Swamp Angel by Anne Isaacs

Swamp Angel by Anne Isaacs

Working in an American primitive style animated by the humor and storytelling genius for which he is renowned, Caldecott Winner artist Paul O. Zelinsky puts oils to cherry and maple for this tall-tale competition between a Tennessee woods-woman extraordinaire and a hungry, fearsome bear.Thundering Tarnation has a bottomless appetite for settler's grub. When word goes out about a competition to hunt this four-legged forest of stubble, a young woman, second to none in buckskin bravery, signs up. How about baking a pie, Angel? the other hunters taunt. I aim to, says Swamp Angel. A bear pie.What follows is as witty a round of roughhousing as ever jostled the ranks of Americana. Anne Isaacs' original text unfolds in a crackling combination of irony, exaggeration, and bold image-making. Zelinsky's paintings respond with deft yet hilarious expressions, rhythmic shapes, and a sense of monumental motion, as benefits a heroine who can wield a tornado like a lasso, drink a lake dry, and snore down a forest. In the course of these grand shenanigans, the Great Smoky Mountains are stirred up, Montana's short-grass prairie laid down, and Thundering Tarnation's fate proves to have no less a reach than the starry heavens.Swamp Angel marks the debut of a promising new storyteller and adds to the tall-tale traditions a pictorial counterpart that will entertain and endure for a long time to come.

Anne Isaacs was born and raised in Buffalo, New York, until she went to college. Anne was a voracious reader as a child, devouring works like The Wind in the Willows and Romeo and Juliet. Her favorite book was Little Women, and she grew up to live a life similar to the heroine Jo's, working as an educator, a mother, and a children's book author. In 1967, Anne moved to Ann Arbor, Michigan, to pursue degrees in English Literature and Environmental Education. She currently resides in the San Francisco Bay Area. Pancakes for Dinner, published in 2006, is partially based on Helen Bannerman's famous story, Little Black Sambo.

Yet, when Anne Isaacs wrote Pancakes for Dinner, she intended to provide the first entirely American rendition of this cherished story. Pancakes for Dinner has five characters who are native to New England in the early nineteenth century, including five animals. Toby, the protagonist, is a feisty new heroine who has what it takes to take on a savage wolf, cougar, bear, skunk, and porcupine. In Pancakes for Dinner, the clarified butter, or ghee, of the original story is replaced by fresh-tapped maple syrup from Vermont trees, which continue to supply America with the most famous of pancake toppings.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780525452713
ISBN 10	0525452710
Title	Swamp Angel
Author	Anne Isaacs
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Hardback
Publisher	Penguin Books Ltd
Year published	1994-09-01
Number of pages	48
Prizes	Winner of Caldecott Honor Book., Winner of New York Times Best Illustrated Book.
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.