de Foiard-Brown Knihy

Here, Father Jacques de Foiard Brown, the priest fictionalized in some of Marilyn Nelson's poems as the hermit monk "Abba Jacob," combines his own voice with that of his fictional self to write about how he learned to meditate from a baobab tree which was his boyhood's "best silence teacher." Observing the baobab and the creatures who lived in its trunk and branches taught him about beauty, friendship, generosity, vulnerability, compassion, and the community of living lessons he tells us we can learn ourselves, without having a nearby baobab tree, by going inward in meditation. Listening to silence may help us to see the connection between the natural world and faith. Some of the oldest baobab trees, between 1,000 and 2,500 years old, have died in the last decade. The giant redwoods and sequoias, some over 3,000 years old, are dying off. It's time to listen to the trees.

A quiet girl makes a powerful impression through her artwork in this lyrical story of introversion and peaceful protest--a stirring picture book from Newbery Honor winner Marilyn Nelson and fine artist Philemona Williamson.Lubaya is a quiet girl who doesn't raise her hand in class and who prefers daydreaming to soccer games. She spends most of her time drawing, often behind the sofa while her family watches TV. That's where she is, creating happy pictures on the backs of her parents' old protest posters, when upsetting news shouts into the living room. The next day her family takes part in a march, and there, on one side of the posters being held high, are Lubaya's drawings of kids holding hands and of the sun shining over the globe--rousing visual statements of how the world could be. "Lubaya's roar may not be loud, but a quiet roar can make history."