When my teenage daughter was going through an excruciatingly hard time, she taught me something that has stayed with me forever. She said, "Don't try to fix it, just listen." Maybe Tomorrow? is about that superpower. I'm the author of many books for children and young adults, and one professional development book for fellow teachers. I'm originally from Sweden, but grew up in Canada and Hong Kong. I made my way to Maine, USA, where I have spent all of my adult life so far. I have an Ed.M from the Harvard Graduate School of Education but think some my most enduring lessons have come from the students in my public school classrooms.
Elba has a big block. She's been dragging it around for a long time. Norris dances everywhere he goes, even uphill. He is always surrounded by a zany cloud of butterflies. Can Norris and his butterflies help ease Elba's sadness and convince her to join them on a trip to the ocean?
The idea for Maybe Tomorrow came about when a student asked me if I ever got writer’s block. I said, “No, Emily, I'm more likely to have too many ideas.” The notion of ideas like butterflies kept following me around as if I were some kind of Norris, and, eventually, dour and sad Elba presented herself to me. She was dragging around her block (not writer’s block, but a deeper block - her immense grief made physical). Working with children, as I do, I think it is important to address life’s big issues through art and books. Issues, for example, like death and sadness. Maybe Tomorrow does this, focusing on friendship, listening, and its power to help us go on.
Jamaican
American author/illustrator Rohan Henry, in a deceptively simple sweet book,
illustrates the gift of true understanding and friendship. I first met Rohan at
a book fair here in Maine, when we traded books - one of my early picture books
(Dancing Feet) for his self-published The Perfect Gift. I happened to be
having lunch with my agent the next day. I showed her this book and she sold
the rights almost immediately. It's now out in several languages and is, in my
estimation, the perfect gift.
In the tradition of Shel Silverstein's beloved stories, Jamaican artist Rohan Henry presents a simple and touching story of love and friendship. Leo and Lisa are long-time best friends and Leo wants to give her that one special gift to show her how he feels. The first leaf of autumn, the most delicate snowflake ever, an exquisite spring butterfly - but none of them endures. So Leo sets off in search of the perfect gift.With charming black-and-white illustrations accented with a second colour, the book conveys its message with simplicity and grace. Rohan has created a timeless parable of friendship…
This
book floored me. As an immigrant, as a public school teacher, as a human. This
is a story of self-preservation by storytelling. Nayeri and his mother and
sister flee Iran in the middle of the night, and - via Italy - end up in
Oklahoma. To protect himself from relentless bullying in the classroom, a boy
named Khosrou (Nayeri!) spins tales like Scheherezade. True tales, featuring
the secret police, blood-soaked fields, complicated and loving relatives, and
the scent of jasmine. Fitting in is hard. Telling one's story is vital.
Nayeri's manage to be beautiful, terrifying, and hilarious, all at once. Listen
in!
At the front of a middle school classroom in Oklahoma, a boy named Khosrou (whom everyone calls "Daniel") stands, trying to tell a story. His story. But no one believes a word he says. To them he is a dark-skinned, hairy-armed boy with a big butt whose lunch smells funny; who makes things up and talks about poop too much.
But Khosrou's stories, stretching back years, and decades, and centuries, are beautiful, and terrifying, from the moment his family fled Iran in the middle of the night with the secret police moments behind them, back to the sad, cement refugee…
When this author is confined to her bed for a year, she passes the time
watching and noting the small doings of a Neohelix albolabris—a common
forest snail. Bailey's powers of observation are a mix of poetry and science that
slowed my heart down to a comfortable pace I will call: Here I Might Manage to
Listen to the Mysteries of Existence, that is, a very healing pace of listening
and being.
While an illness keeps her bedridden, Elisabeth Bailey watches a wild snail that has taken up residence in a terrarium alongside her bed. She enters the rhythm of life of this mysterious creature, and comes to a greater understanding of her own confined place in the world. In a work that beautifully demonstrates the rewards of closely observing nature, she shares the inspiring and intimate story of her close encounter with Neohelix albolabris - a common woodland snail.
Intrigued by the snail's world - from its strange anatomy to its mysterious courtship activities - she becomes a fascinated and amused…
A husband loses his wife. Two young boys lose their mother. They are
unmoored, in shambles. Into their house moves the perfect visitor, a most
unlikely and unloveable therapist: a crow. He stays as long as he needs to
stay, a sort of Mary Poppins of the soul. This strange multi-genre book really
made me think about grief and listening. Listening to oneself, first and
foremost.
A SUNDAY TIMES TOP 100 NOVEL OF THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY
Winner of the 2016 International Dylan Thomas Prize and the Sunday Times/Peter, Fraser + Dunlop Young Writer of the Year award and shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award and the Goldsmiths Prize.
In a London flat, two young boys face the unbearable sadness of their mother's sudden death. Their father, a Ted Hughes scholar and scruffy romantic, imagines a future of well-meaning visitors and emptiness.
In this moment of despair they are visited by Crow - antagonist, trickster, healer, babysitter. This sentimental bird is drawn to the grieving family…
This is a murder mystery but it is still about listening. And who is
murdering whom, anyway? Told in the person of an eccentric Polish recluse,
Janina, this book had me rooting for strange outcomes. The very earth is
listening to us dangerous humans and cannot be silent anymore. Part ode to
William Blake, part naturalist's hymn, part the demented story of a possible
crackpot (or saint), this book's warp and weft are grief and listening.
With DRIVE YOUR PLOW OVER THE BONES OF THE DEAD, Nobel Prize in Literature laureate Olga Tokarczuk returns with a subversive, entertaining noir novel. In a remote Polish village, Janina Duszejko, an eccentric woman in her sixties, recounts the events surrounding the disappearance of her two dogs. She is reclusive, preferring the company of animals to people; she's unconventional, believing in the stars; and she is fond of the poetry of William Blake, from whose work the title of the book is taken. When members of a local hunting club are found murdered, Duszejko becomes involved in the investigation. By…
Charley Byrne isn’t really living. She hunkers down in her apartment above the bookstore she manages, until quirky activist Xander Wallace lures her out of social exile with the prospect of friendship and romance. Charley joins Xander’s circle of diverse friends and thrives, even leaving her comfort zone to join protests in a city struggling with social justice ills.
But the new friendships bring back-to-back betrayals that threaten the bookstore—Charley’s haven—and propel her into a dangerous depression, in a stark reminder that friendship has the power to destroy as well as save lives. Can her friends save the store? And…
"A beautifully crafted story of friendship and self-discovery set amidst the harsh realities of today's world. Superb!" -Eileen O'Finlan, author of Erin's Children
Charley Byrne isn't really living. At age 29, she hunkers down in her apartment above the bookstore she manages, afraid of a 7-year curse. Then quirky activist Xander Wallace lures her out of social exile with the prospect of friendship and romance. Charley joins Xander's circle of friends diverse in their heritage, race, gender and sexual orientation. She thrives, even leaving her comfort zone to join protests in a city struggling with social justice ills.
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