Reviews:
CCBC (Cooperative Children's Book Center Choices, 1991)
A collection of tales written from the perspective of a young girl in Trinidad show her and her cousins delighting in listening to her great aunt's stories from traditional folklore. Each tale is framed by family events and activities which inspire Tantie to remember a fitting story: some of them teach, some of them amuse and some of them scare but all of them entertain and delight listeners and readers. CCBC categories: Folklore, Mythology And Traditional Literature; History, People And Places; Fiction For Young Readers. 1991, Clarion Books, 51 pages, $13.95. Ages 6-11.
Kirkus (Kirkus Reviews, 1991)
The author of Coconut Kind of Day (1990) returns to the Caribbean to present a series of six vignettes featuring traditional folklore. The storyteller is Tantie, a great-aunt who is larger-than-life to narrator Amber and her cousins. Tantie has a tale for every occasion: one about the witch-like soucouyant for a picnic; one featuring Ligahoo, a powerful shapechanger, for the rainy season; or one about graveyard jumbles to explain the absence of neighbors. The most affecting narratives are the title story, concerning Tantie's lost love, and another about her encounter with papa Bois, a beloved figure in Trinidad. Less formal folktales than flavorful slices of life, all shaped into a continuous narrative uniting the family with stories. An afterword tells more about the legends. Pinkney's skillfully evocative b&w scratchboard illustrations nicely match the spirit of the text. An entertaining introduction to a relatively unfamiliar folk tradition. Glossary. 1991, Clarion/Houghton Mifflin, $13.95. © 1991 Kirkus Reviews/VNU eMedia, Inc. All rights reserved.
Betsy Hearne (The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, July/August 1991 (Vol. 44, No. 11))
The author's introductory note explains that, as a child in Trinidad, she originally heard these six short stories from her grandaunt, or tantie. True to the oral tradition, some are scary and some fragmentary. The first tale is both, with the death of a soucouyant (a woman by day, but by night "a ball of fire that flies through the air and will suck the blood clean out of you") implied but not clearly described. Not until the afterword do we learn some important background on the legendary figures, including the fact that if you sprinkle salt on a soucouyant's skin, which she hides at night while she's flying through the air, it will burn her when she tries to put it on again in the morning. In the second story, Tantie uses the threat of the mysterious Ligahoo to keep the children away from the dangerous river at flood season. In the third, Tantie plants trees for the graveyard jumbies to play in so they won't bother her isolated house. The last three stories are best: one, a humorous trickster tale; another, a bittersweet story about Tantie's boyfriend lost at sea; and the last, a haunting tale of the forest's beast-protector, Papa Bois, whose gift of beads Tantie passes on to the narrator as a kind of storyteller's mantle. Pinkney's scratchboard illustrations, one per story, add richly to the verbal images, but the text may nevertheless be best storytold, with some background information adapted into the presentation, by a narrator comfortable with the dialect. Review Code: R -- Recommended. Curricular Use: Storytelling. (c) Copyright 1991, The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois. 1991, Clarion, 52p, $13.95. Grades 4-6.
Horn Book (The Horn Book Guide, 1991)
Six rhythmic tellings of love and adventure pour forth from Tantie Delphine, a Trinidadian family's great-aunt. The stories range from traditional folk tale to supernatural terror, and Pinkney's illustrations are eminently suited to the island setting. Category: Nonfiction. 1991, Clarion, 51pp.. Ages 9 to 12. Rating: 3: Recommended, satisfactory in style, content, and/or illustration. ( )