"Bearpond Books

October 19, 2009

I was shelving a slew of new books yesterday when I sat down with two picture books that I had ordered from my sales rep (apparently!) but about which I remembered nothing (yeah, well that happens a lot).

And now for the 337th reason I love my job. Two gems, both of them.

In The Bog Baby, by Jeanne Willis, two sisters go fishing (against their mother’s wishes) in a magic pond and discover the Bog Baby. They take him home (of course- you would too if you could!) and they soon realize that he really is a creature of the wild when he starts to turn grayish and sickly. This book make s me remember all those times I caught some strange innocent creature in the woods, thinking we’d become the best of friends and I’d keep it safe and happy for all time. Noble, heroic and magical thinking. But life doesn’t always work that way, and the two sisters in Bog Baby decide they have to tell their mom about him in order to save him.  She tells them that the Bog Baby is a wild thing, and isn’t meant to eat cake, or walk on a leash, or sleep in a tub. “If we really loved the Bog Baby, we had to do what was best for him. No matter how much it hurt us. That was real love. That’s why we let him go.” Within the context of the book these words are not preachy,  just sweet and pure, topped off with an ending that exudes magic.

Here’s another story that makes childhood feel like yesterday. The Secret Plan, by Julia Sarcone-Roach, is a bedtime book in which four friends– Henry, Harriet and Hildy (the cats) and Milo (elephant) hatch a plan to evade bedtime, which is always ruining their fun. Needless to say they have to devise more than one plan, including  some clever disguises, a bit of hiding, some undercover operations and climbing out of windows. We’ve all been there.

The beauty in here is that they actually succeed– there are no parents swooping in to squash the exuberance and perform the gentle but controlled tucking-in ritual. These funny characters create their own ritual that will satisfy any age kid.

Both books are not only a joy to look at, they do what I like best in a kid’s book– they understand how children work– their emotions, desires, disappointments– and reimagine them on the page for us. They remind us what it feels like to be young, and who doesn’t want to feel that?