Red Ribbon (A Laura Geringer Book)

Weeks, Sarah

ISBN 10: 0060254319 ISBN 13: 9780060254315

Publisher: HarperCollins, 1995

Synopsis

A child's introduction to AIDS is presented in a lyrical text that follows a young girl's concern over her neighbor's failing health and her demonstration of support when she wears a red ribbon pinned to her front.

About this title

Reviews

PreSchool-Grade 3-Lyrics to a song (cassette included) whose low-key melody matches the somber subject matter. Eight-year-old Jenny is surprised and saddened by her upstairs neighbor's rapid decline in health and wonders what is wrong. (Apparently he has AIDS, but the illness is never mentioned in the text.) Her mother offers no explanations but gives her a red ribbon. When she ties it in her hair, the woman explains how to wear it pinned to her clothing. "She says the ribbon means 'I care.' " The brief text is surrounded by ample white space. Greene's full-page representational paintings juxtapose the normal, happy occurrences of the girl's life-her birthday and Christmas-with the sober reality of her neighbor's imminent death. In a brief note, offered with selected titles on AIDS and instructions for wearing a red ribbon, the author expresses the hope that the book will inspire questions "...that deserve to be answered." But children will find no answers here. For a more compelling treatment of the topic, try Patricia Quinlan's Tiger Flowers (Dial, 1994).?Marianne Saccardi, Norwalk Community-Technical College, CT
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Publication date: 1995
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0060254319
• ISBN 13: 9780060254315
• Binding: Library Binding
• Illustrator: Greene Jeffrey
• Edition number: 1