The Art of Reading by Reading is Fundamental

[katekintailbc]

The Art of Reading: Forty Illustrators Celebrate RIF's 40th Anniversary
by Reading is Fundamental

I came across this during one of my library volunteering shifts (oh, if you had a nickel for the number of times I've started out a review like that, you would be... I don't know... able to buy a pizza?). The cover looked beautiful, so I glanced inside. It's an incredible and beautiful concept: a collection of children's book illustrators who 1-discuss how they came to love reading and 2- present an illustration that pays tribute to that love.

Some of the authors discuss how they've loved reading since childhood. Some discuss how they didn't like reading until they came upon that one special book that changed their minds. Each page pays tribute to the influence books had on these people whose livlihoods now have to do with bringing images from books to life. Also on each page is a photo of the illustrator, a quote, and a short bio that lists the books they are famous for illustrating.

But the illustrations are what really caught my attention. Most of them illustrate in their own style a book that one of the fondest of theirs from their childhoods. Some of my favorites are Eric Rohmann's imagining of Millions of Cats what the cats would look like when the cats eat each other up (answer: adorably fat cat!) and Mark Teague imagining the quest-goers in The Silver Chair meeting the dark knight who never speaks and the green lady out near the city of the giants (absolutely gorgeous). But my absolte favorite was Tony DiTerlizzi's illustration. I love his art from the Spiderwick Chronicles. And he illustrated one of my favorite scenes from the Winnie-the-Pooh books: Eeyore's birthday! What a gorgeous piece!

What a pleasure of a book to read!

Click on each picture for a bigger view: