The Ball of Clay that Rolled Away

by Elizabeth Lenhard, Jason Wolff (Illustrator)

Overview

The kids at Camp Knish want to make the ball of clay into a mezuzah, a menorah, a kiddish cup, and more…but the ball of clay will have none of it. He jumps away, rolling through the camp and joining a circle dance, picking up a squash blossom as a sunbonnet, and getting mistaken for a soccer ball. Finally, he lands by a lake and just as the last camper approaches him, he has the last word! Jason Wolff’s sprightly illustrations, rendered with paper, photographs, and colored pencils, capture the character of a ball of clay with attitude in this tale loosely based on The Gingerbread Man.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781542020329
Publisher:	Amazon Publishing
Publication date:	01/30/2024
Series:	Shofar
Pages:	25
Product dimensions:	8.30(w) x 6.30(h) x 0.20(d)
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

About the Author

Elizabeth Lenhard is the author of the young adult trilogy Chicks with Sticks and has written more than forty other books for kids, middle schoolers, and teens. She lives in Atlanta, Georgia, with her husband and two young daughters. The Ball of Clay That Rolled Away is her first picture book.

Jason Wolff has illustrated a number of popular children’s books, including The Hog Prince by Sudipta Bardhan-Quallen and three books by Diane Levin Rauchwerger: Dinosaur on Shabbat, Dinosaur on Passover, and Dinosaur on Hanukkah. He lives with his wife, three children, two cats, two parakeets, and two antique British sports cars in Ashburn, Virginia.

Editorial Reviews

An irksome version of the traditional cumulative tale adds little to the collection of Jewish literature. At Camp Knish, a ball of clay escapes the arts-and-crafts cabin, vowing never to be cut. It rolls through the camp as a growing group of look-a-like campers with names like Mira Farfelbottom and Mose Plotznik, along with Rabbi Shmaltzbaum give chase. Not wanting to be formed into a menorah, dreidel, kiddush cup or even a yad (pointer for reading Torah), the bedeviled ball of clay manages to get to the bank of Camp Knish Lake. Once there, he is "more like a pancake of clay…dented, dinged, and dirtied; stained, pebbled, and pounded" but still able to brag about his escape. One last roll has him sinking to the bottom, never to be seen again by the likes of Tali Nudgeblatt and her fellow campers. Colored-pencil drawings of typical camp scenarios with wooden cabins, soccer games, Israeli circle dancing and vegetable gardening along a green-hued meadow landscape provide a stereotypical background for the tale. The ball of clay itself is a tumbling, gray, lumpy mass with a snarky expression. The vexing choice to use faux-Yiddish names exacerbates its tiresome effect. This poorly executed adaptation is utterly lacking in ingenuity. Leave this one behind when packing kids for their summer-camp experience. (Picture book. 3-5)

Kirkus Reviews