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Summary
Summary
You may never have
heard of a lightship.
Once, lightships
anchored on waters
across America,
on the oceans
and in the Great Lakes,
floating where lighthouses
could not be built.
Smaller than most ships,
but more steadfast, too,
they held their spots,
through calm and storm,
to guide sailors
toward safe waters.
In these pages
one lightship
and her crew (and cat)
again hold their place.
The crew goes
again from bow to stern,
from keel to mast,
to run their engines,
shine their lights,
and sound their horns.
They run the small ship
that guides the large ships.
They are the crew (and cat)
that work to make the ocean safe,
that hold their place,
so other ships can sail.
Come aboard!
Author Notes
Brian Floca was born and raised in Temple, Texas. He graduated from Brown University and received his MFA from the School of Visual Arts.
Brian Floca is the author and illustrator of Locomotive, winner of the 2014 Caldecott Medal. He has also written and illustrated Moonshot: The Flight of Apollo 11, Lightship, The Racecar Alphabet, and Five Trucks. He is the illustrator of the Poppy Stories series, by Avi; Ballet for Martha: Making Appalachian Spring, by Jan Greenberg and Sandra Jordan; Kate Messner's Marty McGuire novels; and Lynne Cox's forthcoming Elizabeth, Queen of the Seas. His books have received four Robert F. Sibert Honor awards, an Orbis Pictus Award, an Orbis Pictus Honor, a silver medal from the Society of Illustrators, and have twice been selected for The New York Times' annual 10 Best Illustrated Books list.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (6)
Publisher's Weekly Review
With straightforward, compelling prose and crisply detailed narrative ink drawings, Floca (The Racecar Alphabet) creates an engrossing portrayal of a now-vanished nautical practice (according to a closing author's note). "Here is a ship that holds her place," he begins, with a phrase that becomes the basis of an improvised refrain (e.g., "The lightship holds her one sure spot"). Thus he introduces the fictional lightship Ambrose and her nine-man crew. Floca follows the men and their marmalade cat mascot during the mundane tasks and sometimes-dramatic occurrences of daily life (a too-close-for-comfort encounter with a big tanker elicits a salty "#@*%&!" from the crew). In the final pages, a fog rolls in (as the cat creeps across the deck, for Carl Sandburg's fans), allowing the Ambrose to show off her raison d'Etre. She flashes her beacon and sounds her horn (with a mighty "beeooh," at which the feline visibly shakes) to "mark the way" for other ships "past rocks and shoals,/ past reefs and wrecks,/ past danger." Youngsters who are mesmerized by "how things work" books will want to add this one to their shelves, but even landlubbers may well embrace this tribute to steadfast duty on the high seas. Ages 4-7. (Mar.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Horn Book Review
(Primary) Unlike other ships, which set sail and go interesting places, the job of a lightship is to hold its place at sea. When other ships might try to avoid bad weather, it's the job of a lightship to stay put and ""sound their horn so loud the whole ship SHAKES."" Without running aground on the shoals of too much or too little information, Floca skillfully details the crew, equipment, and routine for all aboard. He's especially good at working in extra information through pictures with a minimum of words -- a dinghy approaches, with a speech balloon saying ""Mail's here!"" (Speech balloons also catch the authentic flavor of seaboard dialogue, as when a larger ship comes too close and a sailor on the lightship shakes his fist and lets fly with ""#@*%&!"") The watercolor-and-ink illustrations gracefully depict the beauty of the ocean on both calm and turbulent days as well as the massive vessels the lightship protects, all seen from many perspectives. Endpapers include a cross-section diagram labeling everything from the gin rummy game taking place in the stern to the anchor at the bow, and an author's note at the end explains (in letters too tiny for most child readers) that the last U.S. lightship was retired in 1983, making the present tense of the main text a decidedly odd choice. Copryight 2007 of The Horn Book, Inc. All rights reserved. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Booklist Review
Lightships--floating lighthouses--were retired in 1983, but they live on in Floca's handsome picture book, which uses simple words and repeated phrases to emphasize the vessels' purpose and uniqueness as well as their day-to-day operation. Here is a ship that holds her place, begins the text, which takes children on a sensory tour of the Ambrose, complete with the slapping of the waves on the hull, the rocking motion of the ship, the smell of the sea and of fuel, and--in one climactic blast that sends the ship's cat leaping straight up into the air--the sounding of the foghorn. Meanwhile, the ink-and-watercolor illustrations offer close-ups of the crew at work as well as wide, double-page scenes of passing ships (including the SS Ardizzone). Varied in composition and perspective, the art shows the little ship inside and out, in summer and winter, in calm and stormy weather. Some pictures include elements of humor, while other scenes are notable for their quiet beauty. Floca explains in an informative note that before it was possible to build platforms in deep water, lightships served as floating lighthouses, using powerful lights and blaring foghorns to signal other ships. From the endpapers, showing a cutaway view of the ship, to the final phrase, the lightship holds her place, this handsome book respects both its subject and its audience. --Carolyn Phelan Copyright 2007 Booklist
New York Review of Books Review
The cheerful visual joke in this handsome board book recalls Magritte's "this is not a pipe" painting (and the cover recalls his cool blue-sky backgrounds). But it will also prove irresistible to all Halloween-besotted children: what isn't a pumpkin but is round and orange, with gaping eyes and a gap-toothed grin? The slowly developing image gives few clues to its true identity, but a toddler would guess for sure. THREE LITTLE GHOSTIES. By Pippa Goodhart. Illustrated by AnnaLaura Cantone. Bloomsbury. $16.95. (Ages 3 to 6) In a comical mixed-media collage, three small ghosts set off on a scare spree ("I scared some mean witches, sitting in dark ditches, lipsticking their lipses, plotting evil trickses," brags one), sending ghouls and ogres galumphing. But they meet their match with a little boy who's been telling us the story - one "boo!" and they "tumble-tangle fled" and were sent "home to bed." SKELLY THE SKELETON GIRL Written and illustrated by Jimmy Pickering. Simon & Schuster. (Ages 4 to 7) Skelly, a cheerful skeleton girl in a black party dress, lives in a creepy haunted-looking house on a hill, with cobwebs, death's heads (her relatives) and a monster under the stairs. When she finds a bone on the floor, she sets out to discover whose it is - in one of the more comical images, she takes an X-ray of herself: "Could it be a bone from me? No, it wasn't mine." After asking ghosts, spiders and other boneless folks, she finds the source of the bone and makes a new friend - a skeleton dog. LIGHTSHIP Written and illustrated by Brian Floca. Richard Jackson/Atheneum. $16.99. (Ages 4 to 7) Until they were retired in the 1980s, lightships were like floating lighthouses, warning oncoming boats of reefs and other dangers. In this fascinating account, not lacking a touch of humor - we see the crew swearing "#@*%&!" as a cruise ship comes too close - the boat stays at anchor in "one sure spot," an image of quiet steadfastness. Floca's meticulous drawings are based on Light Vessel 87, now docked at the South Street Seaport Museum in Manhattan. OLD PENN STATION Written and illustrated by William Low. Holt. $16.95. (Ages 5 to 9) Low "is a lover of trains and New York architecture," his author's bio says. That much is clear from this homage to the great McKim, Mead & White building that was destroyed in 1963. Digital and oil-painted images convey the grandeur of old Pennsylvania Station - "a half-million cubic feet" of granite, ornamented with clocks, maidens and eagles. Low eloquently conveys the loss, but reminds us that after the demolition, outraged conservationists formed the city's Landmarks Preservation Commission and saved Grand Central Terminal from the same fate. A FIELD GUIDE TO HIGH SCHOOL. By Marissa Walsh. Delacorte. $15.99. (Ages 12 and up) When her ultracool older sister, Claire, leaves for Yale, Andie faces freshman year at her high-pressure private school alone. But not quite: Claire has left her a "field guide" to school - how to dress, how to act, who to be. ("School starts the minute you leave the house in the morning, whether you take the bus, drive or walk. You must be on.") Walsh's first novel is a smart and knowing satire that is probably all too on target as the survival guide it pretends to be. JULIE JUST ON THE WEB: Last Words An interview with Jenny Downham, the author of "Before I Die," a novel told from the point of view of a 16-year-old girl dying of leukemia. nytimes.com/books
School Library Journal Review
K-Gr 2-Lightships were anchored where lighthouses could not be built. They protected our ocean harbors as well as points along the Great Lakes. The last one was decommissioned in 1983, so this fascinating picture book is a piece of nautical history. Floca's watercolor drawings depict daily life aboard one of these vessels, cooking, sleeping, working, all the while rolling with the rhythm of the waves. There were many hazards involved. Big ships came too close, anchors lost their mooring, and weather caused many problems. But when the fog rolled in, the lightship sprang into action. Lights flashed and horns sounded, allowing ship traffic to make it "through fog and night, past rocks and shoals, past reefs and wrecks, past danger." The drawings are very detailed. Some pages are collages of small scenes. Many are full spreads. The sailors' facial expressions are amusing to watch, and the resident cat appears on almost every page. The front and back endpapers show a cutaway view of one of the vessels. This fascinating, little-known slice of history should prove interesting to every child who loves big boats.-Ieva Bates, Ann Arbor District Library, MI (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
Floca creates both suspense and poetry in this tribute to the anchored lightships that once warned ships away from hazards on the North American coast. Beginning with, "Here is a ship that holds her place," he introduces viewers to a crew of nine, plus a cat, then shows that crew performing routine tasks both topside and down below as they wait, but for what? When the weather worsens, that question is answered; on come the bright lamp and the deafening foghorn: "Then other ships sail safely, / because the lightship marks the way / through fog and night, / past rocks and shoals, / past reefs and wrecks, / past danger." Using the Ambrose, a New York museum ship, as his model, the author presents an array of cutaways, views from above, glimpses of the engine room, john and kitchen, as well as showing the steadfast vessel floating on glassy seas and tossed by waves. Together, the pictures and the brief, measured text lend these utilitarian, no-longer-active vessels a heroic aspect that will resonate with all young fans of ships and the sea. (afterword) (Picture book/nonfiction. 4-7) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
