The Neighborhood Mother Goose

by Nina Crews, Nina Crews (Illustrator)

Overview

Every day, children the world over sing, shout, and celebrate Mother Goose rhymes. And now there's a new reason to cheer: Nina Crews has added her own remarkable, jazzy style of illustration to a collection of forty-one favorite verses. Whether it's Jack jumping over a candlestick (atop a cupcake), Georgie Porgie kissing the girls (at the playground), or a fine lady riding a white horse (on the carousel), this exuberant treasury is sure to be read and enjoyed over and over again.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780060515737
Publisher:	HarperCollins Publishers
Publication date:	12/23/2003
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	64
Sales rank:	73,623
Product dimensions:	8.60(w) x 10.60(h) x 0.30(d)
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

About the Author

Nina Crews drew inspiration from her own neighborhood in creating the artwork for both this book and its celebrated companion, The Neighborhood Mother Goose. She lives with her family in Brooklyn, New York.

Nina Crews drew inspiration from her own neighborhood in creating the artwork for both this book and its celebrated companion, The Neighborhood Mother Goose. She lives with her family in Brooklyn, New York.

Editorial Reviews

Preschoolers will enjoy seeing kids like themselves in pictures that make the familiar rhymes part of imaginative fun on the city sidewalk, where girls and boys come out to ride their scooters and bikes, play ball, and dream.

Booklist (starred review)

Brimming with infectious joy.

Horn Book (starred review)

"Brimming with infectious joy."

Horn Book

"Preschoolers will enjoy seeing kids like themselves in pictures that make the familiar rhymes part of imaginative fun on the city sidewalk, where girls and boys come out to ride their scooters and bikes, play ball, and dream."

Booklist

’Crews has collected over 40 Mother Goose rhymes and photos of an urban neighborhood to bring the poems to life in a modern, relatable way” (in the article “My First Poems: 12 Great Poetry Books for Kids Ages 0–4’).

Brightly.com

Crews's photographic picture books (One Hot Summer Day; Snowball) have always captured a certain rhythm-be it of the playground, a city sidewalk or just childlike interaction. Like them, her latest project rolls along with a strong beat; verse and image keep perfect time. Viewed through Crews's camera, an urban neighborhood (the author's beloved Brooklyn, as distinguished by various borough landmarks) resonates with activity. Readers can almost hear hands clapping, babies cooing and children laughing in crisp photo-collages. A grassy park, storefronts, apartment windows and rooftops provide some of the backdrops for members of a multi-ethnic cast as they interpret such rhymes as "Ring Around the Rosie," "Dance, Little Baby" and "Humpty Dumpty." Crews includes lesser-known verses as well-"Cobbler, Cobbler," "Three Wise Men of Gotham"-which work to equally good effect. Adding an element of whimsy, she digitally manipulates her photos, achieving a varied scale that allows Jack (of "Be Nimble" fame) to hurdle a cupcake with a candle in it, or three tiny men (those men of Gotham) to head seaward off a Coney Island pier. The updated look provides a freshness without being overtly contemporary; Mother Goose's timeless rhymes are quite at home in this new setting. Throughout, the artist demonstrates a talent for coaxing seemingly candid moments from her child subjects as they enact their nursery-rhyme roles, and the other hallmarks of her work-color, action and a sense of fun-shine at full force. Ages 3-up. (Jan.) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

Just when Mother Goose rhymes seem to have fallen by the wayside, Nina Crews has resurrected them and made them relevant to children today. Through the use of photography and children in an urban setting, she has cast Mother Goose in whole new light. Rhymes like "There Was a Little Girl" and "Jack and Jill" are updated and fresh yet they still retain the integrity of the rhymes themselves. This volume will appeal to children of all shapes, sizes, and colors. Just what Mother Goose was intended to do! 2004, Greenwillow, Ages 4 to 7.
—Joan Kindig, Ph.D.

Children's Literature

PreS-Gr 2-No quaint little woman in a tall hat here! This "Mother Goose" is a real goose that lives in a city park. The 41 rhymes range from the most familiar ("Pat-a-cake," "The itsy-bitsy spider") to a few that may be new to readers. Crews sets the verses in an urban environment full of city sidewalks, fire escapes, and brownstones. The pages are peopled with modern-looking, jeans- and T-shirt-clad youngsters of a variety of ages and backgrounds, as well as several adults. It is the smart, digitally manipulated photographic compositions that give this book its snap. They capture a child's real world, animated by contemporary visual references. A saucy little girl with a little curl is busily taking scissors to her Barbie's hair, and a helmeted kid rides a razor scooter in the street. Some pictures have been manipulated to be humorously surreal. The grinning lad photographed in "To market, to market" is carrying a grocery bag with a real piglet in it, while the old woman who lived in a shoe is raising her brood in a pair of well-worn men's boots carelessly tossed on the stairs. This offering is a fresh and welcome contribution that will have broader appeal than the standard nursery rhyme fare, which often seems limited to the preschool set. A truly cool version that is not for babies only.-Kate McClelland, Perrot Memorial Library, Old Greenwich, CT Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

School Library Journal

Crews connects 41 nursery rhymes to full-spread, skillfully manipulated photo-collages depicting a multi-age cast of marvelously expressive children at play in various sunny, well-kept Brooklyn locales. Her visualizations are, by and large, literal: an outsized dish and spoon peer over a tall fence between brownstones, ignoring the airborne cow in the background; an itsy bitsy spider does double duty, climbing up a drain spout and frightening a brown-skinned Miss Muffet; a thumb-sized little old lady laughingly scolds 15 even tinier children as they clamber over a pair of shoes left on a carpeted stairway. Opening and closing with rooftop views of Brooklyn (look for the goose), this gathering of common and not-so-common rhymes will be a hit with young readers and pre-readers in any setting, urban or otherwise. (source note) (Nursery rhymes. 3-7)

Kirkus Reviews