Books for the Backseat

Planning a Road Trip this Summer? These backseat books will keep children age 4-7 entertained.

Are We There Yet? by Dan Santat

The refrain is a familiar one. Maybe an hour into the road trip, a voice pipes up from the backseat, asking, “Are we there yet?” This is the refrain uttered throughout Are We There Yet, written and illustrated by Caldecott Medal Winner Dan Santat, author and illustrator of Beekle. A family of three is driving to celebrate Grandma’s birthday. The narrator, a young boy, thinks the trip is taking forever, a familiar feeling for small children. 

He says, “The car trip to visit Grandma is always exciting! But after the first hour, it can feel like an eternity.”

Are We There Yet? explores what happens when your brain gets too bored…and apparently, that means time goes backwards! Santat cleverly employs tricks such as turning the book upside down and flipping pages right to left, making the reader travel backwards in time alongside the family in the book. Buckle up and come along for the ride! 

Santat ensures that the reader will most definitely NOT be bored as they follow the family in a little orange car back through the stage coach era, to when pirates rule the high seas, even going so far back to see the ancient Egyptians at work. The reader will travel back in time millions of years to when dinosaurs walked the earth. Finally, the little boy thinks, something exciting! And since his brain is no longer bored, the book fast-forwards to October 24, 2059. Oops! Too far into the future—the family has missed the birthday party! When they finally arrive, just in time for the birthday party, there is no better time than the present.

For a fantastic preview of the book click the video below, provided by Little Brown, Books for Young Readers.

Our Great Big Backyard by Laura Bush and Jenna Bush Hager, illustrated by Jacqueline Rogers

The former First Lady and her daughter have teamed up to write a picture book just in time for summer! In Our Great Big Backyard, Jane can’t wait to play videogames with her friends all summer, but her parents have different plans. Along with her little brother Sam, they’ll be taking the Great American Road Trip. Jane is less than thrilled to be riding in the backseat without any Wi-Fi, but as they travel to more and more parks, Jane starts to notice the amazing sites around her. From the Everglades National Park all the way to Yosemite, Jane has fun with her brother Sam out in the wilderness. 

“The mountain went up and up and up, straight into the sky, watching over us. I felt really small but really great, too, like I was part of something big." 

When Jane gets home, she realizes that even in her backyard she can see the stars, and invites her friends over for a camp out. Even better, if you and your family are planning a trip this summer, there is a listing of National Parks in the back of the book to help you see what might be in your own backyard. 

Original to The Clarion Ledger.

Road Trip

Raina Telgemeir (r.) at SLJ's Day of Dialog with
(l.-r.) Lois Ehlert, Chris Raschka and Peter Sís

Raina Telgemeier's new graphic novel Sisters is the road trip from Smile that "only gets a passing mention," the author told the audience at School Library Journal's Day of Dialog this past spring.

Telgemeier joked that only after publishing her first book, Smile, did she learn that "you're not supposed to write [an autobiography] unless you've done something." But her books--Sisters and Smile, and also Drama, aimed at slightly older readers--serve as excellent examples for kids who either think they have nothing to write about or are asked to write their autobiography for school. Telgemeier finds the humor and vulnerability in seemingly everyday experiences: a wish for a baby sister that (when finally fulfilled) can have its drawbacks, a parent losing his or her job, and a family vacation.

Her approach, a mix of visual and verbal storytelling, clearly indicates what's fantasy or flashback--or even wishful thinking (when her father loses his job and she would really like a hug). Telgemeier zeroes in on a road trip and also takes that experience as a way to magnify the family dynamics--as traveling and staying in confined spaces will--using it as the jumping off place for flashbacks that add complexity to present events, and fantasy sequences to reflect her characters' changing emotional states.

Her books also let readers know that the more details they can add to their writing, the more universal their experiences feel to readers of their own writing. Telgemeier says, "I tell very personal specific stories, thinking this doesn't happen to anyone else, and then the letters come." 

Collaborative Storytelling

Gary Paulsen photo c Brian Adams

Gary Paulsen tells us in his author's note for Road Trip that he'd never intended to write a book with his son, Jim. It just evolved organically. Gary Paulsen sent Jim a section he'd written about a father and son rescuing a dog, and his son sent him another section. Collaborative storytelling can be a great ice breaker with kids who don't think of themselves as writers. 

We all remember sitting in a circle in the classroom in early elementary school, and the teacher would give us a line to start a story with, and we'd go around the circle and add a line to keep the story going. But writing a story in pairs or in a larger group offers kids a chance to polish, to see which story threads seem to be the most promising. Gary Paulsen acknowledges the crucial role of the editor of Road Trip, who "tied it all together." 

Another recent example of excellent collaborative storytelling is Click: One Novel, Ten Authors (authors include Linda Sue Park, Gregory Maguire, Eoin Colfer, Roddy Doyle and Margo Lanagan). Each author's chapter carries the story forward. Then there are strong anthologies on a theme, such as Steampunk!, edited by Kelly Link and Gavin J. Grant, and Jon Scieszka's Guys Read anthologies, Thriller and The Sports Pages. There's even an anthology with a competitive spirit, Zombies vs. Unicorns, edited by Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier (for a true treat, listen to the audiobook edition, in which the ad lib between the editors is even funnier than what Black and Larbalestier wrote in their introductions to each story). 

This could be a great way to keep the dark days of winter lit up with ideas.