Building Our House - Hardcover

Bean, Jonathan

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0374380236 ISBN 13: 9780374380236

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR), 2013

Synopsis

Perfect for the little builders in your life, this warm-hearted and unique picture book is all about “building a house and turning it into a home” (Publishers Weekly), inspired by award-winning author-illustrator Jonathan Bean’s own childhood.

In this can’t-miss book for kids who love tools, trucks, and all things construction-related, readers join a girl and her family as they pack up their old house in town and set out to build a new one in the country. Mom and Dad are going to make the new house themselves, from the ground up, with a helping hand from their lucky kiddos. From empty lot to finished home, every stage of their year-and-a-half-long building project is captured here―page after page brimming with machines, vehicles, and all kinds of house-making activities!

As he imagines it through the eyes of his older sister, Building Our House is Jonathan Bean’s retelling of his own family’s true experience building their home, and includes an author’s note with real-life family photographs.

“Raise the roof for this picture book. It's something special.” ―Kirkus Reviews, starred review

Did you love Building Our House? Then pick up a copy of This Is My Home, This Is My School, another autobiographically inspired picture book from Jonathan Bean about the special rhythms and routines of a homeschooling family.

About this title

About the Author

JONATHAN BEAN received an M.F.A. from New York's School of Visual Arts and now lives in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. A two-time winner of the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, for At Night and Building Our House, he is also the illustrator of Big Snow, two picture books by Lauren Thompson, and Bad Bye, Good Bye by Deborah Underwood.

Reviews

An author’s note reveals that this picture book is based on personal experience, as Bean’s parents built their own house when he was a young child. Here we follow a mother, father, two children (and, eventually, a new baby) over the course of a year and a half—through a harsh winter and plenty of lumber pickups—all the way to move-in day at their new abode. Told from the point of view of the oldest child, a girl, the challenges and rewards involved in constructing from scratch become clear. The kids are not exempt from the do-it-yourself action, and they happily help “fill the loud mixing machine.” Bean (At Night, 2007) makes use of every inch of the tall trim size here, filling his pages to the brim with heavily lined illustrations of bustling people and activity—often as a series of four vignettes across a spread. What’s heartwarming throughout is the depiction of a tight-knit family (“My family makes up a strong crew of four”). The author’s concluding personal photos add to the loving feel. Grades K-3. --Ann Kelley

Edition details

• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)
• Publication date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0374380236
• ISBN 13: 9780374380236
• Binding: Hardcover
• Illustrator: Bean Jonathan
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 48