I now have three years' experience in reading children's books to my daughter. Some of them my daughter chooses night after night for their cadence and cuteness (such as Gossie by Olivier Dunrea). Some of them I think my daughter chooses because she senses that I think they're important to read (such as A Children's Bible).
A select few I choose whenever I get the chance.
Through the blessing of a multi-county interlibrary loan system, we had Adam Rex's Tree Ring Circus for about six weeks. Rex's brilliant focal point (a single tree) in which a fantastical menagerie comes to roost (including two tigers, three chipmunks, and a runaway clown named Pogo) provides the content for an expert piece of poetry. Tree Ring Circus sets the poem against a backdrop of illustrations that remind me of Tim Burton's works. Its off-kilter realism delivers to the eyes what a Moroccan tajine does to the palate: succulent satisfaction with layers of exotic spice.
The best part: the poetry and the illustrations together bring the story to a climax (when the elephant climbs the tree) which causes my daughter to ask in a gleeful voice, every time, "What's gonna happen next?"
Would you like to find out?
Adam Rex, Tree Ring Circus. You'll want to be three again.
~ emrys
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