Nightly book reading has been fun as we are delving into some new books (from Grandma) and finding old favorites.

For whatever reasons, the kids have pulled out our Bur Bur books and finding out why we liked them in the first place.

Book Cover image from Borders.com

I first discovered Bur Bur a few years ago when I interviewed JoAnne Pastel and Kakie Fitzsimmons. As parents of multi-racial and multi-cultural children with a love of the outdoors, they were having a hard time finding books that spoke to their children.

Necessity is the mother of invention so they made their own books featuring Bur Bur. Bur Bur goes fishing and boating and makes the first pitch at a ball game.

There are various parts of the picture to look at and count. You can find colors and animals. We have a lot of fun reading Bur Bur. One of my favorite pictures is “H  is for Horn.” Bur Bur talks about how dad lets him do the horn every now and again. And the horn sounds off. There is not a sound chip in the book but you just know.

You can find the books at the Bur Bur and Friends website.

My book reading as of late came from one of the other mom’s on my son’s tee ball team. We talk of books and I mentioned how much I have been enjoying some vampire series. She talked about Alice Hoffman whom I have never heard of.

Book Cover Image from Borders.com.

Well, I should know her because the movie Practical Magic was based on her book of the same name. I love that movie. While researching I found out that the movie took liberties with parts of the story (surprised? I hope not) but retained the essentials of a modern-day fairy tale.

In Second Nature,  we are traversing through that sort of story as well. A woman bring home a man about to be locked in a mental institution. He was found in the woods of Michigan, hurt and surrounded by wolves.

Is it realistic that she could have done this or that he would be raised by wolves from an early age? That he could so quickly fit into her world or that they would fall in love with each other almost instantly? Probably not. But other touches are very realistic. A vindictive ex-husband. A feisty grandfather. Young lovers forced into the open and a friend suddenly angry about it.

I enjoyed the reading, enjoyed how the story was told from the various perspectives, including the ex-husband who realizes he is turning into a person he does not want to be. Flights of fancy are written in such a grounded manner, it all seems logical and right.

I stayed up one night because I could not put it down, on the day I was given the book. That is what a good book should do for you.

What have you been reading?

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