique, painted, collage-like clouds and stars float around a mustached man in the moon as his younger self runs across his surface when Sean Qualls pictures When the Man in the Moon Was a Little Boy. As if surrounded in a wispy fog Song to Estyn, illustrated by Eric Puybaret, shows a man in a long golden all-weather coat, captain's hat on his head holding a child in a sailor suit on board a ship.

Melissa Sweet's signature style, of pastel collage with splashes of red, pieces together The Secret Song.  White block-like houses, one on top of the other, are strung together by a ribbon road of red among green tulips on a midnight blue background by Christoper Silas Neal for Wooden Town.  An orange, blue, black and white palette feature creatures looking upon and living in a town as a child gazes out his window in Little Donkey Close Your Eyes portrayed by Zachariah OHora.

Blue and white striped curtains billow around the stage set with green birds, blue clouds and rows of cut-out houses in Carin Berger's interpretation of When I Close My Eyes. Bold, bright orange-yellow, orange, green, purple and shades of dark blue mesh perfectly to create the quiet found in Sounds in the Night pictured by Dan Yaccarino.  It's a windy, winter night, leaves and snow swirling about under a full moon as a child sleeps beneath a large leaf and a mouse stands in the doorway of his cozy home in The Mouse's Prayer depicted by Jonathan Bean.

Stunning pictures lift the words of Margaret Wise Brown toward dreamland in Goodnight Songs: Illustrated by Twelve Award-Winning Picture Book Artists.  As if the text and visuals are not enough to hold readers spellbound, a CD with the words set to music by Tom Proutt and Emily Gary is included.  I have listened to it twice as of this writing.  It is truly lovely.  You could not ask for a better book for closing out your day or bringing a small measure of calm into an afternoon.

Two pages at the book's conclusion include thumbnails of the illustrations along with comments about or by the illustrators.  A note from the musicians and credits are inserted on the closing endpapers.  An introduction by Amy Gary begins this title.

I hope you enjoy these videos.  I was made aware of some of them through tweets by the illustrators.



Goodnight Songs: Chris Neal, contributing illustrator from Sterling Publishing on Vimeo.



Goodnight Songs: Sean Qualls, contributing illustrator from Sterling Publishing on Vimeo.



Goodnight Songs: Sophie Blackall, contributing illustrator from Sterling Publishing on Vimeo.



Goodnight Songs: Carin Berger, contributing illustrator from Sterling Publishing on Vimeo.



Goodnight Songs: Isabel Roxas, contributing illustrator from Sterling Publishing on Vimeo.


Goodnight Songs: DanYacarino, contributing illustrator from Sterling Publishing on Vimeo.



Goodnight Songs: Amy Gary, editor of Goodnight Songs by Margaret Wise Brown from Sterling Publishing on Vimeo.

Numbering The Years

Do you remember playing hide and seek with the neighborhood kids as it started to get dark?  Whether you were "it" or running toward the ultimate hiding spot, the sounds of counting rang out.  Using a well-known, tuneful chant, our group reached one hundred by fives.  When the top number was reached you could hear those familiar words, "Here I come, ready or not."  It was like a rite of passage when you were old enough to play by counting correctly.

The act of counting is such a part of our lives, once accomplished, we are unaware of the actual amount of times it is used during our day.  In an enlightening and uncommon take on numbers, author, Lola M. Schaefer with illustrator, Christopher Silas Neal, has created Lifetime: The Amazing Numbers in Animal Lives (Chronicle Books).  Let's explore their world with a mathematical eye.

In one lifetime,
this spider will spin
1 papery egg sac.

Fragile. Don't touch.

From cover to cover we read about eleven animals, five mammals, one arachnid, one insect, two reptiles, one fish and one bird, eleven fascinating facts, and eleven ways to count those intriguing details. Within these pages we think, look and tally.  We pause and ponder about what we might notice if we stopped to look more carefully.

Each animal's life is not measured in days so much as it is measured in physical changes, cycles and instinctive habits.  An individual caribou gets not one, not two, not even three but ten sets of antlers during their life.  I know that Xena sheds her coat twice a year but an alpaca does so much less.

Whenever I hear a woodpecker I'll be thinking to myself, is that the second, fourth, sixth or thirtieth house they are carving out of a tree?  The louder a rattlesnake's rattle might mean it has more beads.  How can forty beads fit on the tip of its tail?

Can you guess which Australian marsupial has fifty babies in a lifetime?  I'll bet you'll be surprised not only at the sea mammal who never gets a new tooth but how many teeth they actually have.  Roaming the African savannas is an animal whose adult height and number of spots are a match.

Alligator eggs, butterfly visits to flowers and seahorse births leap from 550 to 1,000.  As the numbers climb our eyes wander from leaf tips to tree trunks, forests to barns and under the sea.  We travel the world number by number, animal by animal.


Lola M. Schaefer begins her book with an introductory explanation of her numerical estimations. She includes factors which might affect these numbers and the experts whose advice she sought.  For each animal she begins with In one lifetime...  Using this phrase repeatedly ties each animal to the one before and after it.  For most she provides a conversational aside.  It's like she is speaking with her readers instead of at them.

At the conclusion of the title, The Animals, the common and scientific name of each are given along with several informative paragraphs.  A computation including the average adult life span further instructs on how Schaefer got her numbers.  In What is an average?  she defines average with an example and how she used averages in this book.  Finally, in a special section, Lola M. Schaefer reveals I love math.  She provides readers with an opportunity to quiz themselves with story problems.

Gazing among the rows of trees on the matching jacket and cover, woodpeckers busy making homes, each hollow numbered, readers realize they're about to take a walk into the world of counting among nature.  Opening and closing endpapers in black feature an alligator with numbers like air coming from its mouth.  Matte-finished paper increases the tactile experience.

Rendered in mixed media, the two page illustrations for each animal by Christoper Silas Neal showcase the individual behavior.  It won't take readers long to discover (second animal for me) that for every number listed Silas pictures the exact amount.  Yes, I did count the 100 spots on the giraffe but not all the teeny-weeny, squiggly-wiggly baby seahorses.

How he chose to illuminate each animal, using a solid background, black, white, green, blue or a combination of two, draws the reader's eye immediately to the intended feature.  His technique of including delicate, intricate details with simple bold elements is appealing in design and layout.  I would not hesitate to hang my favorite illustration, the swallowtail butterfly on black among flowers colored white, blue and yellow, on the walls in my home.

I have been turning the pages again and again of Lifetime: The Amazing Numbers in Animal Lives written by Lola M. Schaefer with illustrations by Christopher Silas Neal for several days.  The pairing of Schaefer's information with Neal's illustrations is completely captivating.  This title could serve as a means of presenting mathematical averages to students or for the beginning of a research project.

Wouldn't it be fun for students to make pages like these? ...to make their own book?  To learn more about the author and illustrator follow the links to their websites embedded in their names above.  If you click on Christopher Silas Neal's link to his blog, you can see more pictures found in this book.   I would pair this with Bugs by the Numbers: facts and figures for multiple types of bugbeasties by Sharon Werner and Sarah Forss. Recently Jen reviewed at Teach Mentor Texts: Using Mentor Texts to Promote Literacy, Million, Billions & Trillions: Understanding Big Numbers by David A. Adler, which would also be a good match.

Where Eyes Can Not See

With a shortage of snowfall in northern Michigan I have been craving those crisp, clear, windless days of snowshoeing and cross-county skiing in the woods with my dog, Xena; days when you stop to rest surrounded by silence, only broken by the occasional inviting call of a chickadee or the persistent tapping of a hungry woodpecker.  On those days it's as if life has stopped; resting until spring. Over and Under the Snow by Kate Messner with art by Christopher Silas Neal reveals a world beneath that quiet, a world full of comings and goings.

Over the snow I glide. Into woods, frosted fresh and white.

Readers follow a young girl's narration as she and her Dad cross-country ski through a winter wonderland.  A quick glimpse of a vanishing squirrel's tale prompts a question about where he went.  Her Dad replies that he went under the snow; further explaining...

"Under the snow is a whole secret kingdom, where the smallest forest animals stay safe and warm."

Beneath their journey a red squirrel, a shrew, deer mice, a vole, bullfrogs, beavers, a chipmunk, a black bear and a queen bumblebee forge for food, rest for the day or slumber until spring.  The great horned owl like a sentinel waiting for food, a trail of deer tracks leading to a melted patch of snow, an almost invisible snowshoe hare gazing from under a spruce branch, and a red fox listening for a meal, add to the marvel of their travels in this snowy season.  As the moon rises in a starry sky the two make their way toward a roaring fire where a supper of hot chocolate, hot dogs and roasted marshmallows awaits.

Closing this day Mom, Dad and daughter head home where in bed under her blankets the girl dreams of those beings whose world in winter is under the snow.

Kate Messner takes us on a day trip with a parent and child employing text that flows seamlessly as it informs but also brings readers into the realm; it's like you're riding in a coat pocket peering over the top.  With details and a rhythm reminiscent of the most engaging of poetry, we wander the woods in wonder and appreciation.

Over the snow I glide, past beech trees rattling leftover leaves and strong, silent pines that stretch to the sky.

Complimenting her story the mixed media illustrations of Christopher Silas Neal evoke the season, its inhabitants, in earthy hues of chilly blues, dark browns, grays, dusty greens and black with splashes of color.  The liberal use of white space draws readers right into this joyful jaunt as do the endpapers done in a snowflake pattern on deep sky blue.  True to life depictions of creatures over and under the snow invite closer inspection with their museum like quality.

Of particular interest is an interview that Kate Messner conducted with illustrator Christoper Silas Neal about the process he used in creating the art for this book.

At the book's end each animal mentioned in the text is further discussed following an author's note.  A small bibliography of resources for additional reading on winter and animals is included.

Kate Messner and Christoper Silas Neal have created an idyllic title for any time of the year but, like a cozy comforter, perfect for curling up and sharing on a winter's day or night.  Readers, like myself, will be watching with new eyes the next time they explore winter's world, hoping to see what they can see Over and Under the Snow.  I am certainly wishing to see more from these two talented artists.