Ma Dear's Aprons - Hardcover

McKissack, Patricia C.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0689810512 ISBN 13: 9780689810510

Publisher: Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 1997

Synopsis

Follows the story of a poor son and mother before the days of cars, televisions, and washing machines, describing how young David Earl helps his mother wash the clothing of rich people, sell pies, and run errands.

About this title

Review:

You can read piles of books for kids and think they're just fine--until you hit one that reminds you how truly wonderful a children's book can be. Patricia C. McKissack's Ma Dear's Aprons is such a book. Graceful and deceptively simple, it tells the story of a week in the life of a turn-of-the-century boy and his mother: McKissack's great-grandmother.

Floyd Cooper's illustrations, misty as memory, bring readers so close, and with such warmth and welcome, that youngsters may feel that they, too, sit in the lap of Ma Dear's apron, a little sleepy, and very happy to be there.

From the Back Cover:

Little David Earl always knows what day of the week it is. He can tell by the clean, snappy-fresh apron Ma Dear is wearing -- a different color for every day. Monday means washing, with Ma Dear scrubbing at her tub in a blue apron. Tuesday is ironing, in a sunshine yellow apron that brightens Ma's spirits. And so it goes until Sunday, when Ma Dear doesn't have to wear an apron and they can set aside some special no-work time, just for themselves.

In their first collaboration, Newbery Honor author Patricia McKissack and award-winning illustrator Floyd Cooper lovingly recreate a slice of turn-of-the-century Southern life as it was for a single African-American mother and her son.

About this edition

• Publisher: Atheneum Books for Young Readers
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0689810512
• ISBN 13: 9780689810510
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 32
• Illustrator: Cooper Floyd