The Horn Book Guide

PICTURE BOOKS

Bunting, Eve

The Memory String

32 pp. | Clarion | August, 2000 | Trade ISBN 0-395-86146-2 $$15.00

(3) K-3 Illustrated by Ted Rand. Because she misses her mother, who died three years ago, and resents her new stepmother, Laura refuses to join in a family project and instead dwells on the stories represented by the buttons on her memory string, a family heirloom. When the string accidentally breaks, scattering the precious buttons, her stepmother's compassion and understanding help the two of them forge a new bond. Rand's sensitive watercolors are dappled with light.

Reviewer: Anne St. John