I Really Like This One

Just so everyone is clear Norton Juster's The Hello, Goodbye Window is one of my all time favorite books.  That's right all time favorite books, not favorite of just picture books or just Caldecott winners, or just kids books, favorite books.  The story is absolutely charming and full of love and whimsy.  The illustrations, by  Chris Raschka are perfectly paired to the story-so much so that I was shocked to learn this was an author illustrator team, they are so perfectly in sync I thought it had to be done by one person.  The pictures have gorgeous colors and capture the charm, love and whimsy of the story.  I cannot say enough good things about this book.

When I read it to Eva and Leah they also loved it.  This story is about a young girl and her grandparents and all of the adventures that take place around the magical hello, goodbye window ("It looks like a regular window.  But it's not.") at the grandparents house. Eva and Leah have a wonderful relationship with their grandparents and I think that helps them relate to this story.  Leah delighted in pointing out the illustrations, "there's the dinosaur," "there's the lion," while Eva says, "I like the pictures but it looks like a kid made them."

I love the fact that the illustrations are so kid friendly but Eva wasn't sure about it.  You can tell she really liked it but she was skeptical as if it was somehow less of a book becuase it looked like a kid did it.  But the illustrations make this book extremely approachable.  The girls and I had many discussions about whether Poppy could really do all of the things he said he could, and all of the other fun claims of this book that I am forcing myself not to tell you becuase this is a book you have to read.

I was first introduced to this book in my Children's Literature class in unergrad and I immediately went out and bought it.  Whenever I need a little pick me up all I need to do is flip through this book and I immediately get a smile on my face.  It's that good.

Charm, love, and whimsy...that's kids stuff.