Module 1 - Miss Brooks Loves Books! (and I don't) by Barbara Bottner

• Book cover image
   
• Book Summary:This book is about a child who is in the first grade and is not the biggest fan of books. The child visits the library regularly with other children. Miss Brooks seems to be a very fun librarian who encourages the children to participate. She brings up a program for book week where she wants every child to pick a story to share while wearing a costume. The main character is certain that she will never find a book she loves, but she is presented with many books and eventually she finds one she really enjoys and realizes the library really is for everyone.
• APA Reference of Book:
  
  Bottner, B. (2010). Miss Brooks Loves Books! (and I don't). New York, NY: Random House, Inc.
• Impressions:
  
  I really enjoyed this book. I liked that it presented a character that children can relate to and I felt it was very appropriate for the age group. I appreciated the humor that was included, especially from the mother.
  
  Sometimes children feel discouraged about reading because they have not been presented with a subject that they would enjoy, and the message proves that anyone can find something that they could enjoy. I like that the book depicts a helpful librarian and mother. The mother appears to be fairly artistic and really helps her child with creating the costume for her chosen story. I think this book is wonderful as it shows how fun reading can be.
  
  I thought the illustrations by Michael Emberley were well done. The color scheme worked well for the story. I appreciated how he made the librarian look interesting with the costume choices, her everyday clothes, and the way she does her hair. The mother was also designed well as an artist.
  
• Professional Review:
  
  "R 5-7 yrs The first-grade girl who narrates this story is not a fan of the printed page, despite the best efforts of her enthusiastic school librarian, Miss Brooks, who regularly dons elaborate costumes and reads the class a dismaying (to the narrator) variety of books. When our protagonist has to find a story she likes to share with the class (and wear a corresponding costume) for Book Week, the girl grumpily despairs, until a comment by her mother (“You’re as stubborn as a wart”) finally leads her to her kind of book: William Steig’s Shrek. Filled with new purpose, the girl happily practices her presentation, even making stick-on warts for her classmates to wear, and both librarian and student rejoice at this newly kindled passion for a book. Head and shoulders above the usual purposive pro-library materials, this will undoubtedly resonate with children who just haven’t bought into the pleasure of books yet and also with the librarians or other adults trying to win them over. Bottner’s comically wry, no-nonsense text (“I ask my mother if we can move to a new town. My mother says there’s a librarian in every town”) is a stitch to read aloud. Emberley’s illustrations (drawn with pencil, then scanned and printed onto watercolor paper and painted with watercolor) are cheerfully casual, with the figures posed against lots of refreshing white space. The bespectacled girl in her slouchy striped sock cap, bedraggled brown hair, and overalls is clearly one tough (if short) customer, while Miss Brooks is a long, tall figure with a riot of sproingy brown hair (frequently bedecked with theme-appropriate accessories) and colorfully eccentric costumes. This would make a great beginning-of-the-year class read or preparation for a Book Week celebration for aficionados and resisters alike. JH" (Hulick, 2010).
  
  Hulick, J. (2010). [Review of the book Miss Brooks Loves Books! (and I don't), by J. Hulick]. Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, 63(9), 371. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/223686729?accountid=7113
• Library Uses:
  
  This would be a good book to use as a program mimicking the one in the book created by Miss Brooks. It could start as a storytime and then lead into a program where children can choose their favorite book to share and dress up (although that could be optional).