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My post modern picturebook of choice is Battle Bunny by Jon Scieszka and Mac Barnett. Pictures by Matthew Myers. This is a book my son received from a library reading program he was a part of during the summer. When I first looked at this book I thought, how odd. Now, having taken this class, I understand this book a little better and the genre it falls in, postmodern picture books.

This book is fun because it it's what I imagine a kid would do to a book if they had free will and were into drawing and creativity. As this story moves on, it becomes almost like a comic book more than a story with the crazy drawings on the pages. The changes appear in pencil, again, like a kid drew on the book. What I like the best is that you can still read the original story but then read the imaginative changes. Makes for a fun reading time with my kid.

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Interrupting Chicken Review by Molly George

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Interrupting Chicken Review by Molly George

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Just like The Three Pigs, this story starts off like a traditional story until the little red chicken jumped in and interrupted the story and made herself be part of the storyline of each of the stories the father tried to read.

This reminds me of children because my son can't sit still long without interrupting, talking, asking questions, etc. I think kids naturally like to be a little scared but just like little chicken, most kids shut their eyes or say stop the story. In little chicken's story, he speeds up the story and changes the scary parts.

I like when the story changed to the little red chicken's story. This would be a great book for a young classroom where you could have student invent their own story just like little chicken did.

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Postmodern picture style is about doing things slightly against the norm with things like non-linear storylines, separate plots, break in images and text in the story that stops the storyline, etc.  This story starts off like a traditional storyline with the images and text. Then, on the third page is when the postmodern picture style first appears with the pig's image on top of the traditional images saying "Hey! He blew me right out of the story!" This is a classic example, of postmodernism where they've taken a classic story and interrupt its flow. The additional pig images continue through the story where the pigs images appear on top or around the traditional images. The pigs are an additional story plot that are changing the main story line as they are blown out of the story or go outside to a safe place.

When the story gets to the brick house, this is clear postmodernism as the pigs actually shove and push the images on the page. This allows the reader to explore a different interpretation and take on a classic storyline. It's like a whole new story because the classic part is minimal compared to the pig's big adventure.

I love the audience involvement when the pig said "I think someone's out there", and then they jumped into a new stories over and over again and picked up characters along the way.

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Interrupting Chicken Review by Sharon Codispoti

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Interrupting Chicken Review by Sharon Codispoti

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The little chicken in this postmodern picturebook has heard the stories his Papa reads to him many times. The books in the illustrations are human-sized, which are very large in comparison to a chicken. Though he is supposed to be winding down for the evening during the read-aloud, the little chicken enthusiastically interrupts each story to warn the storybook characters of the bad choices he knows will lead to their harm. There is a mixing of illustration styles, as the illustrations of Chicken and his Papa are bold and saturated, while the images of the storybook pages are limited in color, and the text is illegible. However, the chicken's interruptions are drawn in clear black-and-white speech bubbles. The discontinuity of the father's reading tone is replaced with the little chicken's unexpected intrusions. As the story progresses, the little chicken is given more control of the read-aloud, and the illustrations become more colorful and child-like, which is more from the little chicken's point of view.

I really enjoyed this book because it depicted the young character behaving in a manner that is typical of many children that are listening to their favorite stories. I remember the time in my life when my own children would select the same picturebooks every night for days or weeks, and I pushed through exhaustion to read-aloud to them as part of their bedtime routine. Honestly, I fell asleep a couple of times before they did, just like Chicken's Papa. Children and adults can both relate to the characters in this book.

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Chester Postmodern Picturebook Review by Sharon Codispoti

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Chester Postmodern Picturebook Review by Sharon Codispoti

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The postmodern picturebook Chester by Melanie Watt is a comical book about a cat who does not want to allow his owner to write a book about a mouse, or really about anyone other than himself. I found it humorous because of the feline stereotype of selfishness. Chester crosses out anything in the book that he doesn't agree with using his red marker, and he tries multiple times to rewrite the story so that he becomes the main character. Finally, his owner, the true author, agrees to allow him to be the focus of the story, but he is less than pleased with how she chooses to do this. The illustrations in this book compliment the text very well. There is an obvious mixing of styles that is a key characteristic of the postmodern picturebook style. The text created by the author is depicted in black print, while the text and illustrations created by Chester are red and unrefined. There is also a discontinuity of tone, as Chester attempts to make changes to everything, including the cover page and endpapers. Because so many children express that they enjoy reading books about animals, I think it would be a fun book to use during writing instruction in an elementary classroom for a writing prompt about pet perspectives.

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The Three Pigs Review by Sharon Codispoti

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The Three Pigs Review by Sharon Codispoti

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Most Americans are very familiar with the story of The Three Little Pigs, but this adaptation of the story takes it to a new level! The book started out fairly similar to every variation I have ever read, with traditional illustrations to complement the text in muted watercolor thinly lined with black ink. However, the reader discovers that there is something different about this book when the first little pig escape's into the white framing between the four panels of illustrations as the wolf blows his house down. The text, which states that the wolf, "ate the pig up..." significantly contradicts the image of a confused wolf searching for the first pig among the ruins of the straw house.

This picturebook is a good example of the postmodern picturebook style because of the mixing of illustration styles that result when the main characters move from one story format to another. They are drawn as one-dimensional characters when they enter a nursery rhyme, but they are depicted as more realistic, with shading and shadows when they exit the illustrations. In a black-and-white dragon story, they lose their colors and become black and white too. There is also a discontinuity of tone when the first storyline transitions to a story about the characters' journey outside of their illustrations and into the white space of picturebook framing. Though the progression of events initially seems random, all of the characters learn how to safely escape the negative outcomes of their initial storyline and live happily ever after with one another. The reader feels immersed in their adventure, as the illustrator uses multiple points of view, including above and below a paper airplane that the three pigs fly through the air of white space on. It was a comical change to the normally serious story of The Three Little Pigs that I really enjoyed, and I think children of all ages will too.

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Don't Push The Button! by Bill Cotter is definitely a post-modern picture book. The monster addresses the reader from the very first page and gives the reader instructions not to push the button. As the book continues the monster decides that it sounds fun to push the button and tells the reader to go ahead and push. Then shenanigans ensue. The monster keeps asking to reader to push the button multiple times or shake the book to try to recover from what happened from pushing the button. This is a post-modern picture book because the reader is the focus of the book and is asked to interact with the character. The illustrations are fairly simple which brings the focus on the monster and the reader, there is nothing else to be distracted by. The cover calls attention to the button and the monster looks like he really wants to push it so it would be easy for students to predict that he finally gives in.

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Interrupting Chicken is a post-modern picture book because of the unexpected disruptions in the text. Papa Chicken sits down to read Little Chicken a bedtime story. The stories he reads are the classic fairy tales that are so familiar to us. As he is reading Little Chicken interrupts and jumps into the story changing it to fit the narrative that he would like it to be. The illustrations change when Papa Chicken is reading the story to make it look like he is holding an old book of fairy tales.

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In the beginning, this version starts off the same as the classic Three Little Pigs. It isn't until the wolf blows too hard and blows the pig off the page that we notice this is a very different story than we know. The pigs are able to visit other fairy tales and collect friends as they go. As they visit each fairy tale, they are changed to match the artistic style of that fairy tale. One fun thing about this book is that the text of each story never changes even though the pigs are disrupting them. We know from the illustrations and the speech bubble that the characters understand what is happening to them. This is a very fun post-modern picture book.

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Interrupting Chicken by David Stein features post-modern picture books and is just like the story The Three Pigs by David Wiesner did by upending readers’ expectations of picture book’s structure. Generally, readers used to a linear story without interruption. However, Interrupting Chicken constantly interspersing storybook pages throughout the story when the Little Chicken jumps into the storybook pages and interrupts her father’s bedtime story. The unpredictable narrative engages readers and could make readers hyper; I believe this is the less bedtime story for children since it makes them stay awake. The visual style changes when the emergence of interspersing storybooks pages in sepia-toned; also, the Little Chicken’s own picture book in crayons with childlike drawing.

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The Three Pigs by David Wiesner an iconic post-modern picture book since it changes the traditional linear narrative to nonlinear format. Also, it offers more interaction for readers to engage the story; as we see the speech balloon “He just blew me out of the book?” In addition, the three pigs are no longer the ones we perceived in the original book; they freely to go through other stories in which we might be familiar, which features post-modern picture books by retelling the story with playfulness of incorporating another story. The visual elements designs include watercolor, colored inks, pencil, and so forth. These changes of visual techniques act as performance.   When three pigs go to the different setting, the artist makes them match the setting on specific page; for instance, they look like cartoons when they are present in the cat and cow pages.

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This Book Just Ate My Dog! by Richard Byrne - Lydia Miles

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This Book Just Ate My Dog! by Richard Byrne - Lydia Miles

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Bella's dog disappears into the gutter of the book (in between the pages), and Bella seeks help. But then the characters there to help Bella find her dog also disappear into the gutter. This picturebook utilizes the physicality of the book itself to create the story, which I find very creative and fun. A note then appears from Bella after all the helpers go missing in the gutter, that directly instructs the readers to turn and shake the book! Everything and everyone come falling back out of the gutter and all is well. Another thing I noticed was the subtle background in this book had a soft, blurry palette so the focus was all on the action and movement of the expressive characters in the foreground. Super cute and interactive book!

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This book is similar to "The Three Little Pigs" because it holds a few other classic children's stories within this story. Papa Chicken reads bedtime folktales to the Little Red Chicken, who knows each story so well that she interrupts Papa to shout out the ending of the story, or at times her own version of how she wants the story to go (“Don’t panic! It was just an acorn” to Chicken Little). I have read this out loud to some kids I nanny and they find it absolutely hilarious, and it can also be a good way to teach manners to little ones who interrupt a lot! The illustrations change between the bedtime stories and the main story using a different medium and style (less color, illustrates a book within the book compared with colorful full bleed images). These characteristics provide multiple perspectives while simultaneously drawing the readers’ attention to the capturing of the stories. Definitely a post-modern picturebook!

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What a fun retelling of a classic! As the wolf enters the story and attempts to follow the plot line as it was originally told, the first pig escapes the story pages and enters into the "reader’s space", or blank white space on the page of the book.  He then proceeds to follow the “pages” of the traditional story to help his bothers out to safety in the readers space with him which leaves the wolf looking confused standing alone in front of each house.  They proceed to make a paper airplane with one of the story pages, and then crash-land in a field of pages from other nursery rhymes.  A few other characters leave their own stories to join the pigs on their journey, such as the cat from Hey Diddle, Diddle, and a dragon from a medieval fairy tale as the pigs weave in and out of storybook pages.  At the end of the book the pigs see a picture of the third brother’s brick home lying on the ground and decide that they would like to go home.  All of the characters in the blank space contribute to straightening the crumpled and mixed up pages of “The Three Little Pigs”, with letter (text) crumbling to the ground as they discuss the making of their own “happy ending”, without the wolf. It breaks the barrier between the story and the reader and almost makes it seem like the characters in the story know you are there too!

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Julian is a Mermaid Review by Sharon Codispoti

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Julian is a Mermaid Review by Sharon Codispoti

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I have to admit that I wasn't really sure what to think of this book at first. I didn't understand where the illustrations were leading as the young boy was pictured in various stages of undressing during the opening commuter train scene. I understood that he was imagining what it would be like to become a mermaid, like the three women he saw with light blue-green mermaid tails on in the train. I wasn't sure if the mermaid women were also part of his imagination until he asked his Nana if she had seen them too, and she replied very matter-of-factly, "I saw them, Honey."

The characters are darker-skinned, and the terms of endearment they have selected for one another indicate that they are probably from the southeastern United States. Individuals from that region of the country often refer to their loved ones as "Honey." I am from that region, and I rarely refer to my own husband by his name. I always call him "Hun" or "Honey." I refer to my own children as "Sweetie" or "Buddy" when they are younger. My cousins in the southeast refer to their grandparents as "Nana" and "Pop".

As the story progressed, Julian removed his clothes at his Nana's house while she was in the shower. He placed a plant on his head to symbolize long hair and tied a curtain around his waist to represent a mermaid tail. When his grandmother entered the room to find what he had done, the expression on her face appeared angry, and the reader is left to wonder why she was reacting in that manner. Even though she leaves the room, she returns with a pearl necklace for Julian to wear before they walked outside together. The illustration that depicted the two of them stepping outside together is symbolic of Julian's Nana's open acceptance of his clothing choices.

It wasn't until the last few pages of the book that I realized Julian's desire to dress like a mermaid was in response to a cultural event that was occurring in his community. It reminds my of Mardi Gras in Louisiana. His Nana brought him to a parade where there were many other people dressed like sea creatures, and Julian fit into the parade perfectly. In the final scene, the three women dressed as mermaids from the commuter train are leading a parade of people. However, on the endpapers, Julian, the mermaid ladies, and Julian's Nana are all depicted as actual mermaids, and Julian's tail is colored pink and yellow. The parade costumes eased the reader into the theme of gender stereotypes, cultural practices, and cross-dressing, which are difficult topics to discuss with children. Julian just wants to express himself and feel accepted, though.

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Drawn Together Review by Sharon Codispoti

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Drawn Together Review by Sharon Codispoti

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Wow! This is a very thoughtfully illustrated picturebook about the power of nonverbal communication through artistic expression.

The book opens with 5 panels of illustrations covering a two-page spread. The medium used to create the images is traditional pen, watercolor, and markers. There are no words, so the reader must make inferences about what the images are trying to communicate. A young boy rings a doorbell, a door opens, the two exchange a traditional bow/greeting for respect, a car is waved to in the distance, and the boy is welcomed into the elderly man's home. On the next two-page spread, there is another set of 5 panels that show the difference between the younger child and the elderly man. A bowl of ramen and a plate with a hot dog and french fries fill the two panels on the left page. The boy is eating with a fork, and the older man is eating with chopsticks. When they try to start a conversation, their languages are written in different text types. Then, a three-dot ellipsis hovers near each character to indicate thought without speech. It is clear that the two characters in this book are separated by culture, language, and age, even though they occupy the same space.

As the book progresses, the young boy begins to draw, and the older man, who I assume is the grandfather, shows interest in the boy's colorful drawing of a wizard. The grandfather brings his sketch book and oil-based inks close to the boy so that they can create a story and artwork together. This is when the illustrator chose to transition from panels to full-bleed illustrations, where the reader feels immersed in the story. With each page, the text sentences that represent the boy's thoughts are left unfinished, to encourage the reader to keep turning the pages. The blend of the grandfather's tight monochromatic artistic style with the boy's loose and colorful brush strokes adds interest. At the climax of the story, the grandfather's samurai-like character defeats a dragon with the colorful wizard wand drawn by his grandson. This signifies an adaptation to creative styles that was learned through their collaboration. In the last pages of the book, the illustrator reverts back to comic-like panels to show the grandfather waving goodbye to his grandson as he drives away with his daughter. He is holding his grandson's red marker, and his grandson is holding his black ink brush.

The illustrator used his knowledge of Thai culture and traditional media to create images that significantly enhanced the text of this picturebook. The text alone could not tell the story that the illustrator created.

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Julian Is A Mermaid Review by Angie DeGraw

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Julian Is A Mermaid Review by Angie DeGraw

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Both picture books today have beautifully illustrated the love between a grandparent and grandchild. I loved everything about this book. Julian is a boy who loves mermaids and imagines becoming one. His beautiful grandmother, rather than trying to redirect him into normative gender roles, supports and loves him just the way he is. The illustrations of him imagining turning into a mermaid are full bleed and vignettes that show the process of this change. I just love the pictures of Julian with his idea of turning himself into a mermaid with the plant as hair and the curtains as his tail. It is such a perfect representation of a child's mind and how resourceful they are when they are using their imaginations. This is just an incredible story that shows unconditional love.

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Julian is a boy who wishes he were a beautiful mermaid and by the end is participating in the Coney Island Mermaid Parade! This book, like "Drawn Together", contains minimal text with large full bleed illustrations of Julian and his imagination of becoming a mermaid and creativity of making it happen. The text clearly stated that "Julian is a boy" and the illustration depicted a very non-gendered child, where if the text hadn't announced that, you wouldn't otherwise be able to tell - this was definitely intentional and very integral to the way the story was told and illustrated. This book introduces young readers to support of freedom of expression, which I absolutely love! The abuela's acceptance and expression when she sees Julian all dressed up, as well as the colors used in these illustrations makes this story come to life with empathy and care. Big fan of this one!

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There are so many wonderful things happening in this book. The grandfather and grandson clearly love each other and are looking to connect but struggle until they find the shared love of drawing. This story takes them on a shared adventure of their creation.  I love that the dragon symbolizes the distance between them and they use drawing together as the bridge to reunite. The different styles of drawings shows the generational gap and though they are very different, they come together to make a more  beautiful picture.

The endpapers give us a clue into the book. The front endpaper is colorful and playful in the grandson's style while the back endpaper is black and white in the grandfather's style. The story begins with the vignettes of many pictures without words on each page showing us and the story advancing in a quiet way making us feel that the grandson and grandfather didn't have much to say to each other and perhaps felt some awkwardness between them. As the story progresses the pictures become larger until there is one picture in the grandson's style on one page and a picture in the grandfather's style on the other. The styles then begin to collide together until there are full bleed illustrations at the climax. The story does go back to the vignettes but there is still full color on each page symbolizing the growth and love between the grandfather and grandson. This was a wonderful story.

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Drawn Together by Le and Dan Santat was just the cutest story, my goodness! The storyboard layout that the illustrator chooses to use allows the book to be told with few words and mostly images, which is congruent to the story itself as the grandpa and grandson communicate mostly via drawn images rather than spoken or written words. The black and white images that the grandfather paints represent a more traditional Vietnamese style of art where the child's crayon drawing of the superhero represents a more westernized upbringing. The two are able to come together through art, and as they do so, they storyboard disappears and the illustrations become full-bleed and integrated between the child and grandpas artistic styles. The dichotomy represented in art styles between the characters is also represented in the illustrations of the meal shared between the two characters, where the son eats a hotdog and the grandpa eats a bowl of noodles with soft boiled eggs. The illustrations in this book tell a much larger story than if we just had the text itself, and offers much greater meaning and interpretation than we would otherwise experience. Really enjoyed this one.

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“Julian is a Mermaid “ illustrated gender in dress and outward appearance. “Julian is a boy”the written text says. If I merely see the illustration, I could not identify Julian’s gender. In the following opening, it describes how Julian enjoy dressing like a mermaid and being comfortable to wear what one’s like. Julian’s behaviors might challenge the gender norm in dress; however, Julian’s grandmother instead of judging him, she takes these as normal behaviors and even encourages Julian to be oneself as she finally to make Julian’s dream come true by taking Julian to the mermaid’s party. I believe readers could feel the atmosphere is full of joy and warm if we solely appreciate the illustrations, but when reading written texts, readers might think of gender in dress, which implies how social norms influences the way we look at people in dress that does not meet gender norm in dress. It is worthy of pondering if the illustration represents the gender stereotype in dress.

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“Drawn Together” described the family bond of the grandfather and the grandson. It seemed that there was a generation gap in ages, cultural differences, and languages since they had different diet habits (western styles versus eastern styles), drawing tools (color pens versus Asian painting brush), and languages (English versus Thai). The gap between them was metaphorize a bridge where the dragon emerged; drawing together served as a connection to them and even closed the gap by battling against the dragon together in a vibrant blended of iconic western and Asian painting features world. When taking a close look, the grandfather and the grandson exchanged their weapons (painting tools) to beat the dragon and they immersed themselves in using their new weapons, as the changing color of dragon’s destroyed scales from colorful scales to black and white when the grandson waved the Asian painting brush. The black and white presented Asian painting style and color indicated the grandson’s painting style, which represented both started appreciating each other’s culture and built a closer relationship when they ran to each other on the dragon bridge. It is interesting that dragon usually symbolizes auspiciousness in Asian culture, and it could be understandable for the grandson who grew up in western culture that sometimes perceives dragons are evil. The dragon after all was symbolized as a bridge serving as a reconciliation of knowledge of both cultures.

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Julian Is a Mermaid Review by Molly George

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Julian Is a Mermaid Review by Molly George

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Again, I'm drawn back to HsingJung because I think this was your mentioned book in our class introductions. I've been meaning to read it and glad I've gotten the opportunity in this week's lesson. I LOVE that the Nana accepted Julian without question which made the whole book for me. That unconditional love and acceptance! So many children don't get to experience what that is like and it makes me sad. This book goes beyond unconditional love and expresses self acceptance, imagination, and creativity. The picture book lays flat which allows us to view these big, horizontal images across the pages. The text is minimal and blends into the pages making the images the most important thing on the page. This is a beautiful picturebook!

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On the first pages I'm instantly remembering HsingJung's FligGrid video stating that having many pictures on a page shows a passage of time. On these first few pages, you can already tell that the boy is not excited to see his grandparent. I like that this story talks about communicating without words, beyond words. I think that's what children's literature represents to me, the pictures telling the story. Yes, some books do not have pictures, but most do and most enhance the story for the reader. Pictures allow for the universal "reading" of the book even when the language isn't understood. Anyone can look at the pictures and discover their own meaning and interpretation. I like this book because it's about building a bond with a family member and breaking down the barriers. Building relationships is tough but it makes it a little easier finding a connection as this boy did with his grandfather.

Watching the second video from the illustrator, it's amazing to see the various mediums used to create the images in the story. How one line forming with other lines forms a picture. How the thick, deep colored whooshing black lines gives the illusion that the boy is flying. Beautiful artistry!