Shaker Lane - Softcover

Alice Provensen; Martin Provensen

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0140507132 ISBN 13: 9780140507133

Publisher: Puffin, 1990

Synopsis

When the town decides to build a reservoir on their land, the residents of Shaker Lane decide to move away rather than fight to keep their homes

About this title

From School Library Journal:

Grade 1 Up A non-sentimental account of ``social progress,'' a pattern of life common to all parts of this country and probably most Western societies. As the Herkimer sisters, rural inhabitants, grew old, they sold off parts of their land to those with modest incomes and a laid-back lifestyle. Then land developers arrived, created a reservoir, and forced the poor to move out to be replaced by middle-class families. Low key in the telling, with a focus on the people, the double-page spread paintings capture the horizontality of the landscape. Opaque, flat colors define clapboard houses, bare autumn branches, and a motley assortment of pooches with equal conviction. The Provensens show the makings of a rural ``slum,'' and readers feel the sense of community built by the La Roses and the Kulicks and the Whipple twins. Each group is defined as individuals by the details of their lives: the condition of their houses, the variety of junk in the yard, the kind of vehicle parked on the grass. Although there's no doubt about the aura of authenticity of the scenes painted, there's equally no doubt about the Provensens' thoughtfulness of the range of yellow-greens used to depict fallow fields, or the use of a few bright clothes on a clothesline to contrast with the graying landscape or the scruffy clouds that add emotional stature to the scene announcing the building of the reservoir. A beautiful blend of direct telling and subtle showing. Kenneth Marantz, Art Education Department, Ohio State University, Columbus
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Publishers Weekly:

Called "an unforgettable piece of real estate" in a boxed PW review, this spare story chronicles the transformation of a rural street into a characterless suburban housing development. All ages.
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Puffin
• Publication date: 1990
• ISBN 10: 0140507132
• ISBN 13: 9780140507133
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 320