Thunderstorm

PreS-Gr 5—Thunderstorm raises talking about the weather to an art form. Each generously sized spread is an exquisite etching that crackles with the power of a Midwestern storm. The text merely notes the time while the illustrations bestow the breathtaking experience of being everywhere at once as the landscape is dramatically transformed. Readers follow as the farmer's family pulls in bales of hay, with the cows looking up as lightning snaps a power line. Owls scatter as a twister tears apart the tree where they are nesting. Dense clouds form overhead as the family grabs the laundry from the line. In a climactic illustration, roofs, doors, fences, and trees hurl and spin in the cyclonic winds. After six hours, the storm has passed, leaving the locals to pick up the pieces-many, many pieces. Those who experience this astonishing book will have greater respect-awe, even-for thunderstorms and for those whose lives are so intensely affected by these phenomena.—Susan Weitz, formerly at Spencer-Van Etten School District, Spencer, NY