At first, the Great, Green Garden Tour sounds like a lot of fun. Before long, though, young rabbit Timo starts to find that it’s a lot of pressure. Can he really call his garden “great?” Maybe it needs one little change…or a few… or a lot. Anxious to make his garden measure up, Timo forgets to take time out for anyone else. Luckily, his friends know just how to remind him of the value of being there for others: by being there for him when he needs it most. In musical prose filled with word play and whimsy, Victoria Allenby invites young readers to come along as Timo sets to work with a skip and a song, meets trouble with a sniff and a sigh, and triumphs with a smile that’s as bright as the sun. Dean Griffiths’ charming illustrations are both classic and fresh, infusing each animal character with personality and life. Complete with an illustrated glossary of flowers, this beautifully-designed early reader might just be worthy of the word “great.”
2020-2021 Keystone to Reading Elementary Book Award List 2019 Florida Book Award - Bronze Medal It's springtime and Badger is ready to plant the perfect garden. He has spent months gathering and sorting seeds. It's been a lot of work but it's worth it. His friends Red Squirrel, Dormouse, and Weasel come to help. They weed. They rake. And finally they plant. Afterward, everyone celebrates, and Badger can already imagine the perfect rows of flowers and vegetables. But then a rainstorm comes and washes away the beautiful seeds. Badger's perfect garden is ruined. Or is it? Author Marsha Diane Arnold's gentle story will encourage young readers to think beyond plans and expectations and imagine the wonderful possibilities that may occur when life and nature have other ideas.
The luminous garden scenes and playful language in this tale of late-blooming self-discovery tell the story of Holly Bloom, a girl who wants nothing more than to be a great gardener but simply doesn't seem to have the knack. Despite suggestions and support from her green-thumbed mom and siblings, Holly just can't get her garden to bloom. She waters and fertilizes and uses all the right gardening tools, but her daffodils don't grow, and her daisies keep drooping. Armed with a positive attitude and unwavering perseverance, Holly finally realizes that she does not need to grow flowers with soil and seeds to be a success. Inspired by her artistic father, she taps into her natural creative abilities and surprises everyone by growing her own unique garden—from paper, paste, pipe cleaners, and paint.
In the history of planning, the design of an entire community prior to its construction is among the oldest traditions. Iconic Planned Communities and the Challenge of Change explores the twenty-first-century fortunes of planned communities around the world. Drawing on interdisciplinary perspectives, the editors and contributors examine what happened to planned communities after their glory days had passed and they became vulnerable to pressures of growth, change, and even decline. Beginning with Robert Owen's industrial village in Scotland and concluding with Robert Davis's neotraditional resort haven in Florida, this book documents the effort to translate optimal design into sustaining a common life that works for changing circumstances and new generations of residents. Basing their approach on historical research and practical, on-the-ground considerations, the essayists argue that preservation efforts succeed best when they build upon foundational planning principles, address landscape, architecture, and social engineering together, and respect the spirit of place. Presenting twenty-three case studies located in six continents, each contributor considers how to preserve the spirit of the community and its key design elements, and the ways in which those elements can be adapted to contemporary circumstances and changing demographics. Iconic Planned Communities and the Challenge of Change espouses strategies to achieve critical resilience and emphasizes the vital connection between heritage preservation, equitable sharing of the benefits of living in these carefully designed places, and sustainable development. Communities: Bat'ovany-Partizánske, Cité Frugès, Colonel Light Gardens, Den-en Chôfu, Garbatella, Greenbelt, Hampstead Garden Suburb, Jardim América, Letchworth Garden City, Menteng, New Lanark, Pacaembú, Radburn, Riverside, Römerstadt, Sabaudia, Seaside, Soweto, Sunnyside Gardens, Tapiola, The Uplands, Welwyn Garden City, Wythenshawe. Contributors: Arnold R. Alanen, Carlos Roberto Monteiro de Andrade, Sandra Annunziata, Robert Freestone, Christine Garnaut, Isabelle Gournay, Michael Hebbert, Susan R. Henderson, James Hopkins, Steven W. Hurtt, Alena Kubova-Gauché, Jean-François Lejeune, Maria Cristina a Silva Leme, Larry McCann, Mervyn Miller, John Minnery, Angel David Nieves, John J. Pittari, Jr., Gilles Ragot, David Schuyler, Mary Corbin Sies, Christopher Silver, André Sorensen, R. Bruce Stephenson, Shun-ichi J. Watanabe.
A legend tells of the danger posed by the abuse of an overpowering force of nature, the "White Dragon", which in ancient times brought about the downfall of an entire continent. This dragon will one day awaken from its millennia-long sleep and ignite the world conflagration. A small circle of faithful is called by the sages of the Brotherhood to lift the veil of mystery that hides behind the legend. Their directive: to warn humanity of this threat, which must be recognized and averted. A task that confronts all those involved with unimagined challenges. Can they succeed, in agreement with the Council of the Wise, to banish the disaster?
Emerging from the ruins of the former Soviet Union, the literature of the Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia is analyzed from the fruitful perspective of postcolonialism, a theoretical approach whose application to former second-world countries is in its initial stages. This groundbreaking volume brings scholars working in the West together with those who were previously muffled behind the Iron Curtain. They gauge the impact of colonization on the culture of the Baltic states and demonstrate the relevance of concepts first elaborated by a wide range of critics from Frantz Fanon to Homi Bhabha. Examining literary texts and the situation of the intellectual reveals Baltic concerns with identity and integrity, the rewriting of previously blotted out or distorted history, and a search for meaning in societies struggling to establish their place in the world after decades - and perhaps millennia - of oppression. The volume dips into the late Tsarist period, then goes more deeply into Soviet deportations to the Gulag, while the main focus is on works of the turning-point in the late 1980s and 1990s. Postcolonial concepts like mimicry, subjectivity and the Other provide a new discourse that yields fresh insights into the colonized countries’ culture and their poignant attempts to fight, to adapt and to survive.This book will be of interest to literary critics, Baltic scholars, historians and political scientists of Eastern Europe, linguists, anthropologists, psychologists, sociologists, working in the area of postcommunism and anyone interested in learning more about these ancient and vibrant cultures.
"Dazzling...Critics hailed Buwalda as 'The Dutch answer to Jonathan Franzen', but his brilliance is entirely unique."--The Times (UK) Siem Sigerius is a beloved, brilliant professor of mathematics with a promising future in politics. His family—including a loving wife, two gorgeous, intelligent stepdaughters and a successful future son-in-law—and carefully appointed home in the bucolic countryside complete the portrait of a comfortable, morally upright household. But there are elements of Siem's past that threaten to upend the peace and stability that he has achieved, and when he stumbles upon a deception that’s painfully close to home, things begin to fall apart. A cataclysmic explosion in a fireworks factory, the advent of internet pornography, and the reappearances of a discarded, dangerous son all play a terrible role in the spectacular fragmentation of the Sigerius clan. A riveting portrait of a family in crisis and the ways that even the smallest twists of fate can forever change our lives, Bonita Avenue is an incendiary, unpredictable debut of relationships torn asunder by lies, and minds destroyed by madness.
Some of the world's oldest and richest folk traditions come from a country that most Americans know very little about-Finland (or Suomi). The fifth largest country in Europe (in land size), Finland is home to the third true folk epic, The Kalevala (The Land of Heroes). It is a country of lush forests and sparkling clear lakes where, in the northern regions, reindeer still roam. This collection introduces readers to the fascinating culture, history, geology, and folk literature of Finland. After a historical and cultural overview, the authors present 20 representative stories-including ancient tales from The Kalevala, humorous and moral tales (e.g., The Selfish Housewife and The Magic Wish)-and a fictionalized account of a witch trial in the 1600s. Holiday traditions, proverbs and sayings, and traditional recipes embellish this collection and will tantalize and intrigue readers. Color plates illustrate the land, the people, and artistic traditions of this wondrous people.
