A Child's Christmas In Wales

Title:  A Child's Christmas in Wales, by Dylan Thomas, illustrated by Trina Schart Hyman, 47 pages
Publisher: Holiday House, 1985.  Original publisher: New Directions, 1954
Source:  Library

This Christmas classic is worth a read, but a lot depends on the illustrator, as it really is a picture book.  Thomas's poetic prose is beautiful, and evokes a long-past childhood that seems just a little bit magical, with a touch of humor (Auntie Hannah!).  Somehow, over all these years, I'd never actually read this (despite the fact that it took about 20 minutes, tops!), and it's a shame.  I would have enjoyed sharing this with my boys when they were little.

I have to admit that I'm not crazy about the illustrations in the edition I read (the first on the left above).  The landscape and village structures--those are great.  The people are a little odd, though, and kind of scary. I'd like to see the original.  But this is what our library has, so it's what I read.

Wander down to your bookstore, check out the different editions, and pick one that you like to add to your collection of holiday traditional reads!

Disclaimer: I checked A Child's Christmas in Wales out from my local public library, and received nothing from the publisher or author in exchange for my honest review.  The opinions expressed herein are my own and those of no one else. 

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And so. . . A Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night! 

Book Review: . . . According to Humphrey

 It's time again for the Kid Lit Blog Hop!  Rather than review each of the Humphrey books (Betty G. Birney, early middle grade fiction) separately, I would like to review the series as a whole.

I first met Humphrey the Classroom Hamster five or six years ago when my boys were in maybe third or fourth grade.  In my never-ending quest for books we could read aloud as a family, I dragged home the first book in the series, The World According to Humphrey.  The boys enjoyed the humor and the funny way Humphrey (who is the narrator of all the books) repeats himself when excited ("I love love love carrots!").  We parents enjoyed smooth, readable prose and a sound message that doesn't come across as preachy (always a risk with kids' books).  Humphrey uses daring, ingenuity, and reasoning (often with very little data, as hamsters don't know very much about how the human world works, especially when fresh out of Pet World) to help the children of Room 26 with their problems.

Humphrey never lets the humans know that he can read, write, and understand everything they say--nor that he can escape his cage at will and roam the school at night.  Somehow, the fact that he can't talk, and that he makes so many erroneous assumptions about what people mean when they do and say strange things, keeps him from being too cute and too anthropomorphic to tolerate.  His solutions to problems are creative, and if they are also unrealistically effective, that's in the nature of the books.  I mean, you don't look for total realism in a book written by a hamster.

Writing level is on the easier end for Middle Grade--a third-grader should be able to read the books comfortably, and by about fifth grade they will probably have outgrown it (for my non-U.S. readers, that's ages about 8-10).

I highly recommend the series for boys or girls, for solo reading or read-alouds.


Now hop on over and see who else is reviewing kids' books today!

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In other news. . . pop on over to Karen's Different Corners and check out her review of The Ninja Librarian.  Last fall I participated in her "Judging a Book by it's Cover" series of posts looking at different book covers, and she has kindly gone on to read and review my book (rather than being put off by the cover, which is hopefully going to get a revision soon).  Thanks, Karen, for the kind review!