Skip to main content

Herman and Rosie

By

Herman and Rosie
by Gus Gordon
Roaring Book Press, 2013.  Unpaged. Picture Book.

     "I have at last, after several months' experience made up my mind that [New York] is a splendid desert--a domed and steepled solitude, where the stranger is LONELY in the midst of a million of his race."  -Mark Twain-  Herman Schubert, a crocodile, lives alone in New York City. He works in a cube farm "selling things," but when he gets home he likes to play his oboe.  He also likes wild boysenberry yogurt, the smell of hot dogs in winter, and films about the ocean.  Rosie Bloom, a deer, also lives by herself. She works in a restaurant washing dishes, but after work she takes voice lessons, and at night she sings in a small jazz club. One her own time, Rosie listens to old jazz recordings (Dizzy Holiday, Louis Basie, and various other mashups). She also likes toffee, singing on the fire escape . . . and watching films about the ocean. By and by Herman gets fired for talking too much about creatures of the sea and not selling enough things, and Rosie's little jazz club goes out of business. Herman and Rosie are lonesome and sad,  until the night Herman plays his oboe on the roof of his apartment building and Rosie finds him.  The rest is cheerful history, and Herman and Rosie become two people in New York who are lonely no more.  Gordon's story and pictures are a pure delight (don't miss the two anteaters playing cards).  One of my favorite picture books of the year.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Review: Faker

By
Faker By Gordon Korman New York: Scholastic Press, 2024. Fiction. 214 pages. 12-year-old Trey is used to starting over at a new school -- he has the routine perfectly memorized: make new friends, introduce his dad to the wealthy parents of his new friends, and "Houdini" themselves out of there before they get caught running their latest scam. Trey's dad is a master con artist, and Trey has just been promoted to full-partner. Their new scheme for the next big score brings them to the affluent suburb of Boxelder, TN where Trey's dad has cooked up a fake electric car company for investors to buy into. The only problem is that Trey is starting to grow tired of moving around and never putting down roots, especially after forming a fast friendship with Logan and developing a crush on Kaylee, a socially conscious girl in his class. As Trey longs for a normal life, is there any way he can convince his dad to get out of the family business? Gordon Korman is a perennial favorit...
Post a Comment
Read more

Review: The Bletchley Riddle

By
  The Bletchley Riddle By Ruta Sepetys and Steve Sheinkin New York: Viking, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, 2024. Fiction. 392 pages. It's spring of 1940, Hitler has swept through most of Europe, and people believe England will be next. Half Polish-Jewish, half American Jakob has been recruited from Cambridge to Bletchley Park where they are working on deciphering the enigma machine. Jakob's sister Lizzie, meanwhile, is being forced to move from London to Cleveland to live with her grandmother after her mother disappeared in a 1939 attack in Poland. Lizzie manages to escape the keeper her grandmother sent for her to bring her to America and makes her way to Bletchley, where she's eventually given the task of delivering messages between departments. When secret messages begin appearing with Lizzie's belongings, she must decipher them to find the truth about her mother's past and location, while keeping the secrets away from the MI5 agent that seems a little t...
Post a Comment
Read more

Dragon Run

By
Dragon Run by Patrick Matthews Scholastic, 2013.  336 pgs.  Fantasy      Al Pilgrommor is excited for Testing Day, when he will receive his rank, a tattooed number on the back of his neck, and a path forward to his future occupation and life.  He feels confident because his parents were fours on a scale of seven, but he is worried for his friend Wisp who doesn't have much of a chance of scoring above a two at best. But when Al is scored a zero, he not only has no prospects, he may lose his life as the dreaded Cullers are unleashed to kill him and his family to purify the land's bloodlines.  Al's world is ruled by dragons--the lords and supposed creators of humankind--so he thinks that even if he survives, he will have to make his living as a beggar or thief. But when Al sticks up for his Earther friend in front of Magister Ludi, he is drawn into the struggle of a secret organization hoping to destroy the Cullers, and perhaps the dragons them...
1 comment
Read more