Sunday Soup: In My Mailbox - Bigger Than A Bread Box

Are we talking resolutions yet?  Because one of mine will be sharing, in a more timely fashion, books that I have received.  Each of these books that I will be highlighting over the next few days came my way thanks to the generosity of a publisher (with the author putting in a good word), an author, and a tweep.  I love my PLN!

Title:   Bigger Than a Breadbox

Year Published: 2011

Author:  Laurel Snyder

You May Know Her:  as the author of Penny Dreadful and Baxter:  The Pig Who Wanted to Be Kosher

You May Find Her:  at her blog and on twitter at @laurelsnyder

Illustrator (Cover art):  Steve James

You May Know Him: from his blog.

You May Find Him:  at his blog and...?

Review You May Not Have Seen: 

Seattle Times, November 26, 2011

The Delta/Plus

The fabulousity of Bigger Than a Bread Box is now old news, but in this case old news is still news!  This was one of the best books I've read in 2011.  It fits into my new fiction genre: realistic fantasy (along with my favorite book When You Reach Me which fits into my other new fiction genre, realistic science fiction).  

This book is very tightly written, each and every word counts, and it drew me right in (I have to say that I'm lazy and in general cannot wait 'til halfway through a book for the action to get crackin').  Tiny details add to the books believability.

There is not a thing I would change about Bigger Than a Bread Box.  To me, even the cover art added to the book's appeal.  It fits the feel of the book exactly and gives you the sensation that you are literally being drawn into the book and into Rebecca's story.  It reminds me of a Brian Selznick cover, especially those that he did for Andrew Clements' books such as Frindle and A School Story.

15 Second Book Talk in the Stacks (These are when I'm in the book stacks with my students and they hold out a book to me and say, "Have you read this one, Mrs. Blaine?".  I have about 15 seconds.):  

"I loved this book.  This is about a girl who moves with her Mom and brother to her grandmother's house in Atlanta because her parents are having problems and she finds a magical breadbox in the attic and anything she wishes for shows up in the breadbox, but imagine what happens if you got everything you wished for and what if your biggest wish might not come true?"

From the the cover to the writing, Bigger Than a Bread Box gets five out of five Dog Ears from me!

Thank you Random House for this gratis, no-strings-attached, copy of Bigger Than a Bread Box!