“If we could see each other exactly as the other is,” Ezra Jack Keats wrote, “this would be a different world.” The son of Polish immigrants escaping anti-Jewish pogroms in Europe, the world he grew up in was Brooklyn, New York. Ezra’s family had always been poor but during the Great Depression of the 1930s, along…
Naomi is having a bad time. Her Mom and Dad are splitting up, her beloved dog Diesel has died, and she’s probably dead as well. But it’s hard to be sure. Maybe she’s not, maybe she has a second chance. Diesel thinks so, because here he is alive again and talking to her in her…
I like this book: there’s a warmth and delicacy here. But it and almost all of the books by this Finnish emigre to Canada are now out of print. It was published in 1964 and illustrated by the prolific and foxy Edward Ardizzone. Foxy, because for me there’s a mystery about his work; it is…
A simple joke, the dog who thinks his name is No, because it’s what everyone in the house calls him. Any child who has misunderstood how to help and in turn been misunderstood may feel for our well-meaning hero and draw comfort. They are not alone in the world: there are other misguided enthusiasts out…
