Pink Paper Swans

Janetta, intrigued by the paper animals her neighbor Mrs. Tsujimoto makes, learns the art of origami and becomes Mrs. Tsujimoto's hands when her arthritis makes it difficult for her to continue

Grade 1-3-An origami friendship story. Eight-year-old Janetta Jackson is fascinated by the skill with which Mrs. Tsujimoto folds boxes, birds, whales, cats, and crabs to sell to local gift shops. "'...I'm gonna burst if I don't ask you how you do it...I ain't never seen anything like it,'" she says to her. When arthritis forces the elderly woman to stop and confines her to her apartment, the little girl gladly offers to be her hands and legs. Clouse's collage illustrations glow with the colors and patterns of origami paper; squares, triangles, and animal figures (all of which appear to be cut rather than actually folded, a minor disappointment) dance across the pages, and the contrast between the dignified, elegantly posed Japanese woman and the polite but lively African-American youngster adds even more movement and energy. Mrs. Tsujimoto's offer to teach Janetta bonsai techniques at the end may be laying the multiculturalism on a bit thickly, but this fine introduction to the pleasures of an ancient craft includes realistic touches-Janetta accidentally crumples a model Mrs. Tsujimoto gives her, and her own first efforts are not successful. The book concludes with directions for making a simple swan, with standard diagrams.
John Peters, New York Public Library
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Janetta spends steamy summer days outside her apartment building, mesmerized by a neighbor who is "making things from paper with no glue, no tape, not even any scissors." When Janetta asks how she does "that foldin'. I ain't never seen anything like it," Mrs. Tsujimoto demonstrates and presents the girl with a delicate pink swan. The following summer, Mrs. Tsujimoto's arthritis is so painful that she is no longer able to make her origami figures, which she had sold at local stores. Janetta devises a plan ("You be the mind. I'll be the fingers"); the woman teaches the girl her craft, and they become partners. Though Kroll's ( I Wanted to Know All About God ) story could use some pruning, it is gentle and affecting. Clouse's ( Puzzle Maps U.S.A. ) cut-paper collages are a happy amalgam of geometric, origami-like shapes, silhouettes and realistic scenes. The book's final pages include concise, illustrated instructions for making an origami swan. Ages 5-8.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Sitting in their city apartment's shadow on hot days, Janetta is fascinated by Mrs. Tsujimoto, who makes origami so quickly that cranes ``fly right out of her hands.'' Mama always says, ``Don't you be botherin' folks''; still, the old woman once gives the young African-American girl a paper frog, which she can't reconstruct after unfolding it, and later a swan, which she treasures all winter. When Mrs. Tsujimoto doesn't appear the next summer, Janetta goes to her apartment and learns that she has arthritis: ``My fingers do not cooperate any longer.'' Worried that her neighbor can no longer make origami to sell, Janetta makes an offer: ``You be the mind. I'll be the fingers''; and after much practice, the joint venture is as successful as the new friendship. The story is rather deliberately multicultural, with Janetta's speech realistically informal (``I ain't never seen anything like it'') and her friend's home a showcase for Japanese culture; still, Kroll's nicely cadenced narrative and telling details and Clouse's attractive collages in flat origami colors soften the over-obvious intent. (Picture book/Young reader. 5-9) -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Ages 5-9. Janetta Jackson watches Mrs. Tsujimoto, her neighbor, fold origami animals but is too shy to ask how this paper magic works. Eventually, to Janetta's delight, Mrs. Tsujimoto does show the girlhow to make the green paper frogs and the swallows with forked tails and the beautiful pink swans. Later, when Mrs. Tsujimoto's arthritis makes it impossible to do the origami that is her livelihood, Janetta becomes her helper, folding colored papers under the woman's direction. The text is a bit staid, but Kroll's story of an interracial, intergenerational friendship comes alive in Clouse's full-color, cut-paper collages, the perfect medium for the story. Samples of origami are whimsically scattered through the pages, priming kids for the final instruction page that shows readers how to make their own pink swans. An absolute delight that will catch kids' eyes and spark their imagination. Ilene Cooper