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Catalog sorted by age group

Sacred Stories

Sacred Stories is a priceless collection of thirty-five spellbinding stories from distinctive backgrounds and faiths.  Author Marilyn McFarlane takes you on a respectful, engaging, and educational journey through seven major belief systems:

Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Native American, Sacred Earth.

Enhanced by beautiful illustrations and intriguing facts, Sacred Stories draws from a rich storehouse of history, tradition, and symbols of humanity’s deepest needs and longings.  Each captivating story and illustration brings to life the key tenets of a particular belief system, from creation myths to miraculous visions, from gods and goddesses to the Golden Rule.  Appealing to young and old alike, Sacred Stories will expand your understanding of human spirituality in all its wonder.

The Little Brown Jay: A Tale From India

Kindness and helping others often bring unexpected rewards.  Meet Princess Maya and the little brown jay in this magical folktale from India, and find out how unselfish acts bring great joy.

 

The Churki-Burki Book Of Rhyme

Meet Churko and burki, the rhyming sister, and spend a day with them in their billage, playing and singing songs.  Adapted from the Gond arist Durga Bai’s rendering of her own childhood in her village Paranghr, this is a merry tale of fun and rhyme.

Do!

Do! is a set of action pictures rendered in the elegantly minimalist Warli style of tribal art. It introduces basic verbs to the young reader through a series of delicately drawn pictograms, which both illustrate the verb and tell a further string of stories. Every page or pair of pages invites the child to explore a busy world and make up her own tales. The art conjures up a world teeming with human figures, animals, plants, and birds.

The illustrations in Do! were made by people belonging to a tribal community in Maharashtra, in western India. Ramesh Hengadi, Rasika Hengadi, Shantaram Dhadpe, and Kusum Dhadpe are the artists featured in this book.

Do! was conceived of by Gita Wolf, who has written more than seventeen books for children and adults. A highly original and creative voice in contemporary Indian publishing, she has pursued her interest in exploring and experimenting with the form of the book and its status as a revered cultural object.

Excuses Excuses

“Youngsters will delight in Neel’s fantastic excuses… The illustrations, a collage of tinted photographs and art, provide an appropriately surreal backdrop” -Kirkus Reviews” Art and text intertwined with balanced whimsy, imbue Neel’s tall tales with colorful energy and unlimited creativity.” – BookDragon, Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Program Who doesn’t know a child who is always ready with an implausible excuse when caught out by an indignant adult? Excuses Excuses builds on this universal experience using an Indian setting. Young Neel is the boy next door who can’t help getting into trouble, and yet he is endearing in his explanations. He has one for every day of the week and for every kind of adult ? it seems that he may never run out of them! Wildly funny and imaginative, this narrative in nonsense verse is fast-paced and keeps young readers guessing. Unusual and dramatic art that captures the improbable colors of India adds zest to a story that all children would want to be a part of.

Ganesha’s Sweet Tooth

Ganesha is just like any thoer kid, except that he has the head of an elephant and rides around on a magical mouse.  And he love sweets, especially the traditional dessert laddoo. When Ganesha insists on biting into a super jumbo jawbreaker laddoo, his tusk breaks off!  Ganesha is terribly upset, but with the help of the wise post Vyasa, he learns that what seems broken can actually be quite useful after all. The bold, bright colors of India leap right off the page in this fresh and funny picture book adaptation of how Ganesha came to write the epic poem of Hindu literature, the Mahabharate. 

Now

Felix is a grandfather.  He has accomplished much in his life and is widely admired in the community. He has mostly buried the painful memories of his childhood, but the resurface when his granddaughter, Zelda, comes to stay with him. Together, armed only with their gusto and love, they face a cataclysmic event, one that can help them achieve salvation from the past, but also brings the possibility of destruction.

Set in the present day, this is the final book in the final book in the series that began with Once and continued with Then.  It is…Now.

To Hope And Back

Sol and Lisa are two children aboard the St. Louis, a ship full of Jewish passangers escaping Europe to save their lives.

The St. Louis, a luxury ocean liner, leaves Germany in 1939, taking its almost one thousand passangers to a safe haven across the ocean.  They will be making a fresh start in countries like Cuba and the United States, away from the Nazi regime that is trying to destroy them.

Lisa and her family have a large cabin in first class, while Sol and his parents are below in tourist class. They don’t know each other, but they share a mix of feelings: excitement to be crossing the ocean, hope for the future, and sadness at leaving everything they know behind.

Sol and Lisa’s optimism is threatened when the ship is not allowed to dock in Cuba.  What the children don’t know is that their chance for refuge is in jeopardy and a darker future might lie ahead for the jewish passangers on board.

Dragon Castle

Young Prince Rashko is frustrated with his familyÑno one does any thinking but him! The kingdom and castle seem to be in the hands of fools. So when Rashko’s parents mysteriously disappear and the evil Baron Temny parks his army outside the castle walls, it is up to the young prince to save the day. But there is more to this castle and its history than meets the eye, and Rashko will have to embrace his ancestry, harness a dragon, and use his sword-fighting skills to stop the baron and save the kingdom. Along the way, he realizes that his family is not quite as stupid as he always thought. Master storyteller Joseph Bruchac, known for his smart, gripping Native American books, here combines his signature action and adventure with a large dose of humor, which just brings this story to a whole new level.

Timber Wolf

The third book in the series follows the adventures of Jack Byrne, brother of Kit, as he seeks independence from his sister in the lumber camps. Jack works as a cook’s helper but is always yearning for the glory of working with the loggers. Full of confidence, the inexperienced Jack tries his hand at logging only to have his attempts end in a tragic accident for himself and another logger. Circumstances soon find Jack alone and injured in the wilderness. Memories of his past come rushing in as he struggles to survive his guilt over his past and survive the hardship of the woods with only a stray wolf cub for a companion. Jack comes to understand that he must own up to all of his past mistakes if he truly wants to become the strong man he yearns to be.