Magda y la pinata magico - Magdas Pinata Magic, Del Sol Books

Author : Becky Chavarria-Chairez, Illustrator : Anne Vega, Translator : Gabriela Baeza Ventura
Preschool - 2nd Grade

Magda y la pinata magico - Magdas Pinata Magic

Magda y la pinata magico - Magdas Pinata Magic, Hardcover, Bilingual, Book, Becky Chavarria-Chairez, Anne Vega, Gabriela Baeza Ventura, Preschool - 2nd Grade, 9781558853201, # 10186h, $15.95

The piñata for Magda's little brother's birthday is so perfect that he insists that no one break it. What fun is a birthday party without a piñata? But how can the neighborhood children break the piñata without breaking Gabriel's heart? With the help of her abuela's cat, Tita, Magda works some midnight magic and engineers an ingenious solution to save the party and the piñata.

Vienna Rose Listen to Vienna Rose read Magdas Pinata Magic to you. A marvelous example of the magical encounter between a child and books that we wish for all children.

"Magda makes an attractive role model for little girls in her compassion and her intelligent approach to problem solving." —Críticas

" . . .a very appealing bilingual book for young children." —Southwest Book Views

Publishers Weekly : PreSchool-Grade 2-The irrepressible Magda is back and this time she saves the day for her little brother. When an uncle brings home a special pinata for Gabriel's birthday party, everyone is amazed. It looks just like the birthday boy. The problem is that Gabriel doesn't want anyone to smash it in order to get the treasure trove of candy it contains. Magda comes up with an ingenious way to preserve the pinata while still allowing it to scatter candy to all the children at the party. Chavarria-Chairez and illustrator Vega do a wonderful job of portraying a special event in the life of a Hispanic family. The dramatically colored drawings (oil on canvas) feature beautiful Latino children with brown hair and big brown eyes playing and having fun at the birthday party. Young readers will also enjoy spotting the girl's cat, Tita, who appears on every page. Magda makes an attractive role model for little girls in her compassion and her intelligent approach to problem solving. The Spanish translation is good but sticks a little too closely to the English original to be truly fluent. Recommended for bookstores and public libraries.

School Library Journal : Gr 1-2-In this odd story, T'o Manuel brings home a birthday pi-ata for Magda's little brother, Gabriel. It has been designed to look just like the child, and no one seems to have questioned the wisdom of hanging an image of the four-year-old in effigy and breaking it open with a stick. The child is distraught at the idea even after the game has been explained, and his oafish big brother just cannot wait to get in his licks. Tenderhearted Magda sits up with her uncle attempting to come up with a solution. When T'o Manuel goes to sleep, it is the cat that helps to save the day. Big and bright, the acrylic illustrations depict the action clearly, but the human forms are often out of proportion-heads too big, legs oddly foreshortened-nor does Magda, for example, look the same from one picture to the next. This book follows Magda's Tortillas/Las tortillas de Magda (Pi-ata, 2000), and should be purchased where the series has a following. Otherwise, books like George Ancona's The Pi-ata Maker/El pi-atero (Harcourt, 1994) will give readers a better idea of the function of this tradition.

Booklist : Ages 5-8. Gabriel, who is almost four years old, is delighted with his specially made birthday pinata, a life-size, look-alike of himself wearing his favorite outfit, until he realizes that the plan is to bash the pinata until it breaks during his upcoming party. Big sister Magda saves the day. Inspired by watching the family cat work the handle on its cat food feeder, Magda transforms the pinata into a dispenser that rains candies. Vega's workmanlike, full-page paintings catch each scene of the story, which reads like an episode of a Latino family sitcom. A sweet story but best as a filler purchase for libraries serving large Latino communities and in need of bilingual picture books.

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