Blues Journey (Bccb Blue Ribbon Nonfiction Book Award (Awards)) [Hardcover]

Walter Dean Myers (Author), Christopher Myers (Author)

Book Description

Age Level: 10 and up | Grade Level: 5 and up | Series: Bccb Blue Ribbon Nonfiction Book Award (Awards)

The African experience in America is celebrated with a soulful, affecting blues poem.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 4 Up-"Blues- what you mean to me?/-Are you my pain and misery,/or my sweet, sweet company?" The opening verse of this latest father/son collaboration probes the very essence of a form-and a feeling; it asks the question that anyone who has sought solace in music can relate to. The pair's first composition wandered through a Harlem collage (Scholastic, 1997), depicting "-a call, a song- the mood indigo- a language of darkness-." This new duet is the blues: verbally and visually, it explores the idiom while exemplifying it. A call and response accompanies each painting. The poetry is given a variety of voices by the ever-changing cast and settings: three figures in a horse-drawn cart on a lonely road; two children sitting on a curb-one crying, the other comforting; workers in a chain gang; a brother and sister sharing a bed, head to toe. The tightly controlled, yet endlessly surprising palette consists of blue (ink), white (paint), and brown (paper bags). Many of the bodies and backgrounds are literally blue, with white highlights. This chilling effect is tempered by the warm texture of the brown bags. As the journey progresses, the lyrics and art look at loss through the lenses of slavery, poverty, lynching, love spurned, fear of dying-and of living. An author's note provides a lucid description of the history, elements, and importance of the blues. Symbolism is explored in a glossary. Artist and author push the idiom-and the picture book-to new dimensions. Their song will slide through readers' ears and settle into their souls.
Wendy Lukehart, Washington DC Public Library
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Gr. 5-8. The blues' deceptively simple rhyme scheme tracks the deeper feelings of lives that have been bruised. In this picture book for older readers, Myers offers blues-inspired verse that touches on the black-and-blue moments of individual lives. His son Christopher's images, which illustrate the call-and-response text, alternate between high spirited and haunting. Myers begins with a very necessary introduction to the history of the blues that includes an explanation of the rhyme scheme. Still, the level of sophistication necessary for kids to get into the book is considerable: "Strange fruit hanging, high in the big oak tree / Strange fruit hanging high in the big oak tree / You can see what it did to Willie, / and you see what it did to me." Myers' original verse is unsettling if young people know the reference from the Billie Holiday song, but unclear if they don't ("strange fruit" is defined in the glossary). The accompanying illustration, though it's one of the less inspired ones, helps clarify things--a boy walks in a crowd carrying a sign saying, "yesterday a man was lynched." But there's no cohesion between the spreads, and the next one features a blues singer at a mike: "The thrill is gone, but love is still in my heart . . . I can feel you in the music and it's tearing me apart." Much of Myers' poetry here is terrific, by turn, sweet, sharp, ironic, but it's the memorable collage artwork, executed in the bluest of blue ink and brown paper, that will draw readers first. Once inside the book, some children will immediately hear the songs the poetry sings; others will have to listen more closely. Ilene Cooper
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 10 and up
  
• Hardcover: 48 pages
• Publisher: Holiday House; First Edition edition (March 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0823416135
• ISBN-13: 978-0823416134
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 11.2 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #570,118 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Walter Dean Myers is a New York Times bestselling and critically acclaimed author who has garnered much respect and admiration for his fiction, nonfiction, and poetry for young people. Winner of the first Michael L. Printz Award, he is considered one of the preeminent writers for children. He lives in Jersey City, New Jersey, with his family.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A masterpiece redefines what picturebooks can do, February 20, 2004

By 

Ayelle (Boston, MA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Blues Journey (Bccb Blue Ribbon Nonfiction Book Award (Awards)) (Hardcover)

Father-son, writer-illustrator team Walter Dean Myers and Christopher Myers have produced a masterpiece. W. D. Myers's text is made up of poetic blues lyrics, the "call and response" depicting the African-American experience. The poetry is beautiful, unsettling and evocative; it is perfectly complemented by C. Myers's art. The artwork is done entirely in white paint, warm brown paper bags, and blue ink -- every blue tone from navy-black blue to ice-white blue. It is not at all obvious at first glance that his palette was so limited; C. Myers is astonishingly creative, using a wide variety of artistic techniques and tools, and his spreads are richly textured and diverse. The images are moody, haunting, and tense. Sorrow and pain are the dominant emotions, though hope, joy, tenderness and celebration make appearances as well.

As the title indicates, the book is a journey, and the verses and images progress forward through the timeline of the blues, from the end of slavery through the beginning of the civil rights movement. The pictures also show the gradual movement from country to city, the black migration from South to North. The blues timeline is printed at the end of the book, along with a glossary of symbolic terms used in blues lyrics. This back matter, in addition to the opening author's note giving an explanation of the history and meaning of the blues, provide a necessary key to understanding the layers of meaning in the verses and accompanying illustrations.

Several of the spreads are visually breathtaking, evoking deep feelings of grief and sympathy. A man stands facing away from the viewer, knee-deep in a gorgeously painted blue ocean, holding onto a fishing net. The verse speaks of "casting my love out to the sea;" the illustration speaks powerfully of loneliness. Another spread depicts two young boys sitting on the curb, one with his face buried, turning away from the other child, who is holding his hand in comfort. The very adult look of concern and hopelessness on the boy's face is striking. Coupled with the verse, which says "despair will scrape the bone/ misery loves company, blues can live alone," the illustration speaks of abuse and misery visited upon children helpless to protect themselves; a similar illustration shows two children sleeping on the same mat, head to toe, by a verse that describes their poverty. One of the strongest images in the book is a furious boy at the back of a crowd holding up a sign that says YESTERDAY A MAN WAS LYNCHED, which explicates the accompanying verse ("Strange fruit hanging high in a big oak tree") and summons an image that, while shocking, is an important part of blues history.

"Blues Journey" is neither upbeat, nor easily accessible; it a sophisticated, layered work that expands with every re-reading. Perhaps it is not the sort of book a parent will take home to read to a toddler, but it has a great deal to offer older children; in particular, the book would be an invaluable classroom tool for the study of African-American history and blues music. The Myers have expanded the boundaries of what a picturebook can do. The combined effect of the text and art is to create a visual metaphor for the music of the blues, and a powerful evocation of the black experience.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Travel with Walter Dean Myers, November 30, 2003

By 

Librarian (Cleveland, TN United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Blues Journey (Bccb Blue Ribbon Nonfiction Book Award (Awards)) (Hardcover)

Blues Journey briefly explores the blues. Walter Dean Myers prefaces his lyrics with a note about this musical genre. We then travel with the speaker through the sadness that he has experienced over his lifetime. W.D. Myers adds a timeline of blues landmarks and a glossary of blues terms to the end of the book. Walter Dean Myers' son, Christopher, beautifully illustrates this book. This is an excellent title for an introduction to a study of the blues with students fifth grade and up!

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A BEAUTIFUL AND HAUNTING BOOK, January 31, 2004

By 

A. L. Straayer (Illinois) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Blues Journey (Bccb Blue Ribbon Nonfiction Book Award (Awards)) (Hardcover)

If you want to know what the book is about and the feel of it,
take a look at the cover. It says it all - the scariness, the
unutterable sadness, the awfulness of the slavery & then the segregation in the South from which the Blues developed.