Home

Rating:
Summary: Pictures Worth Thousands of Words!
Review: Jeannie Baker's "Home" is a model for a book without text: The pictures are compelling, the story flows easily, and there's enough intrinsic narrative to stimulate discussion. Although much of the material is relevant to social and economic issues, the gorgeous collages and everyday scenes will appeal to infants and toddlers, as well as older siblings and adults. Publisher Greenwillow displays its usual excellent production values.

Baker shows the progression of a rundown neighborhood to the small city equivalent of a town square, as well as the maturation of the female protagonist ("Tracy") from newborn to mother. Baker cleverly shows this--"Rear Window"-like-through Tracy's upper floor apartment window. From this perspective, we view the changing interior (a window ledge and some of the wall), the adjoining backyards, and the stores and dwellings at the intersection. When Tracy is born, the backyards and large apartment building are run-down, and graffiti ("DAMAGE," "PAIN ") reveals residents' frustration and anger. You get the feeling that the people, too, are neglected objects.

As the young girl grows, she and her environment begin to change. It starts small: The girl plants some flowers, a wall is fixed, and eventually someone puts up a sign: "Reclaim Your Street." Gradually, more and more people enact the spirit of that sign as they rebuild their houses and yards. Residents make a small common area in a former driveway/vacant lot, and newer buildings replace old ones. On a larger scale (one that may be appreciated by grade- and middle-school kids), economic and perhaps political forces begin to shape the neighborhood: The apartment building is renovated, the streets are lined with plants, and a large complex in the background is torn down-revealing a beautiful lake that was previously hidden from view. Meanwhile, the young girl makes friends, goes to school, and later falls in love, marries, and has a baby.

The changes are gradual and believable: They apparently spring from residents' desire to fashion a better place to live. A couple of times, Baker "cheats" just a bit by painting the sky overcast on one page, and then a clear light blue as the intersection improves. For the most part, however, the book doesn't take the easy way out-not everything is perfect in the end, nor is everything simply a "slum" in the beginning. Neighborhood improvement is not necessarily equivalent to "neat and tidy" either: By the end of the book, large, varied, and somewhat overgrown foliage blocks the view.

"Home" is a beautiful picture book with exceptional composition and colors. It is bright and pleasant to look at and it's fun to compare the subtle on each page. It is also heartfelt, as Ms. Baker, in an afterward, discusses how the term "home" once encompassed the entire neighborhood. This is a superb book that with appeal to many different age groups, each of which will experience it in a different way. That quality makes "Home" a small treasure.

Rating:
Summary: The best picture book published in 2004. No debate.
Review: Without question, the most beautiful picture book of 2004. No other contenders come half so close. Author/illustrator Jeannie Baker has somehow managed to create a deeply moral book without placing even a sentence of dialogue or text into her tale. "Home" is a simple story that follows the circular nature of life and regeneration by paralleling the growth of a single young girl with the restoration of an urban neighborhood. What follows is a gorgeous story about what we owe the places where we live, and how best to interact with our environments. All that and it's still a fun book for Kindergartners to flip through repeatedly.

Almost every page of this book is the exact same shot again and again and again. We are initially looking out of a house's window onto a grimy city street. In the first picture, a mother and a father cuddle their new baby daughter within their enclosed yard. The scene is gritty but, because of the couple and their daughter, touching as well. The next two page spread takes place two years later. It's clear that the couple have recently put down new sod, though the neighborhood still hasn't changed much around them. Next door, an old man works on his garden. With every turn of the page, another 2 years passes. Right before our eyes we watch the girl, whether she's in the yard working on her bike or in the house waving to some approaching friends. She's getting older and more mature. Soon it becomes clear that there's a concentrated "Reclaim your street" effort on the part of the other people in the neighborhood. A dingy old lot across the way starts getting painted and given new green trees. The street itself looks nicer and before you know it a megamall has been torn down, giving the house a beautiful view of a nearby lake. The girl, Tracy, gets older and eventually marries in a ceremony in the street. And before you know it, she has a new baby of her own, and a job as a local native plant specialist where once a used car lot used to be.

The story in this book is told entirely through complex collaged images. I referred to Jeannie Baker at the beginning of this review as an "illustrator" but I think that term does her an injustice. She would more rightly be called an artist of the finest pedigree. I do not know how you go about creating full images like this from just snips and spots of paper and cloth. Yet every single picture in this book is filled with hundreds of delicate details. Baker gives these scenes a great deal of depth, both literally and figuratively. If you've ever seen a book by Anno or spent some delightful hours with a kid while they attempted to locate a tiny detail on an enormous image, this book will not fail to impress.

I loved the lesson of this story as well. As Baker herself explains in an afterword to the text, "In some cities...communities are finding ways their streets can once again become part of people's sense of home and play a part in their sense of belonging". In these situations, people will act similarly to the characters in this book. They'll reintroduce native plants and animals. They'll spend a lot of time revitalizing run down areas. They'll create safe spaces for kids to play and for old folks to sit and relax in the afternoons. "Home" is the ultimate fantasy. One in which a dirty city area becomes tamed by the efforts of the people who know how to love it.

Which leads to the inevitable will-kids-enjoy-this-book question. The answer is a resounding yes. They'll love it. They'll try to find the old lady in the purple dress on every page, or try to figure out exactly when that tree was planted and that highway was rerouted. Best of all, they'll look at the cover of this book and realize that it is actually the moral of the story. High above, you can see the neighborhood as the book leaves it at the end. There are green things growing, childress playing in the streets, and a young woman relaxing in a hammock. And not that far away, where the used car lot used to stand, is a building entitled, "Tracy's Forest". You can't read this book and not be impressed by it. I couldn't read this book and not love it immediately. The most impressive book created in years and years.


Rating:
Summary: What a fabulous book!
Review: Wow, wow, wow! Another reviewer said this was the best picture book of 2004 and I'm inclined to agree: it's simply a fabulous book, beautifully produced and rich in meaning (even without text!) The book takes us through a neighborhood in transition, from a slum to a service area to a vibrant, tree-filled paradise. Through it all, the story of a young girl growing up weaves it together and provides a timeline that is easy for small children to comprehend. It's a simple story but eloquently presented to viewers through the incredible collages of paper, fabric, and pressed plant materials that are rich in detail and meticulously arranged. The author closes the book with a beautiful passage, "People are discovering the need to nurture and to be nurtured by the unique character of the places where they live. It takes time, as this book shows. But the choice is ours to make - having simply a place to live or, by understanding the land and caring for it, belonging to a living home." While this book would be read and read again by young children, it would also be a useful addition to art curriculum for older youth.