Abrams Holiday Books

I am one of those people who loves books, not only to read, but to also display.  My husband has been desperately trying to buy me a Kindle, but I fight him every step of the way.  It is not the same feel. So I was extremely excited when I had the opportunity to review five books from Abrams Books recently.

The first was Grandmother Remembers Holidays by Judith Levy.

It reminds me of the baby book we all filled in for our children. It starts out with statements about the child’s parents in which you fill in the blank.  From there it moves to each holiday, making statements for the blanks to be filled in.  My first reaction was, “but we don’t do anything for Valentine’s Day:”, when I realized it doesn’t have to be right now.  The book can be put away and some day we may do something for that holiday and then I can write that in it.  I loved the premise of the book.  It would be a great keepsake for the grandchild.

The second book was Beyond the Family Tree by Jennifer Worick.

The author discusses ways to conduct an interview of someone about their history. This is something I always have wanted to do with my mother and my husband’s father, but have never known how to approach it.  She gives advice on the various techniques that are available to conduct this interview as well as the pros & cons of each.  The best part of the entire book are her thought provoking questions that can be asked of the relative.  I can see using these in a casual conversation even if I never get around to doing an interview.

The next three books are for children.

The first is La Noche Buena A Christmas Story by Antonio Sacre, illustrated by Angelo Dominguez.

I read this to my six year old graddaughter.  It tells the story of how Christmas is celebrated in Miami by the Cuban culture.  We found it very interesting on how differently their Christmas is from ours.  It is a great book to learn about another culture’s traditions.

The second book was All the Seasons of the Year by Deborah Lee Rose  Illustrated by Kay Chorao.

It is a warm heartening story about how a mother cat will love her baby through all seasons.  The illustrations were wonderful and the poem rhymes perfectly throughout the book.  It was also the perfect book to test your child’s observation level.  I had my four year old granddaughter look at a page for twenty seconds then I would take it from her and ask her questions about what she had seen on the page.  The illustrations were simple enough that it was not overwhelming for her to try to see everything.

The third book the 10 Little Penguins by Jean-Luc Fromental, illustrated by Joelle Jolivet.

This is one of the cutest pop up book I have seen.  It counts down from 10 penguins playing to 0. On each page one penguin disappears because of something that happens in the story.

I don’t recommend this for young children, because the page could be easily ripped which would be sad because it’s so cute! For the 3-year-olds and up it is perfect.  Each year at Thanksgiving we wrap one Christmas book for each child and place it on their dinner plate.  I am excited to be giving this to my 4 year old grandson.

I enjoyed reading these books from Abrams and I’m looking forward to visiting their site often to look over their vast and unique selection.

Thank you to Abrams for providing the books for review. No compensation was provided. The opinions are my own and that of my family.