Armchair Travel

Traveling Man: The Journey of Ibn Batutta 1325-1354
Ages: 4 - 8 yrs.
By: James Rutherford
Houghton Mifflin, $16.00 (Hardcover)

How better to involve your child in geography, history, and the art of picture books than through the pages of a masterfully-told story about one of the world’s most famous travelers? Ibn Batutta’s journey represents one of the first travel diaries we have; author/artist Rutherford takes young readers along on this trip through space and time.

The Travels of Benjamin of Tudela: Through Three Continents in the Twelfth Century
Ages: 4 - 8 yrs.
By: Uri Shulevitz.
Farrar Straus and Giroux, $17.00 (Hardcover)

Less well known but equally impressive as a world traveler is Benjamin of Tudela, who hit the road a century before Ibn Batutta. Here, Shulevitz displays the wonders of the 12th century world through story and art. The book is full of tales and anecdotes and information, conveying excitement as well as education to its young readers.

Calavera Abecedario: A Day of the Dead Alphabet
Ages: 4 - 8 yrs.
By: Jeanette Winter
Harcourt, $16.00 (Hardcover)

This colorful book stars a lot of calaveras, or skeletons. Or rather, it stars the family that makes the skeletons for the fiesta el Dia de los Muertos in Mexico (“el Dia de los Muertos” is what Americans call Halloween). The design is outstanding; crisp flat colors and black backgrounds highlight the skeletons. When the pick-up truck packed with calaveras heads for the festival, the alphabet begins - skeletons in every frame, humorously clad as mariachis or zapateros. The story is warm and informative; the illustrations and design are unusual and original.

Red Scarf Girl: A Memoir of the Cultural Revolution
Ages: 9 - 12 yrs.
By: Ji Ji Liang
Harpertrophy, $6.99 (Paperback)

Books about China’s Cultural Revolution of the late 1960s-1970s fall, generally, into two categories: memoirs by those who participated, for example as young Red Guards, or by those who were victimized, such as descendants of landlords and intellectuals. Ji Ji Lang, falls into the second category and her story of the confusion and fear of those times is conveyed through a child’s perspective. Why should your child read a book about growing up under a totalitarian society? Why not? Ignorance isn’t bliss—it’s dangerous.

I also recommend Da Chen’s China’s Son and Chun Yu’s Little Green. And, for young adult readers, Anchee Min’s Red Azalea.

The Clay Marble
Ages: 9 - 12 yrs.
By: Minfong Ho
Farrar Straus and Giroux, $5.95 (Paperback)

and

Goodbye, Vietnam
Ages: 9 - 12 yrs.
By: Gloria Whelan
Dell Yearling, $5.50 (Paperback)

These two novels realistically and sympathetically relate the stories of Southeast Asian refugees, Cambodian and Vietnamese respectively. The protagonists are pre-teen girls who, along with their families and neighbors display tremendous courage throughout the turmoil of war - loss of family, stress within families, modern-day pirates. Both stories end happily enough, with the main characters eventually winding up where they want to be: back in Cambodia after time in a Thai refugee camp, or in the USA as new immigrants. The student sitting next to your child in his or her classroom might very well have a similar story.

The Lady Grace Mysteries (Series, Five Books So Far)
Ages: 9 - 12 yrs.
By: Patricia Finney writing as Lady Grace Cavendish
Random House, $6.95 (Paperback)

Lady Grace Cavendish is the Nancy Drew of the Elizabethan Age, an independently minded teenager whose godmother just happens to be Elizabeth I. Court intrigues and rivalries, swashbucklers, unlikely friends, and a mystery in each book make these very lively historical novels.

My Friend the Painter
Ages: 9 - 12 yrs.
Lygia Nunes
Harcourt, $5.00 (Paperback)

With great sensitivity, through the voice of a young boy, Nunes relates the effects of military dictatorship in Brazil some decades ago. The book is not a rant; it is a thoughtful exploration of the protagonist’s feelings and discoveries as he comes to grip with his family and with the suicide of his neighbor, and friend, the painter.

The Whale Rider
Ages: 9 - 12 yrs.
By: Witi Ithimaera
Harcourt, $8.00 (Paperback)

With much information about New Zealand history, and the gender roles and tribal beliefs of the Maoris, this is a fantasy-tinged, energetic novel about a girl and her whale.

Haroun and the Sea of Stories
Ages: 9 - 12 yrs.
By: Salman Rushdie
Penguin, $14.00 (Paperback)

Rushdie’s only children’s book, begins somewhere in Western Asia. Drawing upon the folklore of India and Muslim cultures, the story takes its father and son heroes on a quest from our contemporary world into a magnificently conceived “other” world. In the real world, Rashid Khalifa, the father, has lost his remarkable ability to tell stories, earning the moniker the Shah of Blah. Simultaneously, in the fantasy world, stories are disappearing from the Sea of Stories. Haroun, Rashid’s son, searches for the mysterious cause of his father’s loss and remedy to restore his talent, he encounters situations and characters of great originality, humor, and imagination in a fast-moving tale full of word play and clever dialogue.

Stories for Children
Ages: 4 - 8 yrs.
By: Isaac Bashevis Singer
Farrar Straus and Giroux, $14.00 (Paperback)

Set in the Eastern European Yiddish culture of his own childhood in pre-WWII Poland, these thirty-four stories range from masterful refinements of pure folklore, as with the Fools of Chelm and Shlemiel Family stories, to poignant original tales, such as “Zlateh the Goat,” “Naftali the Storyteller and His Horse, Sus,” and “Menaseh’s Dream.” Several of Singer’s picture books’ texts are also included, among them Mazel and Shlimazel and Why Noah Chose the Dove, as are vivid autobiographical tales about Singer’s animated, argumentative household. A whole world—now vanished—is contained within the covers, a world of warmth, silliness, pain, and wonder.

Chike and the River
Ages: 4 - 8 yrs.
By: Chinua Achebe
Cambridge University Press, $7.00 (Paperback)

Like Rushdie and Singer, Achebe is known primarily for his books for adults, such as Things Fall Apart. In this book about growing up in Nigeria, Achebe’s story is about a boy named Chike and triumphs and trials as he moves from a village to a town.

Kaffir Boy: The True Story of a Black Youth’s Coming to Age in Apartheid South Africa
Ages: 9 - 12 yrs.
By: Mark Mathabane
Free Press, $15.00 (Paperback)

Mathabane’s autobiography is testimony to living in a brutal, bigoted society. Intended for older readers, this story informs first-hand about the unpredictable attacks and sheer madness of Apartheid and a government that is now, fortunately, historical. The author eloquently rises above the suffering inflicted by the secret police on his family and friends giving readers a story that powerfully portrays personal ingenuity and courage.

About the Author
Alida Allison is a founding member of San Diego State University's National Center for the Study of Children's Literature and a professor in the Department of English and Comparative Literature, where she happily specializes in children's and adolescent literatures. Her published work includes The Toddler's Potty Book and, on the scholarly side, books and articles about refugee literature, humor, fantasy, and authors I.B. Singer and Russell Hoban. 

Bookshelf Travels
Bookshelves offer starting points for many a journey. If you’ve ever wondered what life is like in Freedom, Georgia, on a ranch in Nevada, or on Blossom Street in Marshall County Mississippi, take a trip through the pages of these Parents’ Choice recommended books available at your local library.

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