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4.09 AVERAGE
4.09 AVERAGE
What a gorgeous book. This story is about the life of the author's grandfather who travelled to America in the late 1800's. He lived in San Francisco but became homesick and brought his family back to his small village in Japan. The book has a photo album free and the text is sparse, but perfect. The author does a great job of capturing what it feels like to fall in love with a place but also be homesick for another.
I can't believe these illustrations are done with water color. They have such amazing depth and texture. The story was lovely.
This was one of my favorite picks in our Caldecott module. I loved Allen Say's illustrations. They truly are beautiful works of art and I felt that each page could easily be a painting hanging in an art museum.
The colors are soft and muted, but the paintings are still powerful in telling the story. The reader sees the beauty grandfather sees as he travels to America and then back to Japan. We understand what he loves about each home and what he misses about one when he is in another.
The story is a great look into a family's memories and past and I think the book could easily encourage young reader's to talk to their own grandparents and parents about family memories.
I found it interesting that the School Library Journal review listed it as a grades 3+, but other reviews listed it as ages 4+. I think it could be a great picture book for older readers, but pre-schoolers could also enjoy the artwork and story in Grandfather's Journey.
The colors are soft and muted, but the paintings are still powerful in telling the story. The reader sees the beauty grandfather sees as he travels to America and then back to Japan. We understand what he loves about each home and what he misses about one when he is in another.
The story is a great look into a family's memories and past and I think the book could easily encourage young reader's to talk to their own grandparents and parents about family memories.
I found it interesting that the School Library Journal review listed it as a grades 3+, but other reviews listed it as ages 4+. I think it could be a great picture book for older readers, but pre-schoolers could also enjoy the artwork and story in Grandfather's Journey.
This was wonderful. A sort of love letter from a boy to his grandfather, and from the grandfather to his home. To both of his homes, one on each side of the Pacific, and how both places stayed with him as he aged. I think a lot of migrants could probably identify with the grandfather here, seeing value and wonder in two different places and not being able to reconcile only being able to stay in one of them at a time. It's a quiet, thoughtful little book, with quiet, lovely illustrations, and it's all so restrained and wistful. I've been reading my way through the 100 Great Children's Books list from the New York Public Library, and I have to say that not all of their picks are ones that I'd agree with. This absolutely deserves to be on there, though, and it was worth reading through any amount of Frog and Toad for.
Course evaluation:
Personal Response: This is a lovely picture book, with a strong message on understanding our family and relating to their experiences. I particularly enjoyed the quiet tone of the illustrations and excitement conveyed during the grandfather’s explorations in America.
Evaluation: Say uses white space on each page to make every illustration look like a portrait; most of the images look like captioned paintings. This invokes a sense of history and intimacy, almost as if this is Say’s personal family photo album. The illustrations are filled with soft, warm tones, which reflect the calm and quiet mood of the story. Although major events occur during the book (such as war), the central plot of the story revolves around the grandfather’s homesickness and his longing for a peaceful home. The muted illustrations convey the slight sadness and internalized longing that come with feeling homesick.
Personal Response: This is a lovely picture book, with a strong message on understanding our family and relating to their experiences. I particularly enjoyed the quiet tone of the illustrations and excitement conveyed during the grandfather’s explorations in America.
Evaluation: Say uses white space on each page to make every illustration look like a portrait; most of the images look like captioned paintings. This invokes a sense of history and intimacy, almost as if this is Say’s personal family photo album. The illustrations are filled with soft, warm tones, which reflect the calm and quiet mood of the story. Although major events occur during the book (such as war), the central plot of the story revolves around the grandfather’s homesickness and his longing for a peaceful home. The muted illustrations convey the slight sadness and internalized longing that come with feeling homesick.
The illustrations are beautifully executed in watercolor, it definitely deserved the Caldecott.
Allen Say tells of his grandfather's desire to move from Japan to the "New World" - this book is filled with reverent longings for home, whereever that may be.
Allen Say tells of his grandfather's desire to move from Japan to the "New World" - this book is filled with reverent longings for home, whereever that may be.
Popsugar 2019 challenge – picture book edition! - A book author from Asia, Africa, or South America
I could really relate to this touching story that shows the personal conflict of people who leave home to make a new life in another country. This shows how one may always yearn for one of their two countries. I think that my grandparents always thought of Poland as home, even though they spent most of their lives here, happily. I especially enjoyed how Say juxtaposes pictures to contrast the features and cultures of the U.S. and Japan and how the images carry the theme of family heritage & following in the footsteps of your grandparents.