Me & You: A Mother-Daughter Album - Softcover

Lisa Thiesing

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0786814330 ISBN 13: 9780786814336

Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 2000

Synopsis

A mother explains how much her daughter is like she was as a little girl

About this title

From Publishers Weekly:

Through a series of watercolors styled as family snapshots in an album, and a simple text addressed from a baby-boomer mother to her daughter, Thiesing (Two Silly Trolls) explains how generations are linked not only by blood ties but also by the everyday experiences of growing up. "When I was a little baby, I looked just like you," Thiesing begins, presenting an album page with two baby pictures, one labeled "me" ("photographed" in black and white) and the other "you" (in color). Children should appreciate the breezy frankness of spreads like the one that explains, "I burped and glurped and pooped, just like you"; and older children may be able to discern cultural shifts in play (ponies in the last generation, Discovery Zones in this), clothes and even care-giving (the bearded boomer dad looks infinitely more comfortable holding his offspring). But the book is ultimately a letdown: Thiesing's gentle cartoon style is pleasant but unremarkable, and in her effort to capture the cozy, prosaic quality of family pictures, she sacrifices impact and interest. Reading the book does indeed feel like looking at someone else's photo album; even so, families may be prompted to pull out their own scrapbooks for some enjoyable comparing and contrasting. Ages 2-5.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal:

PreSchool-KAMost children are interested in learning about their parents' lives when they were young. Thiesing skillfully combines two simulated photo albums (one for the mother, one for her daughter) with this in mind. The book opens with a picture of each of them as infants and ends when they are both about five. In the brief text, the mother explains to her child how alike they are ("I slept and played, crawled and splashed, just like you"). The illustrations resemble photographs, showing mother and daughter engaged in similar activities at similar ages, making interesting comparisons possible. The pictures are done in watercolor and pen and ink: the mother's are in black and white and the daughter's are in full color, making it easy to distinguish between the two. Like real photographs, these images show the many moods of growing children. This book invites readers to pore over the comparisons and talk about them. Families could be stimulated to look at their own photo albums, encouraged to make their own, or led into some good storytimes about "when Mommy was a little girl."AVirginia Golodetz, Children's Literature New England, Burlington, VT
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0786814330
• ISBN 13: 9780786814336
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 32