Editor’s note: We continue with our 31 Days of Reading in Spanish. Check out the book review below and don’t forget to enter our weekly GIVEAWAY of $100 worth of books in Spanish! This is the last week, so you have until July 31 to enter.

BOOK DESCRIPTION/REVIEW

Mexican cinematographer Pepe Valle got the idea for the story of Cali y Mona when he read a newspaper article about a blind young lady that had gone her 23 years of life without a guide dog. Cali’s strict Muslim parents considered dogs to be too unclean. But then she heard a story about mini ponies trained to guide the blind and she saved money for three years to get one, even though everyone told her it wouldn’t work.

We picked up Cali y Mona during this year’s LéaLA book fair in Los Angeles. I was immediately drawn to the beautiful illustrations by Margarita Sada and then blown away when I saw that the book was bilingual: Spanish and Braille. Sada also added texture to the illustrations so you can feel Mona’s hair or pass your fingers to feel Cali’s dress.

Ultimately, Cali y Mona is a beautiful story about friendship and tolerance. It also helped me teach my daughter that some people are born blind and they read with their fingers. It’s become one of our favorite books.

BOOK DETAILS

Title: Cali y Mona

Authors/Illustrators: Pepe Valle/Margarita Sada

Ages: all

Publisher/Year: FONCA/CONACULTA, 2011

ISBN: 978-607-95701-0-1

 Price: $21.57 on Amazon.com

Editor’s note: We continue with our 31 Days of Reading in Spanish. Check out the book review below and don’t forget to enter our weekly GIVEAWAY of $100 worth of books in Spanish! This is the last week, so you have until July 31 to enter.

BOOK DESCRIPTION/REVIEW

There are so many good things to say about the series of books written by Peruvian sisters Andrea and Claudia Paz that I truly don’t know where to begin. For starters, not only do they write and illustrate their children’s books, but they also musicalize them together with their brother Cristobal. They are true treat for kids and grownups alike!

All the books in the Chimoc series revolve around the title character, a Peruvian hairless dog, and a bunch of his animal friends. In Chimoc en Machu Picchu, the authors take kids on a tour of majestic Machu Picchu by telling a story about the importance of caring for our environment. Little ones will love the detailed illustrations and each book contains additional info at the end so that you can further discuss the topic of the story with your kids.

My favorite part of the series are the CDs, which not only include the narration of the story by one of the sisters, but also songs that were written specifically for each story and are super catchy. Unfortunately, these books are not available in the United States, but we’re including this one and Chimoc, el perro calato (the first one in the series) in our giveaway so be sure to enter!

BOOK DETAILS

Title: Chimoc en Machu Picchu

Authors/Illustrators: Andrea y Claudia Paz

Ages: all

Publisher/Year: Editorial Norma/2011

Website: Chimoc.com

Editor’s note: We continue with our 31 Days of Reading in Spanish. Check out the book review below and don’t forget to enter our weekly GIVEAWAY of $100 worth of books in Spanish! This is the last week, so you have until July 31 to enter.

BOOK DESCRIPTION/REVIEW

We all know and love Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are, right?  So I don’t have anything to say about the story itself, but I asked my sons to pick a couple of their favorite books for me to review, and this was one of them. I will say, however, that the translation was done by the wonderful Teresa Mlawer. Her Spanish rendition of the story flows beautifully, and remains true to the spirit of the original. In fact, it is quite possibly my favorite book to read out loud to my boys. ¡Que comiencen los festejos!

   BOOK DETAILS

   Title: Donde viven los monstruos

   Author and Illustrator: Maurice Sendak

   Ages: 4 and up

   Publisher/Year: HarperTrophy 1963/Translation 1996

   ISBN: 0-06-443422-2

   Price: $15.27 on Amazon.com

Editor’s note: We continue with our 31 Days of Reading in Spanish. Check out the book review below and don’t forget to enter our weekly GIVEAWAY of $100 worth of books in Spanish! This is the last week, so you have until July 31 to enter.

BOOK DESCRIPTION/REVIEW

Papelucho is a series of books by author Marcela Paz and it’s a children’s classic for all Chilean kids. Twelve books were published between 1947 and 1974 — it may seem outdated, but the beauty of Papelucho is that it is timeless! Papelucho is a young 8-year-old boy and all stories are told from his point of view in a diary entry style. He spends most of his days with his nanny, “Domitila” and he is a curious, observants and very funny boy.  There are very innocent and laugh out loud moments as he describes his world from the point of view of a child.

Papelucho was so much a part of my life that when I started blogging in 2010 that he was the inspiration for writing from my son’s point of view. For two years I wrote as my child and described a world as seen through young eyes. To this day, the series is still a best seller and ask any Chilean and they have great memories of Papelucho and call tell you about their favorite book!

BOOK DETAILS

Title: Papelucho (name of series)

Author: Marcela Paz

Ages: 8 — 100!

Publisher/Year: Editorial Sudamericana

Price: $5.99 Kindle version on Amazon.com

Editor’s note: We continue with our 31 Days of Reading in Spanish. Check out the book review below and don’t forget to enter our weekly GIVEAWAY of $100 worth of books in Spanish! This is the last week, so you have until July 31 to enter.

BOOK DESCRIPTION/REVIEW

Gloria Anzaldua, Chicana author and academic, wrote several books dealing with sensitive issues that arise from living on the Mexico/U.S. border. Friends from the Other Side/Amigos del otro lado is a book that lends itself to discussing a sensitive issue like undocumented immigration with children as young as 6 years old.

What I especially love about this book is that children are given the opportunity to talk about a delicate topic from the perspective of someone who may be going through what the main character is experiencing — the risks of being an undocumented immigrant.

Like other children’s books written by Anzaldua, Prietita Has a Friend (1991) Prietita y La Llorona (1996) & La fea (1958), this one is also a great way to expose children to the colorful ways bilinguals use multiple languages to communicate.

   BOOK DETAILS

   Title: Friends from the Other Side/Amigos  del otro lado.

   Author: Gloria Anzaldua

   Illustrator: Consuelo Mendez

   Ages: 6-10+

   Publisher/Year: Children’s Book Press/1995

   ISBN: 0-64234-130-0

   Price: $7.60 on Amazon.com

Editor’s note: We continue with our 31 Days of Reading in Spanish. Check out the book review below and don’t forget to enter our weekly GIVEAWAY of $100 worth of books in Spanish! This is the last week, so you have until July 31 to enter.

BOOK DESCRIPTION/REVIEW

Many of us have heard the phrases “Value what you have” or “Don’t be afraid to start over.” It is here that Pam Muñoz, author of Esperanza Renace (Esperanza Rising in English), does an amazing job exemplifying what this really means by taking her readers in a journey with Esperanza (which means hope). This is a story of a young girl who learns how important both love and sacrifice for family and friends are.

Esperanza is a girl who has it all: the most beautiful silk dresses, expensive porcelain dolls, and a family she adores. Unfortunately, things take a turn for the worse and Esperanza and her mother are forced to move to California. This new life is completely different from the one she had grown accustomed to.

The character Esperanza is based on Esperanza Ortega, Pam Muñoz’ grandmother, and her real life experiences living on a hacienda in Mexico and later coming to The United States. The beauty of this book is that is very well written and will leave you always wanting to read more. While it is targeted for audiences 8+, this is a great opportunity to use this book as a read aloud to your children. They for sure will love it.

BOOK DETAILS

Title: Esperanza Renace

Author: Pam Muñoz Ryan

Translator: Nuria Molinero

Illustrator: Joe Capeda

Publisher/Year: Scholastic en Español, 2012

Ages: 8+

ISBN: 978-0439398855

Price: $6.99 on Amazon.com

Editor’s note: We continue with our 31 Days of Reading in Spanish. Check out the book review below and don’t forget to enter our weekly GIVEAWAY of $100 worth of books in Spanish! This is the last week, so you have until July 31 to enter.

BOOK DESCRIPTION/REVIEW

I’ve found some children’s books in Spanish that are so beautiful they take my breath away. I spend a small fortune on them…then many of them sit on the bookshelf, unread, until I eventually concede defeat and get rid of them in a fit of de-cluttering.

Froggy y su papá is not one of those books, but it fits neatly in my new philosophy when it comes to children’s books: I don’t care what my kids are reading, as long as they’re reading. And one of my sons has latched onto the Froggy series. I found this one at a yard sale, and it’s been such a hit I’ve picked up a few more of the books. If you’re familiar with the original, the text is repetitive (with lots of yelling, “Frooooggggyy!”), there are fun sounds — ¡toink!–¡ta-chán! — that we love to yell out loud together. It’s Father’s Day, and Froggy drops his father’s breakfast, bonks his father on the head while playing mini-golf, and makes a hole-in-one. It’s not one of those books I would covet if I saw it at the bookstore. But my son adores it — and what’s more, his Spanish reading skills have improved remarkably since we started reading this series. And that makes Froggy okay in my book.

   BOOK DETAILS

   Title: Froggy y su papá

   Author: Jonathan London

   Illustrator: Frank Remkiewicz

   Ages: 3-7 years

   Publisher/Year: Scholastic/2004

   ISBN: 0-439-76557-9

   Price: Varies (Used copies on Amazon; $3.71 in Scholastic’s Club Leo)

Editor’s note: We continue with our 31 Days of Reading in Spanish. Check out the book review below and don’t forget to enter our weekly GIVEAWAY of $100 worth of books in Spanish! This is the last week, so you have until July 31 to enter.

BOOK DESCRIPTION/REVIEW

If you are looking for a non-traditional book in Spanish, though it comes in English as well, then Tener un patito es util/Tener un nene es util is it! It is essentially a two-for-one book (though the stories are connected) because as the pages are flipped, the book unfolds to one long panel. You can start reading about the duck’s perspective (yellow side) about bath time and then flip the book over to read about the little child’s perspective (blue side). In fact, one of the reasons why I love this book is because it offers a way to teach children about seeing the world (or in this case, the point of view of a rubber duck versus a little kid during bath time) from two different points of view.

The illustrations and the storyline were both created by the author, Marisol Misenta, an Argentine native who is known by the mononym ISOL. Like many of her other children’s books, such as Nocturno: Recetario de sueños, there is an interactive component where the child reading the book is asked to, either literally or implicitly, to think or write about what is happening in the book.

   BOOK DETAILS 

   Title: Tener un patito es útil/Tener un nene es útil

   Author and Illustrator: ISOL

   Ages: 2-5 years

   Publisher/Year:  ISBN: 978-1480001244

   Price: $18.49 on Amazon.com

   Website:  http://www.isol-isol.com.ar/

Editor’s note: We continue with our 31 Days of Reading in Spanish. Check out the book review below and don’t forget to enter our weekly GIVEAWAY of $100 worth of books in Spanish!

BOOK DESCRIPTION/REVIEW

Ever since I was a child, I loved fables and legends. De cómo dicen que fue hecho el mar (or How they say the ocean was made) is one in a series of three books about Taino legends adapted and illustrated by Puerto Rican Mrinali Álvarez Astacio. The other two are about love and people.

Legends explain complex topics using simple tales that even a small child can understand. This one is no exception. I wasn’t aware of this Taino legend and I must say I love it. Basically, it’s thanks to someone’s mischief that the ocean got created. My kids and I love the ocean, so this particular book has been of particular interest to them. Not to mention that they’re half Puerto Rican, so it’s a great story to help them learn about their father’s heritage.

The author has written several children’s books which are favorites at our home. Sadly, they’re not all readily available, but you’ll get a chance to win some by entering our weekly giveaway. ¡Buena suerte!

BOOK DETAILS

Title: De cómo dicen que fue hecho el mar

Author: Mrinali Álvarez Astacio

Illustrator: Mrinali Álvarez Astacio

Ages: 4 to 8

Publisher/Year: La Editorial, Universidad de Puerto Rico/2009

ISBN: 978-0847715862

Price: $10.54 on Amazon.com

Editor’s note: We continue with our 31 Days of Reading in Spanish. Check out the book review below and don’t forget to enter our weekly GIVEAWAY of $100 worth of books in Spanish!

BOOK DESCRIPTION/REVIEW

How many times have your kids wished to be older and have more privileges? How often are they envious of an older sibling that is capable and allowed to do more things?

In Gwendolyn Zepeda’s award-winning bilingual picture book Los Tamales de Ana/Growing Up with Tamales, Ana is the younger sister who is always wishing she were just like her older sister Lidia. Every Christmas the girls are assigned jobs to help make the tamales: mixing the masa, spreading it on the corn husks, filling and rolling the tamales — and every year Ana envies what her sister is able to do.

We see Ana getting older as the years pass, turning 10, 12, 14, and 16, and Ana sees Lidia always two years older, and always able to do the more difficult tasks.

Sweet Ana does not get discouraged and knows that when she grows up, she will make the tamales by herself and get to deliver them to all of her family and friends.

Los Tamales de Ana is a delightful story and combines the holiday tradition of making tamales as a family with the wishes of a little girl who can’t wait to grow up. I can’t wait to take this book out this December when we are making our own tamales!

    BOOK DETAILS

    Title: Growing Up with Tamales/ Los Tamales de Ana

    Author: Gwendolyn Zepeda

    Illustrator: April Ward

    Ages: 3-7 years

    Publisher/Year: Arte Publico Press/2008

    ISBN: 9781558854932

    Price: $20.22 on Amazon.com