Non-Fiction Picture Book: Summoning the Phoenix

Title: Summoning the Phoenix: Poems and Prose About Chinese Musical Instruments
Author: Emily Jiang
Illustrator: April Chu
Publisher: Shen's Books
Pages: 32
Review Copy: From Publisher
Availability: On Shelves Now

Review: Before a reader even opens the book, it is obvious that this is something more than a typical informational book. The cover hints at fantasy and magic. It also demonstrates the richness and attention to detail that is found in the artwork throughout the book. The artist explains her illustration process on her blog using one of my favorite spreads from the book. Obviously, the art impressed me, but so did the text.

The text is in two parts, something that I seem to be noticing a lot lately like in Do You Hear the Nesting Bird? and Mama Built a Little Nest. One part is the poems that are telling about the preparations children are making as the time draws near for their orchestra concert. This is not a typical orchestra concert however. The orchestra is made up of musicians playing Chinese instruments. We find out in the author's note that this type of orchestra has only been around for about fifty years and traditionally the instruments would have been played alone, as an accompaniment or in a small group. The book is a blend of modern and ancient.

Readers may choose to go through the book simply reading the brief poems and looking at the illustrations. This could be especially helpful if the reader is young and not ready for the smaller print and length of the informational text. The poems are written from a child's perspective and are pretty  easy for children to understand and enjoy - particularly if they play instruments themselves. I think they will be delighted by "Warming Up" which features fish lips and a pretend kiss. This is accompanied by a wonderful illustration of a girl making a fabulous fish face. Another one that will be sure to engage children is "Friendly Competition." In this poem, two musicians play as fast, long, and loud as they can trying to outdo each other. This results in purple-blue faces. I imagine it would be fun to act this out with or without instruments. The playfulness in the poems is refreshing and often brought a smile to my face.

While the poems are interesting and fun to read, the second part of text, the informational portion, adds a lot to the book and shouldn't be entirely skipped. Even with a young child, I would share at least some of the information. Each instrument is named (with pronunciation) and Jiang explains how it is put together. She also tells about how the instrument is played and describes the sound. What really caught my imagination though were the legends and little tidbits about some of them. That was where the phoenix came into play. Legend says that the xiao, a flute made of bamboo,  has magical powers that allowed it to summon creatures such as a dragon and a phoenix.

I am looking forward to sharing this book with our students. Music is something that many children connect with and the format and illustrations are sure to capture their attention and allow for interaction. I would definitely recommend this book for purchase. I am also looking forward to the album, Songs for Summoning the Phoenix, that is scheduled to be published also. That was the only thing that was missing for me. I wanted to actually hear the instruments as I read. I hope you get a chance to experience this book for yourself. It's a treat.

Other reviews & interviews:
Kirkus - review
The Pirate Tree - review
Mary Robinette Kowal - interview/guest post
Whatever - interview/guest post

A Tuesday Trailer

It looks like it could be fun. 

It's Monday! What are you reading?

It's Monday! What are you reading? is a meme hosted by Sheila at Book Journeys. Jen Vincent over at Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee Moye from Unleashing Readers decided to put a children's and YA spin on it and they invite anyone with an interest to join in. You can participate by creating your post then visit one of their sites to add your site. Finally, visit at least three participant blogs and comment to spread the love.

If you want to know more about what I am reading, visit me at my Goodreads shelf. Images via Goodreads unless otherwise noted.

The Past Week:

Three great non-fiction texts, two poetry collections and one trickster tale

Two non-fiction texts, one poetry collection, two picture books and a middle grade novel in verse

One more non-fiction text

I would recommend any of the books that I read this week, but here are my favorites:

New and Selected Poems by Mary Oliver: This is a fantastic collection that spoke to me in so many ways. I appreciate Mary Oliver's ability to be still and present in nature. She has such a sense of wonder about the world around her. Poetry month did its job and I am reading more of it again. :)

Red Kite, Blue Kite by Ji-li Jiang: This is a picture book that takes place during the Cultural Revolution in China. More than that though, it is a story of the love between a father and son. Simply beautiful.

Summoning the Phoenix: This is a fantastic text about Chinese instruments. There is a combination of poetry and non-fiction prose that helps to explain the history of the instruments and their use now. The illustrations are fabulous. (I got this copy from the publisher and will be reviewing it soon.)

Chukfi Rabbit's Big, Bad Bellyache: A Trickster Tale by Greg Rodgers is a lot of fun. That tricky rabbit tries to pull one over on everyone, but this is a trickster tale I can truly appreciate. He gets what he wants, but he also gets what he deserves. (I read it as a ARC from Edelweiss and it should be out in June. I will review it here soon.)

The Coming Week:

I am reading these right now and hope to finish them this week

As for what will come after that, I will be reading Beyond Magenta for the CCBC listserv conversation coming up soon. Have a great week of reading.

Celebrate!

Ruth Ayres has a link-up on Saturdays where people link to posts that are celebrations about their week. I love this reminder to celebrate every day. Here are some of my celebrations from the week in no particular order.

* My daughter and I drove up to the cities so I could attend the Arbuthnot lecture. It was a great day. We arrived at The Source in time to participate in Free Comic Book Day. Then we headed to the Central Library in Minneapolis. There we visited the book store and purchased some great used books. My daughter visited the teen section & read while I visited the children's section and did the same.

Central Library

Birchbark Books

Next we went to Birchbark Books. What an amazing store. I loved the calm atmosphere and the beautiful birch inside the store. It was also fantastic to have access to so many books written by or about Native people. We made our purchases in honor of the #WeNeedDiverseBooks campaign and then headed next door to The Kenwood after getting a recommendation at Birchbark. The food was wonderful and we had just enough time to get to the lecture. Andrea Davis Pinkney shared her personal story of growth as a writer from childhood to today. She also shared the history of African American children's literature. The lecture seemed to fit in perfectly with the theme of the week in social media #WeNeedDiverseBooks. As an added bonus to the already amazing lecture, we got to meet Kate DiCamillo. She was super kind and welcoming.

In addition, I met the authors Swati Avashti and Coe Booth in line. I also had a nice discussion with Stephanie Lurie from Disney Hyperion. It was interesting to find out more about publishing.

* Another highlight was my Zumba class. I still have the same instructors, but we have changed locations. I was worried since the building is not a dance studio and we no longer have mirrors, but wow! We have huge windows looking out into a park. Seeing the grass, trees, and sky is a bonus well worth the loss of mirrors.

* New books! A large order came in and it is always a treat to go through them while getting them ready. 

* My son will be home from college in less than a week! Making plans for getting him home has been making me smile a lot. :)

I hope your week was full of celebrations and if not, I hope next week will be an improvement.

Nonfiction Picture Book Challenge

Alyson Beecher over at Kid Lit Frenzy hosts a Non-fiction Picture Book Challenge and has a roundup every Wednesday. I am late getting this posted, but wanted to share a few books that focus on fine arts.

Much like in her earlier and shorter book Hands, Ehlert shares her own art journey in this scrapbook of her life. Both books explain how her family nurtured her artistic talent. The Scraps Book, goes further into her adult art life and shows even more. Seeing her process is fascinating. Ehlert does such a good job of keeping things simple yet engaging.  

Music Everywhere! combines amazing photographs with easy to read text about instruments and music making from around the world. I appreciated the specificity when talking about the people who are in the photos or who traditionally use the instruments. Individual groups of people are named rather than simply saying something or someone is from Africa. The specific country or even tribe is given. The pictures and descriptions are likely to inspire readers to create some music of their own or hunt down examples on the Internet. At the end, there are also simple instructions for making some musical instruments too.

The other books were library books, but this final book, Summoning the Phoenix, was provided by the publisher (Lee and Low Books). I will post a full review within the coming week. The illustrations are wonderful and it includes two different sets of text. On each page, a Chinese instrument is highlighted through a poem and a few paragraphs of description. One could read the poetry all the way through or choose to read the prose or read both together. I really enjoyed the fact that traditions and legends about the instruments were included. I wanted to track down all of the instruments online and hear how they sound. 

-- Cover images are from Indie Bound

It's Monday! What are you reading?

It's Monday! What are you reading? is a meme hosted by Sheila at Book Journeys. Jen Vincent over at Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee Moye from Unleashing Readers decided to put a children's and YA spin on it and they invite anyone with an interest to join in. You can participate by creating your post then visit one of their sites to add your site. Finally, visit at least three participant blogs and comment to spread the love.

If you want to know more about what I am reading, visit me at my Goodreads shelf. Images via Goodreads unless otherwise noted.

**In an effort to get enough sleep tonight, I am basically just listing the books that I read without a lot of commentary.

Previous Week: 

The standouts for the week were Caminar (I will review this one on Rich in Color later this week), Music Everywhere, and the Selected Poems of Langston Hughes. My students adored Mi Familia Calaca. All were enjoyable though in their own ways.

The Coming Week: 

Reading With My Ears

Reading With My Eyes

I just got the ARCs of The Great Green Heist and Chufki Rabbits Big, Bad Bellyache and will likely read them this week. I also have a pile of books from the library as usual. I wasn't able to get to the Geisel Award books this week, but at this point in the challenge, all of the books from here on out are a complete repeat. I am not sure if I will continue the challenge with everything else I am juggling. If I can fit it in though I will read those too. Have a great week of reading!

Celebrate!

Ruth Ayres has a link-up on Saturdays where people link to posts that are celebrations about their week. I love this reminder to celebrate every day. Here are some of my celebrations from the week in no particular order.

• I had an article published in School Library Journal about how to make a difference as a teacher librarian in the area of diverse lit. I am still pretty amazed that they let me write something for them. Seriously. I get a little giddy every time I think about it. 
• After Zumba the other day most of the class members and our fabulous teacher went out to dinner together. There was much laughter. Time with them lifted me up and chased away any stress.

• Dia de los Niños was a fun day. We enjoyed Pat Mora's Book Fiesta in the younger grades and Yuyi Morales' books Just a Minute and Just in Case in the older grades in addition to sharing Putamayo music. We also had bilingual and diverse books on display and many were checked out. Teachers celebrated reading in their classrooms too. I also enjoyed hearing from my students about some of their favorite characters and books in the library in honor of School Library Month (some featured in the above video).
• The #WeNeedDiverseBooks campaign has been fascinating to experience this week. I wrote about it here.
• I get to listen to my daughter play the cello in the orchestra and the snare drum in the band for State Solo & Ensemble today.

• My daughter and I will be driving to the cities where we will visit a comic book store for Free Comic Book Day - our first time participating in this event. If there is time, we may stop at Birchbark Books and/or the library too.
• We will have dinner together and finish the evening with the Arbuthnot Lecture featuring Andrea Davis Pinkney.

It should be a full and rather wonderful end to the week. Have a great weekend!