Review by Booklist Review
In sparse, lyrical prose, Newbery medalist MacLachlan extols the prairies of eastern Wyoming (circa the 1940s), where she was born. Framing her reminiscences around a single summer day, she notes the orange sunrise; the smells of cattle, bluegrass, and wild roses; the taste of cool drinks from the filling station; the sight of birds, rushing streams, and nearby mountains; horseback rides; trips to the granary; swimming in farm ponds; shopping at the general store; playing kick-the-can; and reading by flashlight under quilts and a yellow moon. Archer's vibrant, mixed-media illustrations combine acrylics, ink, and textured papers created with origami, tissue paper, and homemade stamps. The pleasing results offer a variety of spreads that appear three-dimensional (blowing curtains at sunrise and sunset), quilt-like (country roads with fields on either side), and playfully detailed (the country store contains shelves collaged with items that seem to have been snipped from an old catalog). Many spreads employ a wide-angle perspective that furthers the sense of the prairie's vastness. Nostalgic, yet filled with timeless experiences.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Elaborate sun-filled spreads by Archer (Daniel's Good Day) illuminate Newbery Medalist MacLachlan's farm-life memories in this dazzling picture book. The writer's childhood recollections unspool informally, fondly, as if being recalled for family members: "There were small towns with names we loved--/ Sunrise, Rattlesnake, Chugwater, and Spotted Horse." She knits simple words into lines of beauty: "Where I was born, the earth smelled of cattle and bluegrass and hyssop." Archer's hypnotic images show the prairie stretching out like an ocean, its hues and substance changing and fading toward the horizon. In work of remarkable intricacy, dozens of strips of paper painted in yellows, blues, and greens are cut fine and laid out to represent the long, even furrows of farm fields; lace curtains undulate in a breeze. MacLachlan's memories unfold over one long day, beginning with an orange sun rising and ending with a bed, "where we read under quilts," and a yellow summer moon. Together, words and pictures create a sense of endless space and ample time. Childhoods as free as this one are not as common as they once were; borrowing MacLachlan's is the next best thing. Ages 4--8. (May)
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Review by School Library Journal Review
K-Gr 3--This charming story was inspired by MacLachlan's childhood. She recalls waking up with the sun on a summer morning on the prairie. She tells of long, hot summer days spent laying in fields with the smell of wild roses or riding horses on country lanes. With other children she would run and shriek and play kick the can until the darkness came and they returned to bed, reading under the covers while the moon rose yellow. With short, descriptive phrases MacLachlan remembers the beauty of farm life, and the offset portions of text bring rhythm to the words. The paper collage illustrations add intricate texture and detail to the deceptive simplicity of the prairie landscape. Sunrises and sunsets are built with layer upon layer of textured paper so that the landscape fills the page from corner to corner. Nostalgia bleeds into the illustrations, some of which have a scrapbook feel, such as the spread that features store shelves lined with black-and-white images cut out of old catalogues. The human figures are tiny and found nestled into the scenes on most pages, fitting for a story that places them in contrast to the majesty of a beautiful prairie landscape. VERDICT Recommended for purchase.--Laken Hottle, Providence Community Library
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Review by Horn Book Review
In this nostalgic idyll set on the American prairie (judging by clues in the illustrations, in the mid-twentieth-century), a young girl describes summertime farm life as she and the other children ride horses, take a trip into town for penny candy, swim in a pond, and play kick-the-can until adults call them inside at bedtime. MacLachlan immerses readers into the girl's sensory experiences: "Where I was born, there was a sky so big, there was no end of it...the earth smelled of cattle and bluegrass and hyssop." Archer's illustrations lean into the text's idealized depiction of time and place (surely not all the farm smells were sweet, for instance), offering spread after spread of breathtakingly gorgeous scenes. Collages made from a "combination of acrylics, ink, and textured papers" that were created with "origami and tissue papers and homemade stamps" capture the nearness of the sky, the flat expanse of the landscape, the colors of the prairie. Golds, blues, and greens predominate, with the reds of barns or filling-station pumps and the pinks of sunrise and wild roses adding contrast. Viewers will linger on the pond spread, in which two children float on their backs inside concentric circles of ripples; or on a spread in which prairie dogs sit by their holes in the foreground as a train passes on the horizon, the grasses turned blue-green in the dimming light of the setting sun. Martha V. Parravano May/June 2020 p.103(c) Copyright 2020. 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
Newbery Medalist MacLachlan tells the story of a pastoral childhood on a prairie farm. The unnamed narrator is depicted as a pale child with fair hair living in a small prairie town in, perhaps, the 1940s. In a nostalgic, retrospective voice, the protagonist recalls the wildlife and flowers near the farmhouse; the vast landscapes; swimming in the farm pond; and the sights, smells, and sounds of happy summers spent primarily outdoors. The narrator remembers trips to small towns, the local filling station, the granary by the railroad, and the nearby shops. Characters all appear to be white, and it is strictly from this perspective that the story is told; it comes complete with cowboys who say, "Hello, little lady," and nearby towns with names like Rattlesnake and Spotted Horse. The story is insular, told as it is from this one child's point of view, yet sprawling in its visual depictions of the "sky so big" (the book's wide, horizontal orientation does its best to capture this) and the point "where the prairie met the mountains." Archer's vivid, textured mixed-media illustrations include tissue papers and homemade stamps. They are richly colored and detailed; these are spreads to linger over. Readers may see something new with each look. A deeply nostalgic look at once-upon-a-time Midwest farm life. (Picture book. 4-10) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
