(1) K-3 Illustrated by Il Sung Na. A sequence of "what if?" questions pulls the reader into this book about twentieth-century avant-garde composer John Cage. "What if...all the sounds you heard...sounded to you like music?" The answer is always, "Then you'd be like John Cage." Cage thought all sounds--noises made by appliances, everyday sounds like "dog tags clinking," and even silence itself--constituted music if you learned to listen. Rogers's text introduces readers to Cage's notable and controversial performances, including "4'33" (four minutes and thirty-three seconds of piano silence) and "Fontana Mix" (a staff covered with "curlicues and dots...and squiggles" that invited musicians to interpret into playable notes). Digital illustrations take one sensory experience (sound) and represent it in another (sight) in stunning ways. Bursts of bright colors, shapes, and lines that represent Cage's music are overlaid onto people, landscapes, and interiors, which are primarily rendered in black, white, and gray; at other times the colorful music peeks through windows or floats in the air, transforming dull backdrops into colorful, riotous expressions that disrupt a stodgy world. Let's not forget the endpapers, which will absorb the reader's attention: a table representing sixty different sounds with sixty different representations captures the essence of each. Readers will likely be curious to experiment themselves and "be like John Cage"; author and illustrator notes provide additional context.

Reviewer: Julie Hakim Azzam | Horn Book Magazine Issue: November, 2023

(2) K-3 Illustrated by Il Sung Na. A young boy from Korea moves to America and finds a "tall, crooked, quiet" old plum tree in his new backyard that reminds him of his persimmon tree back home. He names her Plumee for the deep purple plums that "dotted every branch" and finds comfort in her whenever he misses home. One spring night, a windstorm knocks Plumee down. Yet even so, with "her roots pulled out of the earth," she is still his playmate, becoming in his mind everything he wishes for: "a tree house. A rocket. An island. A ship." The boy later plants "a new plum tree, short and straight" in Plumee's old place and carefully tends the sapling, finding the same feeling of home as he waters her and watches her grow. Themes of resilience, hope, and vulnerability run through Lim's simple and poetic text. Na's digital illustrations help build empathy. On one dramatic double-page spread, a nearly glowing white silhouette of a ghostly Plumee appears against a dark night sky. The high contrast in hue conveys not just the absence of the tree but also the feeling of emptiness that her absence brings. Gentle symbolism employed throughout creates opportunities for discussion of change, connection, and adaptation.

Reviewer: Weileen Wang | Horn Book Magazine Issue: July, 2021