Review by Booklist Review
MacLachlan pays tribute to a symbol of the American farm as she relates changes and growth in a family over the last century. The narrator, who was five years old in 1919, reminisces about the building of his family's barn from the foundation to its finishing touch of bright red paint. The barn is central to the lives of the farm family: it houses livestock, equipment, and harvested crops, but also offers shelter to owls, swallows, mice, and cats. It is the setting for weddings and generations of children's hayloft slumber parties as well as the birth of farm animals. Time passes and the storyteller always wearing a red cap that makes him easy to spot in the illustrations leaves home to attend school but returns to take over the farm. Watercolor, gouache, pencil, ink, and digital media in browns, tans, and cinnamon, enable the red of the cap and the barn to stand out. The solid building at the heart of the farm offers comfort and continuity in the life of a family.--Maryann Owen Copyright 2010 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In meditative prose, Newbery-winner MacLachlan commemorates the life of a great barn. Pak (Cat Wishes) pictures the initially youthful narrator in a bright red cap and suspenders ("I was only five years old") watching as the barn is raised by neighbors and family members-grainy, ghostly figures against sepia tones. The narrator's father loses his wedding ring somewhere in the confusion, and the group feasts to celebrate their finished work, then poses for a group photograph. The narrator's father announces a toast: "The barn will be called the hundred-year barn." Lyrical writing conveys the slow passage of time ("Seasons went by. The cows were milked"). Pak lingers over the barn's livestock and its cathedral-like interior. The boy eventually marries (his red cap is larger now), the barn becomes his, and one day, he finds the lost wedding ring in an unexpected place. MacLachlan and Pak invite readers into the rhythms of the small family farm and important moments, small and great, over a century of its life. Ages 4-8. Author's agent: Rubin Pfeffer, Rubin Pfeffer Content. Illustrator's agent: Kirsten Hall, Catbird Productions. (Sept.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
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Review by School Library Journal Review
K-Gr 2--MacLachlan's gift for portraying bucolic bliss returns in this account of a 1919 barn raising and the narrator's experiences with the building as years pass. When Jack is five, his community gathers for the framing, building, raising, and painting of what his father dubs the Hundred-Year Barn. Meanwhile, youngsters play in a stream, chow down at celebration feasts, and share scary story at sleepovers in the barn. The narrator ages, assuming tasks of responsibility for the structure and its residents. Sweeping the barn as an adult, Jack discovers a fallen nest containing the wedding ring his father lost during the barn build. Pak applies gouache, pencil, ink, and digital media for folksy illustrations that offer warm gold overtones, and complement the narrator's ever-red cap. Fox, possum, cat, dog, and mouse each meander into the story with winsome expressions, adding to the serene mood. VERDICT This story's poetry and pace are mellow, ideal for a quiet time.--Gay Lynn Van Vleck, Henrico County Library, Glen Allen, VA
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
Known for animating America's past for young readers, MacLachlan here imagines a community barn-raising from a century ago.The setting is simply "a meadow," leaving room for Pak's atmospheric mixed-media and digital compositions to fill in physical and emotional elements. Burnt sienna is the predominant color of the landscape; it surrounds the minimalist figures like a textured veil, emphasizing their ties to the Earth. The narrator, 5 years old at the start, is identified by a red cap and dark hair. He holds the ladder while wooden frames are bolted to beams, plays with neighbors in the stream, and enjoys the celebratory picnic and the photograph that records the gathering. Characters have various skin toneswhether from ethnicity or sun, it is hard to saybut the protagonist and his family present white. This quiet tale captures the rhythm of rural life throughout seasonsand then over generationswith the solid structure at the center of daily chores, fond interactions with animals, sleepovers with cousins, and weddings. The moments of highest drama involve a wedding ring lost by the protagonist's father during construction and recovered in a barn owl's nest when the son has become the farmer. MacLachlan weaves in an abundance of details that will appeal to children with no firsthand experience with farming: "Once, a lamb named Baby pushed me over and licked my face with his little tongue."A cozy filter through which to imagine growing up. (Picture book. 4-7) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
