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Circus Play

by Anne Laurel Carter, Joanne Fitzgerald, illus.

Beyond simply telling a good story, the best children’s literature bases itself on a single, unifying theme. The brevity of the work and the age of the audience demand it. The theme need not necessarily be reducible to a maxim like it’s good to be small, or be kind to others. In fact, many classic kids’ books dance away from clearly stated morals, yet remain – in their language, tone, illustrations, etc. – thematically unified.

In Circus Play, Toronto author Anne Laurel Carter presents a situation loaded with potential: a young boy’s mother who is a circus performer rehearses on a trapeze she has installed in the living room. (It’s an odd arrangement inspired by a real-life friend of Carter’s.) As cool as that sounds, the boy finds that his friends always get distracted by his mom’s acrobatics, and by the circus paraphernalia in the house. “Why can’t I have an ordinary mom?” he asks himself. Instead of pursuing this theme of the son of an eccentric mother yearning for normalcy, Carter lets the story drift away. The boy’s friends play dress-up, a circus and a jungle grow around them. The friends leave and the story ends abruptly, with an unexplained change of heart on the part of the boy.

Joanne Fitzgerald’s watercolour illustrations are fun, and some of the visual details – like having the mother shown only by a background shadow, or out of the picture entirely – show the kind of subtle wit that the whole book needed. Though smart, charming, and sincere in its own right, Circus Play feels like a missed opportunity.

 

Reviewer: Nathan Whitlock

Publisher: Orca Book Publishers

DETAILS

Price: $19.95

Page Count: 32 pp

Format: Cloth

ISBN: 1-55143-225-0

Released: Oct.

Issue Date: 2002-11

Categories: Picture Books

Age Range: ages 4-8