We'll Ride Elephants Through Brooklyn

Come join the fun! When Grandpa gets better, his granddaughter will lead a parade through Brooklyn. Illustrated in vibrant collage, this is a true celebration of family and love.

PreSchool-Grade 2-- A child narrator describes the celebration, with both plausible and fantastic elements, that will occur when her grandfather gets better. (No particular illness is specified.) She imagines a parade of elephants through Brooklyn with a band, balloons, and dancing. After a strong beginning, the impact is diluted by the inclusion of "My red shoes won't pinch me" and "My hair won't have tangles," which seem irrelevant to the subject at hand, and by the last page, which concludes, "and we did." Brilliantly colored and highly stylized collages provide a sunny, joyous atmosphere for the text. The little girl's hair streams across the pages like sunbeams. This is another tribute to intergenerational love, a popular subject these days, and surely a reflection of the childhood yearning for everything to be okay. --Leda Schubert, Vermont Department of Education, Montpelier
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

"We'll ride elephants through Brooklyn when Grandpa gets better." All the unspoken anxiety and fear of loss when a beloved family member falls ill is in the background of this colorful and imaginative exercise in coping. A granddaughter with streaming yellow hair imagines what it will be like when Grandpa recovers and they romp through the city streets in celebration. She'll blow a whistle and beat a drum. Cascading petals from sunflowers will form a carpet on the street. A thousand balloons will rise as aunts and uncles dance the polka in festive clothes. All family differences will be put aside and cousins and cats will turn cartwheels with abandon. The boldly individual cut-paper collages build to a crescendo of color by the end of the book, when the girl's unasked, but ever-present, question is finally answered: the recurring "We'll ride elephants through Brooklyn when Grandpa gets better," is countered with "And we did!" This optimistic, fanciful book offers comfort and reassurance. Ages 3-up.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.