Alaska's 12 Days of Summer (PAWS IV) - Hardcover

Chamberlain-Calamar, Pat

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1570613400 ISBN 13: 9781570613401

Publisher: Sasquatch Books, 2003

Synopsis

Best-selling Paws IV illustrator Shannon Cartwright is back with this charming children's book based on the infectious rhythms of the classic song 'The Twelve Days of Christmas.' Here, the famous 'partridge in a pear tree' becomes a 'black bear in a spruce tree,' while the fifth day of summer in Alaska yields everything from swans and wood frogs to bald eagles and moose.

About this title

About the Author

Pat Chamberlin-Calamar has taught everything from music and English in Denmark to folk guitar and parent-toddler classes. She and her husband, Don, spend summers in Talkeetna, Alaska.

Shannon Cartwright arrived in Alaska in 1972 after graduating from the University of Michigan School of Architecture and Design. She was drawn north by the stories she heard as a child from her grandmother, Esther Schaubel, a famous public-health nurse who spent 15 years in the Alaska bush during the '40s and '50s.  

She has spent most of her Alaska years living in the bush, away from the road system, and has never owned a TV or a computer and communicates by satellite phone and US mail. Cartwright has traveled all over the state working on a set-net site in Bristol Bay, driving horse-pack trips, guiding in the Alaska Range and Brooks Range, researching book projects, and traveling between her cabins by train, skis, snowmobiles, and horses. She expresses her love of Alaska through the 28 children's books she has illustrated, seven of which she has also written.

From School Library Journal

PreSchool-Grade 2-The traditional song "The Twelve Days of Christmas" gets a new treatment in this lighthearted picture book. With artwork by a popular Alaskan illustrator, it shows the typical fauna-moose, black and brown bears, caribou, bald eagles, sandhill cranes, and even mosquitoes-cavorting under the midnight sun. As the cumulative verses unfold, Cartwright's spreads become more and more crowded with activity and interesting details, such as the footprints of some of the animals along river and pond banks. Meanwhile, small-print, parallel text relates facts about the depicted animals and their central Alaska habitat. The illustrations show a landscape with a veritable traffic jam of wildlife, but it's all in fun. The effort to cram all the animals in the 11th and 12th days creates some awkward design logistics, but the kids will not complain. This book might be classified as fluff for the tourist souvenir stands, but kids will see it as fun whether they find it in their library or receive it as a souvenir of their grandparents' trip north.
Sue Sherif, Alaska State Library, Anchorage
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Sasquatch Books
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 1570613400
• ISBN 13: 9781570613401
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 32
• Illustrator: Cartwright Shannon