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Title: The Little Island by Golden Macdonald ISBN: 0-440-40830-X Publisher: Yearling Books Pub. Date: 01 October, 1993 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.5 (8 reviews)
Rating: 3
Summary: The weather started getting rough....
Comment: Published just after the end of World War II, "The Little Island" garnered itself a prestigious Caldecott medal for exemplary plot and illustrations in a picture book. Looking at it today, I'm a little surprised. The book does have a sweet little story. Describing the daily events that occur on a small island in the beautiful blue ocean, the story eventually focuses its attention on a black kitten that visits the island for a while. The kitten explores and speaks with the island and its fish, discovering the nature of, "how all land is one land under the sea". In the end, the kitten leaves and the island is subject to the wild storms and animals that seek its shores.
I like the story of the kitten and I like the words Golden MacDonald has chosen to convey nature's mysteries. "The cat's eyes were shining with the secret of it. And because he loved secrets he believed. And he let the fish go". So no quarrel here with the text. Top notch. Two thumbs up. It's the illustrations I have a bone to pick with.
When you think of the fine illustrators of the past, geniuses like Robert McCloskey or James Thurber come to mind. Less likely to appear in one's brain is a Mr. Leonard Weisgard. In creating this book, Weisgard begins strongly. The opening pages reveal a black and white kingfisher smiling benignly at the viewer. The little island, obviously somewhat close to North American shores due to its pine trees and native plants, is rendered lovingly in the first few spreads. But then the descriptions increase and the pictures do not compliment the words. We are told that, "Small flowers, white and blue and violets with golden eyes and little waxy white-pink chuckleberry blossoms and one tickly smelling pear tree bloomed on the Island". Great. Now where are they? Because in the picture facing these descriptions we see one tree with white yellow blossoms (not white-pink), some small flowers that are white, blue, red, and violet (but NOT violet with golden eyes), and not a pear tree anywhere in sight. Hm. Eventually we come to a picture of two kingfishers preparing, supposedly, to build nests. This may have been the illustrator's intent, and perhaps I have a dirty mind, but I have never seen a clearer picture of a male kingfisher mounting a female kingfisher atop a dead tree. So there's bird sex to contend with as well. Not the illlustrator's purpose, but an undeniable image. oog.
Finally, we get to the little kitten and all attempts at composition and proportion go flying out the window, never to return. The kitten is, from the first shot, about half the size of its humans. Then it leaps into the air and appears to be flying over the island. Next, it catches a fish, its legs having shrunk into its body so that it now looks to be one of those cats bred to have purposefully short legs. In the end, the cat leaves (thank goodness) and we return to some interesting illustrations that bear little or no resemblance to the text that author Golden MacDonald took such pains to write.
There's great danger in critiquing books of a certain age. People who grew up loving "The Little Island" will not want this book to be so poorly reviewed. But if you pull away the sentiment and look at this story with cool clear eyes you will see that it is the unfortunate pairing of an excellent author with an inferior illustrator. It is an interesting book, there is no question. But today it cannot be considered anything but a sub-par Caldecott finalist.
Rating: 3
Summary: An Old Fashioned Story
Comment: The Little Island by Golden MacDonald and Leonard Weisgard is a simple fantasy fiction story about a small quiet island. In it we learn about all the creatures that call the island home. In a relaxing way the book also moves through days and seasons. The old fashioned illustrations make the reader think of pictures in their mind. This book would be great for first and second graders who love nature.
Rating: 5
Summary: Fabulous! An A+ First Quality Book!!!
Comment: Even if this book had no words, I would still love it, because the illustrations are that brilliant!!~~
The wording is quite clever.
This story tells about a little island, and the changing seasons it lives through.
This island is home to many creatures, and serves many, many purposes.
Lobsters crawl underneath the island to find dark hiding places.
Seals come to have and raise babies.
Birds come to build nests and lay eggs.
In spring, flowers bloom on this little island. In summer, strawberries ripen.
One day, a family on a boat stops at the island for an afternoon picnic. With them, there is a black kitty.
The kitty observes:
"My what a small island. You are as small as big is big."
The island converses with this kitty, and teaches him that everything is a wonderful part of this world, and equally unique and important.
The kitty learns a secret from a fish- 'All land is one land under the sea'.
In autumn, the pears ripen on the lone pear tree on the island, and finally winter comes with snow.
It was good to be a little island. A part of the world, and a world of its own.
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Title: A Tree Is Nice by Janice May Udry, Marc Simont ISBN: 0064431479 Publisher: HarperTrophy Pub. Date: 26 June, 1987 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: Ox-Cart Man by Donald Hall, Barbara Cooney ISBN: 0140504419 Publisher: Puffin Pub. Date: October, 1983 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: Abraham Lincoln by Edgar Parin D'Aulaire, Ingri D'Aulaire ISBN: 0440406900 Publisher: Yearling Books Pub. Date: 01 April, 1987 List Price(USD): $10.95 |
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Title: Many Moons by James Thurber, Louis Slobodkin ISBN: 0152518738 Publisher: Harcourt Pub. Date: April, 1981 List Price(USD): $17.00 |
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Title: Finders Keepers by Nicolas Mordvinoff, William Lipkind, Nicolas, Nicolas Will, Nicolas Mordinoff ISBN: 0156309505 Publisher: Voyager Books Pub. Date: August, 1989 List Price(USD): $7.00 |
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