From Publishers Weekly
Silkscreen-style images of New York City, picturing "soul food" signs and downtown icons like the Brooklyn Bridge, illustrate this rendition of Ella Fitzgerald's 1938 song. A boy in a blue baseball cap acts out the jazzy nonsense lyrics about "A-tisket, a-tasket, a green-and-yellow basket,/ I wrote a letter to my mommy,/ on the way I dropped it." As the boy looks for the wicker tote, an impish "little girlie" in pigtails grabs it and runs off, passing a street-corner fruit vendor and making for the park: "She was truckin' on down the avenue/ without a single thing to do." The boy throws a tantrum, but no one has seen his missing item. At last, with the Washington Square arch in the background, the girl gives the boy a flirty glance as her dog returns the basket. Eitan (Cowboy Bunnies) has the tall order of representing lively vocal improv on the pages of a picture book. While the mixed-media collages of people and cityscapes dance with energy, Fitzgerald's fans may wonder at Eitan's choice of a blond boy as the speaker, a silent African-American girl as his teasing counterpart (and playful thief). Monotone text and italics scroll along the bottom of the pictures, implying a call-and-response but flatly lacking in animation ("Was it blue? No, no, no, no. Just a little yellow basket"). There's little correlation graphically with the spontaneity of the scatting sound so closely associated with the First Lady of Song's delivery. Ages 4-8.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From School Library Journal
PreSchool-Grade 2-Fitzgerald's cool, saucy 1930s' musical reworking of the nursery song pours into this picture book like sunshine. Eitan's blithe, classy cut-paper illustrations maintain the electric charge of America's First Lady of Song's delivery and match her sophistication. One character is black, the other Anglo, true to the nursery song's broad appeal. No simple interpretation though, A-tisket reflects the style of a jazz classic. The exuberance of the two children (one losing a basket, one finding it) is enhanced by its contrast with their static urban landscape. The youngsters' clear energy is another nod to Fitzgerald's breezy style. Starting with the endpapers on which baskets and "that little girlie" dance fancifully on an impressionistic depiction of the song's score, it's motion and more motion. Characters are all arms and legs and dance propelled by Eitan's mixed-media, gouache, computer art blast. The book suggests a variety of lively uses for storytime programs and home fun. The reader assumes the role of Fitzgerald's band leader: "Was it red?" and the audience, like her band members, replies: "No, no, no, no." The expectation for children's picture books illustrating songs used to be no more than a series of images supporting the lyrics' literal meaning. This title joins the newer, more sophisticated wave of interpretations like Chris Raschka's Simple Gifts (Holt, 1998) after the Shaker hymn, and Woody Guthrie's Howdi Do (Candlewick, 2000), illustrated by Vladimir Radunsky. Like A-tisket, they evoke the spirit and life inside the songs.
Liza Graybill, Worcester Public Library, MACopyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.
