When the Sea Turned to Silver

10 April 2018
Category:

When the Sea Turned Silver
Written and Illustrated By Grace Lin.
Published by Little Brown and Company

To me, this book is a work of art. The amazing storytelling and the weaving together of many stories to end with a perfect whole picture is very satisfying. The lyrical language is a joy to read. Some passages I just had to read again aloud to hear them as well as feel them in my head.

The illustrations, executed by Grace Lin, are beautiful. The full page, full color pictures scattered throughout are something to savor.

It seems that the publisher has spared no expense. Each chapter head has an illustration in a wood cut style. Seldom are they repeated. These wood cuts and the page numbers are rendered in a different color from the black text. Three fonts have been used to differentiate separate parts of the story.

This is a Chinese story. It gently weaves together many traditional stories as two children venture forth on a quest. The way all the threads of all the stories weave together to create a complete whole is very satisfying. This book would be a joy to read aloud to children.

Ms. Lin has published several other books. Two seem to follow the same story telling pattern as “When the Sea Turned Silver”.  They are “Starry River in the Sky” and  “Where the Mountain Meets the Moon”.

I am looking forward to reading these too.

Author Photo. Alan Bradley

 

(G.Rosemary Ludlow 10 April 2018)

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About the author

G. Rosemary Ludlow grew up in Adelaide, Australia, where she taught school for many years. She loved teaching children to read and her favorite thing to do was to tell them stories. History stories, geography stories, stories about spelling, or arithmetic - it is all stories.

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