Bugs & Critters I Have Known

By Ann Heiskell Rickey

"Bugs and Critters I Have Known" is a collection of humorous verses and story poems - all ecologically aware - featuring insects and sea creatures with appealing personalities. The text is aimed at... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0966783417
• ISBN13: 9780966783414
• Release Date: December 1998
• Publisher: Old Canyon Pr
• Length: 100 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 6.0" x 0.5" x 8.5"
• Age Range: 6 years and up
• Grade Range: Grade 1 and higher

Customer Reviews

Refreshing!

For this parent, I found "Bugs & Critters I Have Known", to be a truly REFRESHING and fun collection of verses and story poems for elementary school-aged children. I purchased this for my daughter when she was 5, along with the audio version (available through www.laraparker.com) My daughter is now 7 and this book remains a frequent selection from her bookshelf and the audio version continues to be a 'must have' for our car CD player and she has memorized several of the selections without prompting! Both versions are excellent! Our family has enjoyed this collection so much that we often give copies as to my daughter's friends, teachers and librarians for birthday or holiday gifts. In this book, children experience well written verse with the rhythm and rhyme of good poetry which sadly seems to be under-emphasized and often poorly written today. The clever verses provide thought inspiring references to the important role a balanced ecological environment plays in our world. The characters are appealing and the lessons learned, are enduring. Readers become caught-up in the dilemma of a captured luna moth and her mate's attempts to free her, and will giggle about the two charming tomato worms that attempt to hide from a gardener by using their talent at ventriloquy to buy themselves time to duck out of his sight. Readers explore the unusual friendships in this collection between a caterpillar & armadillo and later in this volume, a grouper & shark where each pair of acquaintances find a way to co-exist and help each other along life's path of survival with full appreciation for the natural gifts each critter possesses. The short verses in this collection are informative and incorporate the special attributes unique to each bug and critter that are delightful and easy to remember. From the "Spittle Bug", to the "Flu Bug"- there's something to be learned by children and adults alike in this book. The pen and ink illustrations are fun, witty and add much value to the book. The CD/audio version, is very well done with the wonderful articulate voice and fun characterizations performed by the author's daughter, Lara Parker (best known for her role of "Angelique", the bewitching sorceress from the 70's daytime TV serial, "Dark Shadows"). I was also pleasantly surprised to learn that Ms. Parker will personally autograph either (or both) versions when ordering the CD/audio version through her website: www.laraparker.com. The audio version is apparently only available directly through Ms. Parker's website. Overall, "Bugs & Critters I Have Known" by Ann Heiskell Rickey is an entertaining way for children to learn MORE about two subjects (insects and sea creatures) that are incorporated each and every year throughout a child's elementary school education and is a very worthwhile addition to any child's library.

A Neglected Master

Children might like this book, but I haven't been one for many years and still I enjoyed the homespun wisdom of Ann Heiskell Rickey, a poetic talent of the order of Emily Dickinson, only strangely concentrated on one subject only: insects. Why more criticism has not been done on the work of this seminal author, I have no idea. Maybe her fierce focus on the world of insects made people think of her as a children's author, though this hardly seems fair, either to children or adults. Maybe her salty, take-no-prisoners attitude, born of a colorful life that began in Memphis, Tennessee, like Kathy Bates, Shelby Foote, Aretha Franklin, Cybill Shepherd and Morgan Freeman, made her seem like a "Southern" and therefore regional author. But for whatever reason, this poetry has been severely undervalued and it is good to see a whole book of it in print. It may be that Heiskell Rickey herself undervalued her work. We will have to see more biographical research done on this fascinating lyric poet before we know for sure. In the meantime, we ponder the mysteries of human life through an unusual prism, the tiniest among us, the bugs. Like the mystical "no-see-um," about whom she writes, "They're either too small/ Or . . . they're not there at all." Like e e cummings, she plays with punctuation so that each of the three dots of the ellipsis may actually represent one of the mysterious "No-see-ums," of whom no man may say for sure that they even exist. is there a feminist consciousness at work in this material as well? There certainly is. Heiskell Rickey's encounter with the praying mantis finds her, the mantis, delicately cleaning her teeth after feeding on her own husband. That's the way of the mantis and, after a bit, you begin to see that the poet has designed this as an allegory for women's lives. With a queer grimace of understanding across species lines, the poet tells the mantis, "I salute your appetite./ /You're very efficient at husbandry." Elsewhere there is an eco-consciousness that predicts modern movements in bringing back the land, and an awareness of the gentle and the elemental, words that not only rhyme, they go together in waves. I don't know whether I prefer the shorter verses here, or the longer more narrative pieces. The shorter ones are certainly more quotable. "To be turned on his back/ To a beetle is hateful./ / Turn him back over--/ He'll be truly grateful." The Golden Rule applied, not only to the lowly insect, but to poetry as well. The illustrations, by Adrean Heiskell Smith (a relative perhaps of the author?) are cute, sort of, and children may like them, but they're not quite in tune with the poems, they make the poems seem whimsical which they are anything but. However, I would be happy to see more of the work of Heiskell Smith in other contexts.

Educational and entertaining for children

"Bugs and Critters I Have Known" is a poetic look at various "bugs and critters" common to North America. From Chiggers to Mealy Bugs to Tomato Worms and Water Striders, each gets its own special piece of poetry about its lifestyle and quirks. An children's book that is easy to read and educational while still being humorous and whimsical, it is sure to delight most young readers.

ENCHANTING book not to be missed !

This title deserves a home in every public and school library. As a librarian, I feel "Bugs" admirably fills the current void for children's poetry and is the perfect vehicle for a library program or a school project.