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© Katy Kramp and alibrarymama.com, 2004-2024. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Katy Kramp and alibrarymama.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
Blue Moo
Blue Moo by Sandra Boynton
Sandra Boynton and Michael Ford do it again with this collection of songs with quirky humor and clever lyrics performed by first-class musicians. Where their first hit, Philadelphia Chickens, was an imaginary revue with lots of Broadway-style music, Blue Moo is an imaginary juke box of (mostly) 50s and 60s style music. Sha Na Na sings “The Gorilla Song” in which a group of gorillas sing about their favorite ice cream flavor, banananananana. John Ondrasik of Five for Fighting delivers a syncopated poem, mostly accompanied only by drumbeats, about his love for big band swing in “Big Band Sound”. “I sing ironic retro rock with just three other guys / But I’m thinking of a band of significant size/ I want a big (beat beat) band sound.” “Speed Turtle”, reminiscent of “Greased Lightning” and sung in classic Beach Boys style by Brian Wilson himself, would appear from the illustrations to be sung by a band of snails amazed at a turtle’s speed. “The One Shoe Blues” is sung in inimitable style by B.B. King. Though the kids won’t recognize the big names, the music is nuanced enough to be great fun for kids and adults alike. There are a few less well-known performers, including the composer Michael Ford, and a trio including Sandra Boynton’s daughter. Their take on classic Motown, while no less likely to get stuck in my head than any of the other songs, suffered slightly from the singers obviously never having smoked, and, my husband says, a too-modern recording studio. Every so often throughout the whole album, there is a short marching-band style piece by The Uninvited Loud Intruding Band, hilarious in and of itself and an idea I really hope actual marching students latch on to. You can get this fabulous collection as a CD by itself, or for a few dollars more, a picture book with CD, with Sandra Boynton’s full-color concepts behind the songs facing the lyrics in large print. In the back, there are full lyrics with music and chords, for those who’d like to sing along or perform on their own. You, too, could fall under the spell of the legendary Blue Moo.
The Little Giant of Aberdeen County
Not dead. Just now getting over early pregnancy narcolepsy. I’ve been reading lots of books while doing lots of eating, but having difficulty finding the energy to write reviews on top of everything else that needs to get done. I’m not going to write up reviews of the romance novels, but I will note as an aside that I read one where the protagonists were virgins. They finally got into bed together, and afterwards asked each other how it was. Not so good, they decided. They’d work on their technique some. I was astounded at the honesty.
This book has been really popular, but I think deservedly so.
The Little Giant of Aberdeen County by Tiffany BakerThe hook of the plot is the narrator, Truly, a girl who is born large, grows quickly, and never stops. Her sister, Serena Jane, is the prettiest girl in town. When they are orphaned, Serena Jane gets her own room with a nice family in town, while Truly is packed off to live on a poor farm on the outskirts of town. She befriends other outcasts – Amelia Dyerson, the daughter of the family where she lives, and Marcus, too small and too smart to fit in at school. Truly’s memories of growing up are mixed in with her odd adult life, caring for the town doctor, Robert Morgan, her sister’s ex-husband. Truly also shares the town stories of the first Robert Morgan, who came from the South after the civil war, and seemingly out of frustration married the local herb-witch, Tabitha Dyerson. Out of this plot-line comes Truly’s on-going search for Tabitha’s legendary Book of Shadows. Truly’s story of being too large to belong anywhere had a strong potential for freakishness but turned out a beautiful story of the search for humanity and blessing.
Body, Breath and Being
Body, Breath and Being: A New Guide to the Alexander Technique by Carolyn Nichols I’ve studied the Alexander Technique myself for over a decade now, and credit it for pulling me out of chronic tendinitis in my wrists and keeping me free of back pain during my pregnancy. But what the technique is and does and how to explain it to the vast majority of people who’ve never heard of it before has always been a challenge. While common in Australia and Britain, it’s relatively unknown here, and that, too, makes it difficult as it’s really best to work with a teacher and those are hard to come by here. This book does an excellent job of explaining both the theory and the practice of it. It talks about how to recognize and inhibit unhelpful habits and gently encourage your body towards better use. Nichols profiles several of her students from their own points of view, explaining their difficulties before starting the Technique and how it helped after they started. I’ve seen other similar books use fictional, overly-easily resolved examples instead of real people; hearing the real stories, including where there are still difficulties, and including pictures of the people doing their work, was very helpful. While I could feel my body improving just by reading the book, it also includes an audio CD with guided workshops for each chapter. I didn’t have a chance to try them myself, but have heard from another Alexander student that they are very good. While there’s obviously no substitute for a trained teacher working with you personally, as your own bad habits feel right to you, this is the first book I’ve seen that looks like it could help you improve on your own. The Alexander Technique is traditionally used by those in the performing arts, but anyone whose life or work causes physically tension or pain will benefit from this book.
Babies Part 2 – Pregnancy and Birth
I’ve noticed something about pregnancy books, which is that being mainstream or natural will affect what they talk about. The mainstream camp will spend a lot more time on the pregnancy, what to eat and wear, dealing with relatives and heartburn. For labor, they’ll talk about the three stages, and tell you that modern birth is safe and to do what your doctor says. The natural camp will of course tell you what to avoid during pregnancy, but basically tell you to pay attention to what your body needs. They will spend the bulk of the time on labor and birth – preparing for it physically and emotionally, what it feels like from your perspective, the side effects and risks of common medical interventions and well as the effectiveness of various non-medical pain relief techniques, various labor and birth positions and their benefits. Both because no medical intervention is risk-free and because I’ve known people who decided in advance on an epidural and then had it not work for them, I recommend that everyone read about birth from the natural perspective whatever their plans for labor. I’m also including books for fathers and soon-to-be older siblings, for hopefully obvious reasons. [Edited 2/13/09]: because more of my friends are having second or more children now, who need their own books, as do fathers. Links are to my original reviews, where available.
Natural Health for Kids
I finally got around to reading this after noticing it on the new book cart a couple of years ago…
Natural Health for Kids by Sarah Wilson Parent and health journalist Wilson talks about combing standard and complementary health care in this handy reference guide. First, she goes over a whole host of different complementary treatments, from more well-known ones like nutritional therapy and standard Western herbalism to relatively obscure ones like iridiology and kinesiology, including homeopathy and essential oils along the way. She starts with a summary of each kind of alternative therapy, but the real meat of the book is a page-by-page listing of 50 common complaints – eczema, teething, colds, and more. For each issue, she lists possible symptoms and causes, conventional medical treatment, and treatment in what she’s determined to be the most relevant complementary therapies. Both conventional and complementary include when you can treat yourself and when you need to take your child to a practitioner. The British origins are obvious from such things as her saying that homeopathy is considered mainstream, if you didn’t get that from the article on nappy rash. The usefulness is limited, however, as Wilson does not include references for anything, neither books about the therapies she’s discussing nor citations when she occasionally says, that studies have shown xyz effective at reducing abc. On the one hand, it’s novel and useful as a reference to have different treatments together in one book. On the other hand, readers will either have to take her at her word or do their own research on her recommendations.
Parsley Sage, Rosemary and Time
An old favorite, first published in 1975, which I used to check out from the Ann Arbor library annually. Thank you to my brother for buying a library discard copy of this out-of-print book for me!
Parsley Sage, Rosemary and Time by Jane Louise Curry Conservative 10-year-old Rosemary sent unexpectedly to stay with her crazy Aunt Sibby, who lives at an old house in Maine called Wychwood. One beautiful June day, Rosemary follows Parsley Sage the cat to an old walled garden, clearly an abandoned herb garden. A large sundial is in a patch labeled Time – but it doesn’t look or smell anything like the thyme in the kitchen. When Rosemary eats it, she and the cat end up in the 17th century, where the woman whose house she – and a child named Baba and a baby named William – have unexpectedly arrived is being accused of witchcraft. If Rosemary can convince herself that they have moved back in time, how will they all get back to their proper time and save Goody Cakebread? Only with some teamwork involving Goody Cakebread’s magic cupboard, the local Abenaki tribe and Rosemary’s ingenuity. The plot twists are a perhaps more obvious to the adult me, but the story is just as entertaining. Curry is still writing tales of time-traveling children, like 2005’s The Black Canary.
Blindspot
We seem to be having an accidental foray into early America. From Philadelphia to Boston, then.
Blindspot by Jane Kamensky and Jill Lepore Our story here is told by two separate narrators. The first is a disgraced and indebted Scottish painter by the name of Stewart Jameson. He is fleeing Edinburgh, both the debt collectors and in search of his friend, Ignatius Alexander. Jameson tells us, the Dear Reader, that Alexander is an African-born, British educated doctor, but not how or why they were separated. Jameson hopes both to find his friend and earn the money to repay his debt in Boston. Meanwhile, Fanny Easton writes letters to a former schoolmate telling her plans to escape the Manufactory. She is the daughter of one of a judge, but she was disowned and thrown out of the house after her art tutor impregnated her. Now she has seen Jameson’s advertisement in the paper looking for an apprentice and decides to disguise herself as a boy, Francis Weston, to take the job. Then, Samuel Bradstreet, prominent citizen, revolutionary and early abolitionist is murdered, found dead just after sitting for his portrait. Jameson and Weston are key witnesses. Suspected are Bradstreet’s slaves, whose verbal promise to free them on his death is all the evidence the court really seems to want. But one of the slaves recognizes Fanny and asks for help, and she, as a guilty former owner, feels obliged to help. Early revolutionary and racial politics, intrigue and a whole lot of gender-bending sexual tension make this a fascinating and page-turning historical. The authors are both historians; some notes on the accuracy of the piece are included in book, and more on their website.
An American Plague
An American Plague by Jim Murphy This is, as the subtitle says, the true and terrifying story of the yellow fever epidemic of 1793. Over the course of a few short months, the population of Philadelphia, then the capital of the United States, was laid waste by a disease with no cure. Everyone who could afford to fled the city, leaving masses of sick and poor and only a few officials with no authority to do anything. The book describes the panic, the reactions of authorities, the arguing among doctors as to cause or cure, the heroic efforts of black nurses sent by the Free African Society, and the eventual waning of the disease. The United States government was unable to do anything during this time, as no one dared to enter the city, but the Constitution forbade convening Congress anywhere else. We hear about the lasting changes to emergency systems and the medical disaster that could still happen today: while we now know the cause of yellow fever, there is still no cure. Every chapter begins with a reproduction of a document from the time, so you can read, for example, the letter that mayor wrote to the newspaper, different ideas for cures, and the names and occupations of the dead. The text is lively, and frequent quotes from diaries, letters and newspapers bring us close to this long-ago event. This is an exciting book that would go well with Laurie Halse Anderson’s Fever, 1793.
