Synopses & Reviews
< h4="" align="center"> What do you like about summer?< 4=""> < center=""> Mountain hikes? < br=""> Picking cherries?< br=""> Curve balls? < br=""> Ice cream cones?< br=""> < enter=""> < h4="" align="center"> What do you not like about summer?< 4=""> < center=""> Blackouts?< br=""> Bee swarms? < br=""> Thunderstorms? < br=""> Ninety degrees?< br=""> < enter=""> < p=""> However you answered, Douglas Florian will convince you that summer is great. His poems and pictures add up to the best vacation imaginable -- and it is one you can have at any time of the year. A companion volume to the highly praised < i=""> Winter Eyes, Summersaults<> proves that Douglas Florian is a poet for all seasons.<>
Synopsis
From the award-winning author of "Winter Eyes" comes a celebration of all things summery. In 28 exuberant poems, Florian writes of hazy days, fly balls, and swimming holes. Full color.
Synopsis
What do you like about summer?
Mountain hikes?
Picking cherries?
Curve balls?
Ice cream cones?
What do you not like about summer?
Blackouts?
Bee swarms?
Thunderstorms?
Ninety degrees?
However you answered, Douglas Florian will convince you that summer is great. His poems and pictures add up to the best vacation imaginable -- and it is one you can have at any time of the year. A companion volume to the highly praised Winter Eyes,Summersaults proves that Douglas Florian is a poet for all seasons.
Synopsis
What do you like about summer?
Mountain hikes? Picking cherries?
Curve balls?
Ice cream cones?
What do you not like about summer?
Blackouts? Bee swarms?
Thunderstorms?
Ninety degrees?
However you answered, Douglas Florian will convince you that summer is great. His poems and pictures add up to the best vacation imaginable -- and it is one you can have at any time of the year. A companion volume to the highly praised Winter Eyes,Summersaultsproves that Douglas Florian is a poet for all seasons.
About the Author
Douglas Florian was born in New York City, where he now lives with his wife and three children.
In His Own Words...
"I grew up surrounded by art. My father was an artist, and our New York City apartment looked like an art gallery. Landscapes, seascapes, and portraits covered the walls, and the smell of linseed oil filled the air.
"Later I studied at Queens College and at the School of Visual Arts, both in New York. I had great and challenging teachers there, but once I graduated I was on my own, and I wanted to make a living as an artist. I put together a portfolio and took it around: uptown, downtown, midtown, and crosstown. Finally I met an art director at the New York Times named J. C. Suares, who saw a spark in my work. Subsequently I did hundreds of drawings for the Times, and it was a very exciting experience. But newspapers are always in a big rush, and eventually I wanted to do something more relaxed and unhurried.
"When I saw that a lot of good illustrations were being created for children's books, I took my portfolio to what seemed to me to be the best publisher: Greenwillow. Ava Weiss, Greenwillow's art director, saw my work and was impressed enough to show it to the senior editor, Elizabeth Shub. She gave me a charming story to illustrate: Tit for Tat by Dorothy Van Woerkom. Other books followed, but eventually, on editor in-chief Susan Hirschman's suggestion, I wrote my own book: A Bird Can Fly.
"Over the years I've worked hard to improve both my writing and drawing skills. If I had to illustrate A Bird Can Fly today, it would look very different. I've had some favorite books along the way. One is A Winter Day, based on my memories of winters amid snowflakes and pancakes when I was growing up in Huntington, Long Island. A more recent book, A Painter, is about my father, who is still painting landscapes. My first illustrations for the book were based on photographs I had taken and had a stiff and stilted look. I think that was because I stuck too closely to the photos and did not let the artwork have a life of its own. When I put the photos in a drawer and worked freehand, the book acquired the freshness I had been looking for.
"I love to write and I love to paint, but for some reason I hate to do them both the same day or even the same week. Perhaps writing occupies one part of the brain and painting another; each requires a different way of thinking and seeing.
"Children often ask me which is my favorite book. It always seems to be the one I've just finished. I guess that means my favorite book is the one I'll be doing next year."