{"id":5091,"date":"2020-04-26T00:01:27","date_gmt":"2020-04-26T06:01:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/?p=5091"},"modified":"2020-04-25T19:23:07","modified_gmt":"2020-04-26T01:23:07","slug":"7-imps-7-kicks-688-featuring-marie-caudry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/?p=5091","title":{"rendered":"7-Imp\u2019s 7 Kicks #688: Featuring Marie Caudry"},"content":{"rendered":"

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“Hello Bird, I’m the first one up. I found a carpet of strawberries and vines
close to the hole where I dozed off. …”<\/em>
(Click image to see spread \u2014 and read text \u2014 in its entirety)<\/center>
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\nI’m greeting this Sunday with a Belgian import, Gauthier David’s Letters from Bear<\/a><\/strong><\/em> (Eerdmans, March 2020), illustrated by Marie Caudry<\/a><\/strong>. This is the sweet epistolary tale of one bear’s strange and slightly surreal journey to find a beloved friend \u2014 and the adventures had along the way. <\/p>\n

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Bear writes lovingly to Bird: “Have you arrived safely in the south, to your island in the sun?” Bear decides to go find Bird, braving goosebumps in spooky forests (“It feels as if I’m being watched”) at the start of the journey. Bear also manages to survive a sailor’s fishing net, thanks to a friendly mermaid; get past bewildering clouds of dust; trek successfully across the very hot desert; and cross the sea on a hollowed-out tree trunk that serves as a boat. Bear also makes friends with a cat, other forest creatures (there’s a joyous party to be had), and (most notably) another bear. “I don’t feel as frightened now that there are two of us,” Bear writes to Bird, though the two eventually have to part ways. Bear never fails to document the adventures in ongoing letters: “I’m … going to write to you every day.” <\/p>\n

After traveling the world to find Bird, Bear finally arrives to the island only to find Bird gone. Bird had headed north, back to Bear, with equal devotion, and they had passed one another. The birds on the island fashion a clever way to get Bear more quickly across the sea, back to Bird, whom Bear loves, as made clear in the affectionate letters penned throughout the story: “I’m so excited at the idea of being near you,” says one letter. “It fills me with courage.” <\/p>\n

A note on the book’s copyright pages states that the illustrator had begun a series of paintings about “globe-trotting bears,” and it’s these very paintings that inspired her partner, Gauthier, to write this story. It was originally published in Belgium in 2012 as Les lettres de l’ourse<\/em>, and this English edition was translated by Sarah Ardizzone. Caudry’s illustrations possess an offbeat, understated humor, and the final spread is wordless, devoted expressly to the Bird and Bear’s reunion with a tender hug. Though readers will be happy for the pairing, they may start right back at the beginning to once again take in this quirky, touching story. Here are a couple more spreads. …
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“It feels as if I’m being watched ….”<\/em>
(Click spread to enlarge)<\/center>
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“It’s a costume party. … I made a kingfisher mask out of clay.”<\/em>
(Click spread to enlarge)<\/center>
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(Click cover to enlarge)<\/em><\/center>
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LETTERS FROM BEAR. Originally published in Belgium by Gauthier David and Marie Caudry. \u00a9 Autrement 2012 for the first edition. First published in the United States in 2020 by Eerdmans Books for Young Readers, Grand Rapids, Michigan. Illustrations reproduced by permission their permission.<\/em> <\/p>\n

Note for any new readers: 7-Imp\u2019s 7 Kicks is a weekly meeting ground for taking some time to reflect on Seven(ish) Exceptionally Fabulous, Beautiful, Interesting, Hilarious, or Otherwise Positive Noteworthy Things from the past week, whether book-related or not, that happened to you. New kickers are always welcome.<\/p>\n

* * * Jules’ Kicks * * *<\/strong><\/font>
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1)<\/strong><\/font> I love today’s featured book. I love to see picture book imports, especially ones unlike what we tend to see here in the States. <\/p>\n

2)<\/strong><\/font> Still reading reading reading … <\/p>\n

3)<\/strong><\/font> Kimberly Brubaker Bradley’s<\/a><\/strong> new book, Fighting Words<\/a><\/em><\/strong>. <\/p>\n

4)<\/strong><\/font> Reading Julia Drake’s<\/a><\/strong> The Last True Poets of the Sea<\/a><\/strong><\/em>. It made me miss my brother even more than I already do, but it was good to read. <\/p>\n

5)<\/strong><\/font> Realizing my husband and I are about to start the last season of The Americans<\/a><\/strong><\/em>, which we’ve been watching for a long while now. (I hadn’t realized we were that close to the end.) <\/p>\n

6)<\/strong><\/font> Good friends. <\/p>\n

7)<\/strong><\/font> Chocolate pie. <\/p>\n

What are YOUR<\/font><\/strong> kicks this week?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Hello Bird, I’m the first one up. I found a carpet of strawberries and vinesclose to the hole where I dozed off. …”(Click image to see spread \u2014 and read text \u2014 in its entirety)   I’m greeting this Sunday with a Belgian import, Gauthier David’s Letters from Bear (Eerdmans, March 2020), illustrated by Marie […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5091","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-seven-good-things-before-monday","category-picture-books"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5091","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5091"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5091\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}