Review by Booklist Review
Ages 5^-8. A Mexican family prepares for and celebrates the Day of the Dead in this small, square book that combines facts about the holiday foods and rituals with a sense of what they mean. Spanish phrases are a natural part of the storytelling as the children ask questions about all the cooking and preparations. Suspense builds until finally the big night comes and the candlelit procession moves along to the graveyard, where the loved ones lie buried. Winter's brilliantly colored, acrylic illustrations in folk-art style express the magic realism that is part of the ceremony under the stars. Details from the narrative pictures spill out of the frames and light up the thick black borders with fruits, pastries, petals, skulls, and angels. The families sing and dance and feast and remember their loved ones, whose spirits are with them this night. Then they leave marigolds on the graves and walk home carrying candles like stars. --Hazel Rochman
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Readers take a ringside seat during the preparation for and observance of Mexico's three-day celebration of the dead in this dazzling little volume. Winter's (Josefina) dust jacket (resembling a Mexican paper cutout) integrates a silhouetted skull and marigold motif against a festive backdrop of purple, fuschia and turquoisea visual theme echoed in the endpapers and beyond. Inside its covers, in text that copiously interlaces Spanish words and phrases, Johnston (The Magic Maguey; The Wagon) tracks one family in the days preceding the annual fiestathe mixing, the baking, the fruit and flower pickingand the children can scarcely contain their excitement, or their hunger (" `¿Ni una miga?' they ask. `No,' mamá says. `Not one crumb.' "). When the big night finally arrives, the whole village forms a processional, carrying food for the feast and bearing marigold bouquets ("dropping a path of petals for the spirits to find their way"). The empanadas, tamales and pan de muertos (bread of the dead) are laid out on the graves of abuelos (grandparents) and ancestors, and the celebration begins. Winter frames gem-like images of these scenes within thick black borders accented with bright images drawn from the textred chiles, orange marigold petals, pink and green decorated calaveras de azúcar (sugar skulls). Together Johnston and Winter bring this mystical day of the dead vividly to life, and may even provide an uplifting way for children to think about their own dearly departed. All ages. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review
K-Gr 3This graphically arresting treatment of the Mexican celebration introduces its traditions in story form. As two children notice all the food being cooked, the flowers being gathered, and the special packages bought at the bakery, they long to taste, smell, and investigate. The repeated refrains, "Wait" and "Espérense," add to readers' and listeners' curiosity. The acrylic illustrations are bold and stylized, with wide black borders decorated with varying designs. Although the book's small size makes it difficult to share with a large group, it will work one-on-one and with small groups. It also provides a wonderful bridge to Diane Hoyt-Goldsmith's Day of the Dead (Holiday, 1995), which looks at the holiday in a Mexican-American context, or George Ancona's wonderful Pablo Remembers (Lothrop, 1993), a photo essay on El día de los muertos as experienced by a young Mexican boy and his family.Ann Welton, Terminal Park Elementary School, Auburn, WA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
A festive jacket and bright endpapers set the tone for this look at the Mexican holiday. Simple but effectively composed paintings, rich with color, are framed in black and bordered by an image from the illustrations. The brief text, sprinkled with Spanish and less spirited than the art, tells of a family's preparations for and their participation in ceremonies honoring 'los abuelos'. An author's note provides more explanation. From HORN BOOK 1997, (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
The team that collaborated so gracefully on Diego (1991) returns with another little book showing how a Mexican family celebrates el d¡a de los muertos, the holiday commemorating the dead. Everyone spends days preparing special foods, which are carried in a candlelight procession to the cemetery for a nightlong celebration of singing, dancing, and feasting at the graves of loved ones. A number of Spanish words and phrases are worked into Johnston's simple text, as the children are repeatedly told ``esprense''--``wait''--when they try to sample the empanadas (meat pastries) or the pan de muertos (special ``bread of the dead,'' shaped like human figures and decorated with colored sugar). Winter's square acrylic paintings, in rich hues of green, pink, purple, blue, and gold, float within thick black borders that change with each turn of the page. The covers, endpapers, and title page are decorated with silhouettes reminiscent of the cut-paper banners that beautify the ofrendas, home altars bearing candles, fruit, flowers, and photographs of the departed. A warm, fictional introduction for an audience younger than that for the photo-essays by Kathryn Lasky (Days of the Dead, 1994) and Diane Hoyt-Goldsmith (Day of the Dead, 1994, not reviewed). (Picture book. 4-7)
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
