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Tuesday, February 24, 2015

Julia’s House for Lost Creatures: PB #11 for 14:14 Review

Title: Julia’s House for Lost Creatures
Author  / Illustrator: 
Ben Hatke
Publisher: 
Roaring Books Press
Year: 2014
Word Count: 362
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Summary
Julia, a resourceful redhead, lives in a rundown Victorian house that rest atop a giant tortoise. Once her house settles by the sea, Julia isn’t content to sit alone in a quiet house. So she opens a “House for Lost Creatures.” Beasts quickly arrive, including a patchwork kitty, a melancholy mermaid, and a variety of monsters. But Julia realizes that each creature must have a chore in order for everyone to live peacefully together.

Story Element: Pacing

Spread 1: (Introduction)
Julia's house plops down. She gets to work heaving her mailbox into the ground. And waits.
Julia's house came to town and settled by the sea.

Spread 2:
Pace is effected by sentence length and the word and
This changes to mood from peaceful to lonely. 
That evening there was a warm fire and toast and tea.
And all the house was quiet.
Too quiet.

Spread 3:
Pace changes with her plan of action.
So Julia ran to her workshop.
She got out her tools and her paints and went to work. She made a sign.


Spread 4:
Her plan works!
She hung the sign up outside the front door. 
It said: Julia's House for Lost Creatures
And then she waited. 
She didn't have to wait for long.

In the next 3 spreads, creatures show up at her door. 
First just an odd looking cat, and then a line of creatures.
The growing number of guests causes increasing alarm.


There were SCRAPES, SCRATCHES, WHINES, BANGS, BARKS, and BELLOWS.


In a later Spreads:
Julia is overwhelmed by her dirty guests. The pace turns frantic.
Soon Julia's house was filling up 
with lost and homeless creatures
of every description.
They asked for towels and soap,
tea and toast.

They had ideas of their own.
They spilled things and 
they didn't clean up.
And THEN
the troll found Julia's old record player.

"STOP!" shouted Julia.
EVERYBODY STOP!"

Then Julia locks herself in her workshop. 
After a long time, she comes out with a new plan. 
She had created a Chore Chart for all to follow.
It works!

A mix of panel sequences, spot illustrations, and full-bleed spreads also push the action forward. 

(Post #11 for the 14:14 Picture Book Blog Review Challenge created by Christie Wild of Write Wild. http://christiewrightwild.blogspot.com)

10 comments:

  1. This is a great post to illustrate a variety of ways to set up pacing. Thank you so much for sharing!

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  2. I too like the variety of pacing aspects...great review. Thanks Manju.

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  3. Roaring Brook Press has some of the best picture books around! Thanks for sharing this one!

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  4. What a fun and lovely cover! Thanks for all the pacing tips in this one. Seems like one of the harder elements to teach.

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    Replies
    1. I agree that PB pacing is tricky. I'm working on those page turns.

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  5. This sounds like such a richly imaginative picture book! I saw another picture book recently with characters living on a turtle's back, called Turtle Island. How funny that two authors would each have that unusual idea.

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  6. Now, I'm curious. I'll have to read Turtle Island.

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  7. I like the story, the message, and the illustrations. Thumbs up on this one.

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