The Tub People - Softcover

Conrad, Pam

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0064433064 ISBN 13: 9780064433068

Publisher: HarperCollins, 1999

Synopsis

During an unseen child's bath time, the seven members of a wooden toy family ride on the floating soap and compete in swimming races. But after the near loss of the Tub Child down the drain, they are all reunited on a warm bed, where they mountain climb on the ridges formed by soft quilts.

About this title

About the Author

Pam Conrad wrote many award-winning books for children, including the immensely popular The Tub People and The Tub Grandfather, both illustrated by Richard Egielski. She is also the author of a number of critically acclaimed novels, including Prairie Songs, a 1986 ALA Best Children's Book of the Year and a 1985 ALA Golden Kite Honor Book, and Stonewords, winner of the 1991 Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Juvenile Mystery.

Richard Egielski is the Caldecott Medal-winning illustrator of Hey, Al and many other books for children, including the Tub People series by Pam Conrad. He is also the author and illustrator of Buz and Jazper, both New York Times Best Illustrated Books, Three Magic Balls, and The Gingerbread Boy. Mr. Egielski lives in Milford, New Jersey, with his wife and son.

From School Library Journal

Kindergarten-Grade 3-- A deceptively simple story about seven small wooden dolls (a grandma, a boy and his parents, a dog, a doctor, and a policeman). They coexist with people, first as objects for bathtime and then, after the boy gets stuck in the drain, as windowsill decorations. But there's a spookiness, a surreality about the manner of their interactions that invites readers to use them allegorically. The temptation to perceive the actions of these dolls as a family set in a political state that severely limits their lives is strong. Egielski's crisply delineated, deceptively simple scenes create a visual world that adds considerably to the surrealism. There is no question about the inanimateness of these slickly painted, clothespinlike figures. But--with dots and a few lines as facial clues, can we be "reading" their thoughts? Close-ups are used to make a reasonably scaled world for these figures. Thus patterns of shadows, soap foam, quilt, and tools are blown up to take on new identities. Pictures and words interact in ways that magnetize readers, causing them to linger over a page and to turn back to test a theory of meaning. --Kenneth Marantz, Art Education Department, Ohio State University, Columbus
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0064433064
• ISBN 13: 9780064433068
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 32
• Illustrator: Egielski Richard