Tag Archives: sight

Apr22

The City of Jasmine by Nadine Presley illustrated by Heather Brockman Lee

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The City of Jasmine by Nadine Presley illustrated by Heather Brockman Lee

With a release date of May 6, I really wanted to wait to post a review because the images are gorgeous in the electronic version, and I can only imagine how moving and captive they will be presented in a physical format, but alas I know the importance of presales and am sharing to hopefully encourage you to preorder and/or request from your library, this gorgeous 40 page OWN voice book.  A love letter to Damascus, and the sights, sounds, smells, taste, and feelings that the author remembers despite the mountains and oceans that now separate her, are lyrically shared with readers on a journey through the city. The ethereal lilting of words draw readers of all backgrounds in, and the complimentary gorgeous illustrations convey a palpable sense of beauty, love, and memories of home.  Even on a screen, they force you to get lost in their beauty. The cadence of the words allow natural pauses that tug on your eyes and draw them toward something in the images not seen before, forcing the readers and listeners alike to hesitate before turning the page.

The book starts with a little girl telling where she comes from, “the City of Jasmine,” “the Umayyad Mosque,” “Ghouta,” “Damascus,” “Qasioun,” “Qala’at Dimashq,” headers for spreads rich with poetry, wonder, and longing.

Neighborhoods of diverse families gathering, and sharing the foods that bring people together, and quiet bookshops that facilitate travel through time. Family memories built around orchards and fountains and laughter and love.  So far away from the author now, the memories are not lost, they can be touched when the scent of jasmine is “breathed in, and breathed out.”

The book concludes with an author’s note and a glossary.  Those of us who are not Syrian, and who have never been, after spending time with this book will undoubtedly be tempted to add Damascus to our bucket list of travel plans, and inshaAllah as the country rebuilds such trips will come to fruition.

Dec9

A Sense of Gratitude: Exploring the Five Senses by Halimah Bashir illustrated by Laila Ramadhani

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A Sense of Gratitude: Exploring the Five Senses by Halimah Bashir illustrated by Laila Ramadhani

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As a story time host for littles, you always need books about the five senses.  Additionally as a story reader at an Islamic school, thanking Allah swt while talking about your senses and the world around us is a staple year after year.  So purchasing this book with large adorable pictures and claims of rhyme was an easy decision to make, and while it will get used, sigh, the rhyme and lacking rhythm is terrible.  There’s also frequent illogical sentence structures and a bizarre tangent- two pages on wafting.  The book is for toddlers through kindergarteners, not kids learning experiment safety protocols.  @muslimkidsbooknook did a wonderful Instagram post regarding rhyme in kid’s books, and this book really would have benefitted from some additional editing and outside eyes reading the book aloud repeatedly.  That being said, the book will still be used and will be enjoyed with real time editing.  A positive about the book, in addition to the illustrations, is Allah (swt) in Arabic script.  But overall, it really could have, and should have been so much better.

The book starts with a note to grown ups reminding them to stress the importance of being grateful and exploring God’s creation.  It starts with what eyes can be used for, stressing the beauty in nature. and moves to the nose, and has the pages on wafting chemicals, enjoying baked goods, and saying please pardon when passing bad smells.

Tongue is next and stresses that sweets are not nutritious, and then assumes that veggies and fruits are unliked by children, but the narrator admits that they enjoy consuming them.  Hands and skin- touch and feel, and also convey love.  As an FYI- the text states and illustrations show kids petting a dog. The final sense of ears and the gift of hearing wraps up the book.

I’m terrible at grammar, really bad, but even I know not to say “colors like purple,” it should be colors “such as” purple, not “smells like Teta’s baked cookies,” but smells “such as” Teta’s baked cookies.  The formatting on a spread seems off as well with “Like slimy frogs” being under a a two line refrain and the rest of the sentence, “and hairy dogs…” being on the next page with another line and a half, it throws you off when reading aloud to keep some rhyme and rhythm going, every. single. time. On some pages the chopping of normal speech structure to make the “rhyme” is difficult to understand, and I don’t think the glossary, nor putting (God) in English was particularly necessary.

My favorite pages are when they tie directly back to ibadah and Islam, hearing the athan, using your hands to make dua and the little rhyme that starts and concludes the book. Truly the concept makes the book important on a shelf and the illustrations make it attractive, the text needs some editing.

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