Journey

by Aaron Becker

©2013. Somerville, Masachusetts. Candlewick Press. Adventure/Fiction.
Lexile Measure: N/A
Picture Book. Written in last 4 years. 

When a little girl draws a door in her bedroom with a red marker, it leads her to a brand new land. She finds adventure and trouble waiting for her and her marker. Her act of bravery and kindness helps to get her home, and find a new companion.

I gave this book a 27/32. The pictures in the book are beautiful and engaging, which is good, because there are no words in this book! I think that for this reason, children would love this book and to have the opportunity to fill in the blanks, and write their own story to go along with the pictures. I only gave this book a 2 for the diversity of characters, because although the little girl solves problems and has achievements in the book, all of the characters are of Caucasian decent, even in images that show a big city, which I'm sure would have plenty of diversity in real life. I gave a 3 for many of the categories, such as story line, which is interesting, but also confusing at times. For social message, I also gave a 3 because it does send a positive message to girls that they are capable and can be problem solvers, but I just feel as though it is not a super powerful message in the book. I think that there is some cultural relevance to the story, but not as much as many other books that I have read and posted about in this blog. However, the character development got full points for showing the growth of a character from being bored, to changing that for herself, to saving a creature that she comes across. 

I would recommend this book for 1st grade through 5th grade.

Literary elements in this book would be really fun to explore because there are no words! Here are some you may want to explore with children:

Beginning, Middle, and End: This may be a fun way to explore beginning, middle, and end, using only visuals instead of the usual picture books with pictures and text written on the page.

Problem and Solution: What was the problem in this book and how did the girl fix it?  There are multiple problems and solutions to look at such as the girl being lonely and so she draws a door to get somewhere else. Another problem is when she sees the birds who is captured, and she solves it by setting it free. 

Setting: Setting would be fun to explore in this book, as the character goes from where she lives in a big city to this completely different place with castles and knights. 

Mini-lesson on setting: Have students evaluate this book and find as much as they can about the setting, even though the book has no words to tell about the setting. Have students think about how the setting affects the story. What is instead of this palace that she arrives at, she ended up at a public library or inside of a volcano. Have students use their imagination to explore setting and where it could have taken the main character in the book instead.