The illustrations in this book are marvelous. Jerry Pinkney is a Caldecott award winning artist, so marvelous illustrations are his modus operandi. At the moment, he has won the Caldecott Medal once and has had five Caldecott Honor books, the runner ups to the main Caldecott winner, to his name. Jerry Pinkney is a pretty big deal!
This was a book we got out of the library and as soon as we cracked the cover, I was planning on adding it to our permanent collection. The pictures are that great.
Although I knew additional verses to Twinkle, Twinkle existed, I never knew much about them. To be honest, I still don't know the verses all that well. Those marvelous illustrations grab my attention too thoroughly. But if you are terribly clever and focused, you could learn the additional verses.
Opening the book to this glorious riot of morning glories, predisposed me to find the entire rest of the book delightful.
On the first few pages, the little chipmunk investigates various starry shapes found in nature.
Queen Anne's Lace, dewy cobwebs, fireflies.
And then the chipmunk finds a nest.
Quite soon, the chipmunk, decked out in a snappy little sailor suit, sails away in the robins nest.
Much to the robin's consternation.
Pinkney alternates between pages with lines of the song and wordless pages. It allows you to sing the song, and tell the chipmunks story at the same time.
The wind blowing "the traveler in the dark."
Then the chipmunk falls, down, down, down to land gently in a lily blossom.
He leans out to touch a star shining on the water and is suddenly upset by a jumping fish.
The swan rescues him from drowning and nestles him in a cozy little nest of swans down on her back, to fly him back to land.
And at the end, you realize this little chipmunk was just having a very vivid dream.
But aren't the pictures great?
I love his illustrations too, as do my students. Aren't the illustrations of the flowers awesome?
ReplyDelete