Jack Plank Tells Tales

What a wonderful book of short stories for children. I was attracted by the cover and borrowed the book to read for myself (after all, every middle-aged adult still houses elements of the child they once were, right?). In this delightful book with its lovely drawings are a collection of stories told by Jack Plank, unemployed pirate. Each night, over dinner at Mrs DelFresno's boarding house Jack explains why his job seeking isn't going so well. I was especially engaged by the reasons why Jack can't be a farmer or a fisherman. Fortunately, everything works out at the end. In the absence of young children (or grandchildren) of my own to read this book to, I'll settle for recommending it to others. Jennifer Cameron-Smith

Well, Jack Plank isn't actually on board his pirate ship anymore, being a victim of cost-cutting measures--i.e., he got laid off. He now lives at a rooming house, where he manages to tell a story at dinner every night, always in connection with his ongoing efforts to find a new career (aided and abetted by a child, of course). I thought Jack Sparrow had spoiled me for every other pirate imaginable, but then I met Jack Plank and fell in love all over again. Not that Jack is glamorously bizarre; instead he is as kind and gently funny as a favorite uncle. Kids will just plain like the stories, based on premises such as a shipmate who turns into something rather more aquatic than a wolf on full-moon nights or the little girl on a deserted island who's been raised by seagulls. The delivery is so relaxed that when you're finished, you find yourself thinking back through the book as it slowly dawns on you what an amazing collection of stories this really is--all at a level that can be appreciated as a read-aloud by 5-year-olds, 12-year-olds, and everything in between. As for grown-up readers, they can enjoy Natalie Babbitt's notoriously superb craftsmanship. For example, pay attention to the snippets of clever commentary from the dinner guests following each tale. It is said that the best practitioners in any field make their art seem effortless, and this non-aggressive, non-flashy piece of writing fits the bill. True, Jack Plank Tells Tales doesn't have the deep-sea philosophical implications of the classic Tuck Everlasting, but it doesn't need them: it surfs the waves of human nature with a humor and grace and affection often sadly missing from today's children's books.

I was sitting at the children's reference desk the other day when a parent came up to me with a request. "I want a bedtime story to read to my daughter. Nothing cutesy or anything. Just some really nice tales to tell her before she goes to sleep. She's seven." Requests of this sort are a delight. You wait and hope for them. Not as many parents as I would like think to look for this kind of material, so when I get a request of this sort it's all I can do to keep from hopping up and down with glee. After one flash of inspiration I tried to sell the mom on Toys Go Out: Being the Adventures of a Knowledgeable Stingray, a Toughy Little Buffalo, and Someone Called Plastic by Emily Jenkins. No such luck. Not because shedidn 't like the book, mind you, but she'd already read it with her kid and wanted something new. We did some additional searching and I found her some nice books, but all the while I kept thinking to myself, "Why oh why oh whyhasn 't `Jack Plank' come out yet?" Because, you see, "Jack Plank Tells Tales," by the legendary Natalie Babbitt had not yet been published, but I'd seen a particularly enjoyable advanced reader's copy that had just charmed me. These days there's been a kind of upsurge in good bedtime reading thatdoesn't necessarily stink of either nostalgia or uber -cuteness. Finding the right balance can still be a challenge though. Maybe the time is ripe, then, for Natalie Babbitt to break her twenty-five years' worth of silence so as to bring us a book that feels like something your parents might have read to you when you were young. Jack Plank's a lovely fellow, but the fact of the matter is that when it comes to pirating, he stinks. I mean, he gets along with everyone and he's been with his ship, The Avarice, for years and years now. But pirates always have to consider the bottom line and when it comes right down to it, Jackdoesn 't plunder very well. Not very well at all. So off he goes to find a job. While doing so he settles into a boarding house run by the kindly Mrs.DelFresno and her daughter Nina. Each day Jack and Nina go off to find him an occupation, and each day they come back empty handed. Fortunately, for every job that Jack turns down he's able to tell a rip-roaring story for why becoming a baker, a fisherman, a goldsmith, or a host of other places of employment might be too much of a reminder of his days back on his pirate ship. In the end, Jack has told stories involving everything from a girl raised by seagulls to squid-men, vengeful ghosts, mermaid lovers, and trolls. Fortunately, sometimes the best job is one so glaringly obvious you don't notice it until someone points it out to you. Stories are so much fun, but they're sometimes difficult to promote properly. My library's folktale/fairytale section circulates beautifully, no question. Yet most of what goes out are picture books of individual tales. Collected stories gather dust, usually because peoplearen 't sure how to use them with their children. The n