Materials from Asia
Wolf is feeling offended and indignant: All the wolves he’s ever read about are nasty, scary, and greedy! To set the record straight he decides to write a story about a nice wolf. But will his wolfish instincts get the better of him after all? Author/illustrator Mei Matsuoka’s simple yet sophisticated art imbues Wolf’s story of searching for a friend with wry humor and subtle wit.
Summer has arrived — and so has Koo, Stillwater’s young nephew. And when Stillwater encourages Koo, and his friends Addy, Michael and Karl to help a grouchy old neighbor in need, their efforts are rewarded in unexpected ways.
In Japan, as a provincial governor, his wife, and daughter Yuki, followed by 1,000 attendants, travel the historic Tokaido Road to the Shogun’s palace in Edo. Yuki keeps up with her lessons by writing poems describing the journey.
Come and Play features 32 photographs of children from everywhere. China, Japan, Greece, Wales, Morocco, Oman, Texas, New York, and many more. Each photo is beautiful, thought provoking, and accompanied by lines of children’s poetry that will amuse young readers, and cause adult readers to reflect and laugh as they see the images through children’s eyes. The photographs span the last fifty years; while the children who wrote about them are a diverse group between the ages of 5 and 11.
Apprentice dragonologists Daniel and Beatrice Cook’s mentor is called away at a crucial time, leaving the brother and sister alone to search for an ancient diary that could cure some gravely ill dragons.
“Fleeing from the Khmer Rouge soldiers, Vithy becomes separated from his older brother, Mang, as they escape from Cambodia into Thailand. . . . As Vithy makes the dangerous journey, he comes to rely on his own wits and instincts. Historical novel, adventure, and character study, this book takes readers to another place and time”.–Booklist. American Bookseller Pick of the Lists; NCSS-CBC Notable Children’s Trade Book in the Field of Social Studies; Bank Street Child Study Children’s Book Assn. Children’s Book of the Year.
Henrietta Rich, a New York City teenager, spends a year in China when her father accepts a teaching position in Beijing.
Hannah would much rather be back in Australia, starting high school with her friends. But Japan turns out to be nothing like she’d imagined, and when Hannah and her new friend Miki find an ancient message in the stationery shop, they are drawn into solving a mysterious riddle. Why do the beans go berserk during the bean-throwing festival? Who is the evil-eyed woman at Sarumaru Shrine? Why is Hannah attacked by flying donuts? Is the ocean boy really trying to tell her something? A compelling combination of fact, fantasy, and humor, this middle-grade novel is filled with intriguing characters, exotic locations and baffling events.
Featured in Volume II, Issue 1 of WOW Review.
Born in Afghanistan in the thirteenth century, Rumi settled in Turkey and became a great mystical poet. Although he began his adult life as a highly respected scholar, he found his true calling after being mentored by a holy man, Shamsuddin. From “Shams,” he learned to listen for the sacred sound of God within himself. When his creative spirit was awakened, he recited more than 50,000 rhymed couplets. He also wrote about the love that resides in the soul of everyone regardless of religion or background. He founded the order of the whirling dervishes who believed their spinning dances put them in touch with God and brought peace and love into the world. Although Rumi died 800 years ago, his poems are more widely read now than ever before. To honor the 800th anniversary of his birth, the United Nations declared 2007 The Year of Mawlana Jalaladdin Rumi.
Dom, a fourteen-year-old computer enthusiast, travels to Bangkok in order to find a necklace that his sister had lost three years earlier and to lift the curse that has plagued his family since that time.