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Library | Call Number | Status |
|---|---|---|
Searching... Dallas Public Library | + FICTION - HUYH | Searching... Unknown |
Searching... Salem Main Library | J 636.293 Huynh 1997 | Searching... Unknown |
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Summary
Summary
The author as a boy growing up, accompanied by a water buffalo, faced the dangers of life in the Vietnamese jungle and became the best of friends.
Reviews (5)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 3-5This story starts off slowly, but quickly picks up speed as the author remembers fondly his childhood days spent in the central highlands of Vietnam. He describes the people and animals of his village, focusing on his family's two water buffaloes that are his favorite playmates. After the first one dies, the boy's father finds a young replacement, Tank. Quang Nhuong is delighted and describes various escapades he shares with the bull, playing hide-and-seek, an encounter with a crocodile, and a battle with an otter. Most of the incidents described are entertaining and readers will learn fascinating information about the importance of these animals in this culture. A charming beginning chapter book about a child growing up in a distant land that will appeal to animal lovers everywhere. The Tsengs' soft sketches show Tank, his young master, and the various villagers mentioned in the text.Mary M. Hopf, Los Angeles Public Library (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
Set in a tranquil, prewar Vietnam, this elegiac memoir uses Huynh's (The Land I Lost) childhood adventures with the family water buffalo as a vehicle for conjuring a lost world. When the beloved water buffalo Water Jug dies, Huynh, then six years old, is saddened to lose his playmate. However, he quickly finds an equally eager buddy in Tank, the strong young buffalo that his father brings home. As Tank grows up to become a fierce leader of the hamlet's entire herd and the pride of the family, the two spend endless days roaming the rice fields, catching field crabs, chasing fighting crickets and playing hide-and-seek. Huynh's pared-down, expressive prose relays his affection for Tank and hamlet life so warmly that readers will easily be transported into the foreign setting. Delicate black-and-white sketches of the villagers and water buffaloes capture the tender qualities of the text. The peaceful way of life so lovingly described is shattered in the final chapters, when war ("between the French forces and the Resistance led by Ho Chi Minh") first reaches the hamlet and a stray bullet fells Tank. Sharing young Huynh's devastation, readers will come away with a more profound understanding of the casualties of war. Ages 7-10. (Nov.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Horn Book Review
(Younger) A folklike story set in China tells of Mi Fei, an artist who skillfully paints the stories of gods and heroes on paper scrolls while living simply in his village, surrounded by loving neighbors. When alarming news comes that a great dragon has awakened from its hundred-years' sleep and is destroying the countryside, Mi Fei, at the villagers' behest, takes his scrolls and paints and journeys to the dragon's mountain. There, he encounters the fiery breath and lashing tail of the terrifying creature and learns that before the dragon can return to his slumber, someone must perform three tasks, or be devoured. Mi Fei is frightened, but clever, and he uses his beloved scrolls and his love for the people of his village to successfully complete the tasks. In the end, the gigantic dragon fades away until all that remains is a small paper version of himself. In an extraordinary feat of artistry, Sabuda uses the triple-page gate-fold illustrations both to relate the story in the style of Chinese scrolls and to capture the drama of the confrontation between the gentle artist and the awe-inspiring dragon. Each picture is cut from painted tissue paper created by Sabuda and placed on a background of handmade Japanese paper. The combination of the ever-increasing size of the dragon (climaxing in a picture of his teeth framing an entire spread) and the cleverness of Mi Fei creates a strong tale with plenty of action for the story-hour audience. h.b.z. Bob Graham Queenie, One of the Family; illus. by the author (Preschool, Younger) This warm family story begins on the opening endpapers as a bantam hen stands at the edge of a soft blue lake. Baby Caitlin and her mom and dad, walking in the countryside, soon spot the hen floundering in the lake, and Dad leaps in for a daring rescue. They warm the hen and bring her home, and "that might have been the end of the story...but it wasn't!" The hen, dubbed Queenie, soon becomes one of the family, taking over the dog's basket and witnessing Caitlin's first steps. But Caitlin's mom knows Queenie has another home, so the whole family sets off to return her to a nearby farm. "That might have been the end of the story...but it wasn't." Queenie returns each morning to lay a perfect brown egg in Bruno's basket, just right for Caitlin's breakfast or for baking a birthday cake. When a new baby arrives and Caitlin forgets to collect the eggs, Bruno hatches a litter of chicks. The immensely appealing animals and people are depicted in gentle watercolors with loose, comfortable lines. Th (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
The village social life and customs in the central highlands of Vietnam prior to the involvement of the US provide an affecting platform for the author's warm memories of a childhood enriched by close relationships with the animals vital to the family's economic survival. Delicate pencil drawings accompany the first-person narrative that shows the role water buffaloes played during dry-season farming and rainy-season hunting. They were creatures of such importance that, when one named Water Jug dies of old age, it is only fitting that he is buried in the graveyard, ""as we had done for all the dead of our family."" The boy hopes for a new bull with the same gentle temperament as Water Jug's, but his father has always dreamed of a replacement bull that would be not only a valuable worker, but a strong fighter and true leader when tigers, panthers, and lone wild hogs from the jungle threaten the village's herd. The father brings home a calf from a distant village, but delays naming him until his nature makes one apparent. After a fight in which he bests the reigning leader of the herd, the young bull is named Tank. Fierce in battle, Tank's gentleness otherwise earns him the respect of the village, and readers will come to admire him; his death, the result of ""a single misplaced bullet"" in a military skirmish, is very affecting. In Tank's passing, the author brings home the waste of war, in a book written from the heart. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Gr. 4^-6. Huynh, who grew up in Vietnam, doesn't tell an exciting story, but his heartfelt account of part of his childhood in a tiny hamlet during the late 1940s or early 1950s is filled with fascinating details about culture and custom. At the center of his story is Tank, his family's prized water buffalo. Huynh explains how his father acquired the beast as a calf (the slowest part of the book) and how Tank grew to be both gentle pet and fierce defender of the village herd. Scenes of Tank's battles--with a tiger, another buffalo, a wild hog--are brutal and detailed, but these are somewhat moderated by views of the buffalo and young Huyhn roaming the rice fields and forests together in quiet companionship. And readers can't fail to be moved by the tragic conclusion. A book that may inspire talk about cultural differences and be a springboard to Asian history. --Stephanie Zvirin