Sunday, August 21, 2016

La Madre Goose by Susan Elya - OPTIONAL

Elya, Susan Middleton La Madre Goose, illustrated by Juana Martinez-Neal.  PICTURE BOOK.  G.P. Putnams (Penguin), 2016. $17.

Elya takes familiar English language nursery rhymes and in some of them just changes some of the words to Spanish and in others retools the wordings to make rhymes that make more sense with the Spanish words.
I need to read more books written originally in Spanish for children.  I can only compare this to other books that integrate English and Spanish, such as Dia de Los Muertos by Roseanne Thong and Rubia and the Three Osos by Elya herself, each of which is done more skillfully than this offering.  Elya shines best when she changes up the poems – when she leaves the rhyme wording more intact, they don’t work very well.
EL (K-3) – OPTIONAL.  Cindy, Library Teacher

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