This week, Hectic Grandson and I added two new books to our reading list. He loved one but didn’t give the other one such a great review. I’ve been trying to read to him every day. I would like to get to the point where I’m reading to him in two sessions, but this blog isn’t called Hectic Dad for nothing. We’re so busy around here that I haven’t successfully carved out two sessions of reading. Sadly, we’re getting our reading in 4-5 times per week. I’ve got a goal for April and started tracking it, so we needed to add some books to our repertoire.

The Little Engine That Could by Watty Piper was the first book we attempted to add to our reading list. I say attempted because Hectic Grandson wouldn’t sit through the entire story. It’s targeted at 3-5 year olds, and it was obviously above his attention span.  In addition, the graphics didn’t seem to appeal to him. In retrospect, I’m not all that surprised. This book was originally copyrighted in 1930 and the pictures look old, even to me. Remember, I’m in my early 50’s, so this is a book that I grew up with…but it was old at that time.

The story itself is one you probably already know. The refrain I think I can echoes through the latter half of the book. It’s a good story from that perspective. After a breakdown of their train, a ragtag group of clowns, dolls, and circus animals are stranded on one side of a mountain, with a train filled with food and toys for the good boys and girls in the town on the other side of the mountain.

The group stops an arrogant passenger engine who barely gives them the time of day. He refuses to stoop so low as to pull their train over the mountain. Next the group asks a freight engine if he will help them, and they are again rebuffed. Both these engines come off as too good for our little band. The third engine to stop is a weak, old engine who simply isn’t up to the task. He too refuses.

Finally, along comes a little blue engine who works in the switching yard. Long before Thomas the Tank Engine and his merry band came into prominence, Tilly (as she’s called in the animated version of the story that I’m familiar with), was working in the yard. She gladly agrees to help our travelers, but her small size makes the work hard. Through sheer perseverance and the I think I can refrain, she pulls the train over the mountain and delivers the load to the town.

It’s a great story from he perspective of presenting a positive attitude as a way to win, but it looks like we’ll be shelving this book for a few years until Hectic Grandson is a bit older. Hopefully he’ll be more interested then.

Our second book was much more of  hit. New York City by Paula Hannigan not only held my little protege’s interest, but he kept turning the pages backwards and forwards to no end. This is a hybrid cut-out and board book. Frankly, you have to see it to understand. I’ve done what I could with the photos to give you some examples of what I mean.

The book is really just a series of snippets about several New York City landmarks. Since Hectic Grandson and I spent several days this past summer in NYC, it was fun to relive some of those moments while reading the book. Honestly, I learned a couple of things while reading this very short book. More importantly, he loved the shape of the pages. He’s picked this book to be read and reread several times since we added it to our repertoire, so I imagine that we’ll be reading it a lot.

The book highlights the Brooklyn Bridge, Grand Central Terminal, Times Square, Central Park, the Empire State Building, and the Statue of Liberty. If you’ve ever been to New York, you’ll appreciate the detail in the illustrations, but not so much detail as to overwhelm a toddler. There is enough detail that I had something to look at as he thumbed back and forth through the book.

This is one we both highly recommend if you’re looking for a sturdy book that’s different than anything else in your library!

So there you go, one winner and one that we’re going to reserve judgment on. New York City seemed very appropriate for a 1 year-old and haven’t become totally disinteresting to this 50+ year old grandpa. As we read the latter book, I tend to embellish it with stories of our adventures in the city, and hope that over time he’ll understand how much that visit meant to me!

Whatever you do, read to your kids and grandkids. Heck, if you don’t have any of your own, go find some. Kids love to be on the receiving end of stories that are being read. Eventually they’ll be the ones reading. What better way to help them learn!

Make it a great day!