{"id":41699,"date":"2022-08-24T22:17:44","date_gmt":"2022-08-25T02:17:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=41699"},"modified":"2022-08-24T22:17:44","modified_gmt":"2022-08-25T02:17:44","slug":"review-of-berry-song-by-michaela-goade","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=41699","title":{"rendered":"Review of Berry Song, by Michaela Goade"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Berry Song<\/em><\/p>\n

by Michaela Goade<\/p>\n

Little, Brown and Company, 2022. 36 pages.
\nReview written August 15, 2022, from a library book
\nStarred Review<\/p>\n

This picture book is gorgeous, as you’d expect, since it’s created by a winner of the Caldecott Medal. Instead of illustrating a book from another indigenous person’s traditions, she has written and illustrated this book from her own Tlingit traditions. Here’s how she begins the author’s note at the back:<\/p>\n

Like the young girl in this book, I too live on an island at the edge of a wide, wild sea where I grew up picking tl\u00e9iw, or berries. My home is Sheet’k\u00e1, or Sitka, Alaska. It is the same island my Tlingit grandmother, great-grandparents, and great-great-grandparents called home. All year long I excitedly wait for berry season, for the juicy salmonberries that strum the first notes of berry song, and the cranberries after the first freeze that signal its end. Every time I wander back into the forest, I am a little kid again, spellbound by the magic and joy of berry song.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The text of the picture book is a lyrical adventure of a grandmother showing her granddaughter how to get food from the land — especially the berries. As they pick, they sing the names of the berries — many more kinds than I even knew existed — and thank the land for taking care of them.<\/p>\n

The book doesn’t give the tune, but you can hear the music in the words:<\/p>\n

Salmonberry, Cloudberry, Blueberry, Nagoonberry.
\nHuckleberry, Soapberry, Strawberry, Crowberry.
\nThe berries sing to us, glowing like little jewels.
\nWe sing too, so berry — and bear — know we are here.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

At the end of the book, in another season, the girl brings her little sister to gather more berries.<\/p>\n

This is a lovely celebration of family and traditions and living in harmony with the land.<\/p>\n

The endpapers identify all the berries named, with some additional photographs along with the Author’s Note.<\/p>\n

michaelagoade.com<\/a>
\nlbyr.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Buy from Amazon.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Find this review on Sonderbooks<\/a> at: www.sonderbooks.com\/Picture_Books\/berry_song.html<\/a><\/p>\n

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.<\/p>\n

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.<\/p>\n

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