Books by Murray McCain & Illus by John Alcorn

This book is outrageously colorful. A toy shop we were in near Philiadelphia had five copies of this on top of the bookshelves to announce the book area and believe you mean, it was rather powerful! 

This book is a joyous celebration of all things books! 

Glancing through this I was amazed how completely the illustrator nailed that weird 1960s-70s Monty Python vibe. Then I checked the publication date and realized it WAS published in the 1960's. Hence the vintage feel. 

This book celebrates all the things we love about books.

Look at that dust jacket

Most books are just right for holding.

Look at the font variations and the coloring. 

A list of things books can be about.

These illustrations! The insane pink eyed lion! 

Books can be for coloring (or is that colouring?) or singing. 

Then we get into the words in the books. Here are some hard words

Some happy words. 

I think every person would have a different list of happy words. But I love reading other peoples! 

Funny words! 

All the different potential fonts

Look by Fiona Woodcock

This is such a fun book! 

So much color 

Each page has a different word with two O's Except one or both of the O's are part of the illustration. 

I read it as though the O's weren't there, which makes this kids laugh uproariously and tell me that is NOT the right word. Then they tell me that this is "zoom," not "zm"

I love a good concept book. The boxing kangaroo! The cockatoo eyes!

Panda eyes!

Seriously, how adorable is this book?

I love balloons and color and cool sunglasses.

I read this to my two youngest about five times and they were still begging for another reading. But once you have read it without the O's, that is the only way you can read it to please them. And it gets a teensy bit old after awhile. 

But I still love this book!

Isn't it fun and bright and clever? All the best things for a book to be.

Martin's Big Words by Doreen Rappaport and Bryan Collier

See how spangled that cover is with medals? This book is a big deal. It deserves all those medals and more. The illustrations are bigger than life (isn't that an incredible portrait of MLK on the cover?!), the words are spare enough really nail you with their simple truth, and the message is one that never grows old. 

All men are created equal. And to make things happen, you have to DO something. 

I also love the concept of Martin's words changing things. Words are big and important. Use good ones!

Martin grew up in a world that was not fair. And his mother never let him think it was right or fair. 

His father was a minister. So he was around beautiful, important words all his life. 

By the time he himself was a minister, he knew as many big words as he needed to change history. To make the world more fair. 

And he changed the world. He was bold and honest. He became the face of his people. 

I saw an article a few years ago about how school teachers and other water down MLK. He had a message of peace and love, but there was also a realist in him that knew there would be a lot of egg carts upset by what he was trying to accomplish. And he didn't shy away from that. He didn't worry about making people uncomfortable. He wanted people to be uncomfortable with the status quo. 

He wasn't going to wait for some distant, future promise. He was going to make today the promise.

And he knew he might be stopped. He knew he was facing some of the fiercest hatred because of the uncomfortable truths he preached. 

Remember,

 if I am stopped,

 this movement 

will not be stopped, 

because God is 

with this movement. 

This movement was not just Martin Luther King Jr. He never meant it to be. He just stepped up to be the leader for a movement much bigger than himself. 

This is my favorite picture in the entire book. I am not artistic, so I can't really tell you why I love this picture so much, but I just love it. The unflinching stare, the tattered flag, put back together--this is what the civil rights movement did. It demanded that the America that was broken for them be made whole again. 

Words are a big deal. Words can change the commonplace into history changing vehicles.