SOLO - Hardcover

Lasky

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0027516644 ISBN 13: 9780027516647

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing, 1994

Synopsis

Kicked out of Sara Jane's dance for being bossy, klutzy Grace decides to perform a solo dance at the school concert. By the author of Sugaring Time.

About this title

From Booklist:

Ages 4-8. Mary Hoffman's Amazing Grace (1991) is a beautiful, upbeat story about a girl who believes in herself, practices hard, and gets the main role in the school play. But for the rest of us who dream and rehearse and just aren't good enough to be the star we deserve to be, Lasky's funny story will be company, if not comfort. When the leader of the playground circle kicks Grace out of the dance group ("I was too bossy, she said"), Grace decides to dance alone; it's called solo, Mom says. Grace dances and dances at home; she dresses up herself and her dog and twirls around and picks herself up when she falls down. The watercolor illustrations extend what the words say: "This is hard. The music goes too fast and I go too slow." She keeps trying. She imagines herself doing hippety-hops before a grand audience. Her parents tell her she has guts and gumption, but her brother is frank that she's going to embarrass him. The wry comedy is refreshing, and, in fact, it's not all failure. Grace stands up to peer pressure, and readers will appreciate the candid view of jungle-gym power games. Hazel Rochman

From School Library Journal:

PreSchool-Grade 1-A slight picture book with mediocre watercolor illustrations. When Grace is kicked out of her dance group for being too bossy, she decides she will dance solo in her school's spring concert. Her mother tells her she has gumption, her father says she has guts, and her brother tells her she's dumb, but Grace is nonplussed about performing "in front of the whole school and all the teachers...and the air force." In spite of her self-confidence, persistence, and elaborate costume, practice does not go well. If the story's lesson is one of determination and self-reliance, it falls flat. Readers never get to see the child's hard work actualized. Instead there's an abrupt phone call, and Grace is back in her old group. This ending shortchanges youngsters and is bound to leave them disappointed.
Elizabeth Hanson, Chicago Public Library
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 0027516644
• ISBN 13: 9780027516647
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 32