When You Were Small

by Sara O'Leary, Julie Morstad (Illustrator)

Overview

This award-winning picture book is now available in paperback! All children like to hear stories about when they were small. In this charming story, part of the popular The Henry Books series by Sara O'Leary and Julie Morstad, a young boy and his father reminisce together before bedtime. For chidren there is a whole period of their life that they can not remember and, for all they know, it could have been the most magical time of their life.

The hardcover edition of When You Were Small won the 2007 Marilyn Baillie Picture Book Award, won First Prize at the 2007 Alcuin Society Awards for Excellence in Book Design, was shortlisted for the 2007 Amelia Frances Howard-GIbbon Illustrator's Award, and was a 2007 CanWest Raise a Reader Beginning Reader Pick.

The other two titles in The Henry Books series include When I Was Small and Where You Came From.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781772290080
Publisher:	Simply Read Books
Publication date:	09/12/2017
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	40
Product dimensions:	6.80(w) x 9.70(h) x 0.20(d)
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

About the Author

Sara O'Leary is an author, playwright, and literary journalist. She is the author of the award-winning Henry Books, including Where You Came From, When You Were Small, and When I Was Small, as well as the picture book This is Sadie (Tundra). She teaches Writing for Children and Screenwriting at Concordia Universityin Montreal.

Julie Morstad is known for her surreal, whimsical work. Her books have garnered many accolades, including the Elizabeth Mrazik-Cleaver Picture Book Award, Marilyn Baillie Picture Book Award, Christie Harris Illustrated Children’s Literature Prize at the BC Book Prizes, and First Prize at the Alcuin Society Awards for Excellence in Book Design; they have been shortlisted for the Governor General’s Literary Award for Children’s Illustration, Foreword Reviews’ Book of the Year Award, Amelia Frances Howard-Gibbon Illustrator’s Award, Ruth and Sylvia Schwartz Award (Picture Book Category), and Chocolate Lily Award (Picture Book Category). She lives in Vancouver, Canada.

Read an Excerpt

From When You Were Small, by Sara O'Leary and Julie Morstad:



Every night at bedtime Henry and his father have a chat.



It always begins the same way/

"Dad," says Henry.

"Tell me about when I was small."



When you were small you used to have a pet ant and you would take him out for walks on a leash.



When you were small we used you as a chess piece, because our chess board was missing one of the knights and you were the perfect size...

Editorial Reviews

O'Leary's debut features a robin's-egg blue cover and a retrospective title that recalls Milne's When We Were Very Young. Morstad's slightly clumsy ink drawings and drop caps, daintily tinted with watercolor and airy with negative space, update the work to somewhere nearer midcentury; with its large format and minimal color, this paper-over-board book could have been published in 1960 as easily as today, and homespun sketches of a wooden ruler and old-fashioned bathroom supplies only compound the anachronism. The narrative itself cultivates an appreciation for the absurd. Every night, a boy named Henry says to his father, "Tell me about when I was small." Deadpan recollections follow, each accompanied by a literal illustration of a much smaller Henry. "When you were small we used to give you baths in the teapot," his father explains, and the image pictures a boy about to hop into a kettle, a stray sock draped over the handle. "When you were small you wore a thimble for a hat," says his father, and readers see a finger-size Henry, his eyes hidden under the brim of a thimble and a needle-sword hanging from his belt. As in Stuart Little, a sepia-tinted image of tiny Henry with his full-size parents sets the scale. This sequence posits a straight-faced game of hyperbole ("When you were small we took the toy castle out of the aquarium and you were king of it") that may well please children of many generations. Ages 3-6. (May) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

PreS-Gr 3-Each night, Henry asks his dad to tell him about when he was small, and his father relates how very small he really was: "-we used to give you baths in the teapot-," and "-we took the toy castle out of the aquarium and you were king of it." This is obviously an enjoyable nighttime ritual and it always ends with the child asking, "`Dad, is all that true?' `Well,' says his dad, `don't you remember?'" The minimal text is accompanied by delicate illustrations. Subtle coloring and ample white space add to the book's tranquil feel. A lovely title to share one-on-one, and sure to start many family rituals.-Wendy Woodfill, Hennepin County Library, Minnetonka, MN Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

School Library Journal