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PICTURE BOOKS
Hrab, Naseem

The Sour Cherry Tree

32 pp. | Owlkids | October, 2021 | Trade ISBN 978-1-77147-414-6 $18.95
(2) K-3 Illustrated by Nahid Kazemi. On a visit to her grandfather's house the day after his death, a young girl recalls their many connections, despite a language barrier. Baba Bozorg spoke Farsi (he had been a poet in Iran); the narrator speaks only English. The girl walks through her grandfather's house, describing him and the time they spent together. She searches the pockets of clothes hanging in his closet because he was a reliable source of mints, but finds nothing. She notices his empty teacup sitting next to his samovar and recalls that he liked fig cookies and always offered one to her. Even though she didn't like them, "I always took one because we didn't share many words." Each object, each room, reminds her of their shared routines. Kazemi's illustrations have a soft, filmy quality that suits a story about memories. Distances between objects are sometimes elongated, sometimes shortened--a staircase to Baba Bozorg's bedroom looks lonely as the child heads up to face an empty room, but is a warmer, more friendly place when she descends wearing his slippers. The first-person narration, filled with childlike details and tender emotions, reinforces the equally childlike perspective of the delicate art.
Reviewer: Maeve Visser Knoth | Horn Book Magazine Issue: January, 2022

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