Members Get 10% Off and Earn Rewards Find Out More

Locomotive: with audio recording

Add to Wishlist

Locomotive: with audio recording

eBook(NOOK Kids Read to Me)

$10.99

View All Available Formats & Editions

eBook(NOOK Kids Read to Me)
$10.99

View All Available Formats & Editions

Available on Compatible NOOK Devices and the free NOOK Apps.

WANT A NOOK? Explore Now

Buy As Gift

Related collections and offers

Overview

The Caldecott Medal Winner, Sibert Honor Book, and New York Times bestseller Locomotive is a rich and detailed sensory exploration of America’s early railroads, from the creator of the “stunning” (Booklist) Moonshot.

It is the summer of 1869, and trains, crews, and family are traveling together, riding America’s brand-new transcontinental railroad. These pages come alive with descriptive details of the journey: the sounds, speed, and strength of the mighty locomotives; the work that keeps them moving; and the thrill of travel from plains to mountain to ocean.

Come sit inside the caboose, feel the heat of the engine, watch the landscape race by. Come ride the rails, come cross the young country!

Product Details
About the Author

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781442485228
Publisher:	Atheneum Books for Young Readers
Publication date:	09/03/2013
Sold by:	SIMON & SCHUSTER
Format:	eBook
Pages:	64
Sales rank:	624,372
Lexile:	640L (what's this?)
File size:	153 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.
Age Range:	4 - 10 Years

About the Author

Brian Floca is the author and illustrator of the acclaimed picture books Locomotive, winner of the Caldecott Medal and a New York Times bestseller; Moonshot: The Flight of Apollo 11; and Lightship, each a Robert F. Sibert Honor Book. He is the illustrator of numerous additional books, including Avi’s Poppy series. You can visit him online at BrianFloca.com.

From the B&N Reads Blog

Page 1 of

12 Books You’ll Love Reading Aloud to Your Little Ones

We are uncompromising about storytime in my house. As certain as there is peanut butter on my ceiling and my dog providing pony rides between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m., there are 30 minutes around 8 every night dedicated to discovering a new library book or 3, or revisiting (for the thousandth time) a well-loved […]

5 Picture Books Filled with Great Sound Effects

Onomatopoeia: I dare you to say it five times fast! One of the joys of reading picture books aloud is all the funny noises you get to make while telling the story. Here are five books that will have you and your kids tooting like a locomotive, clacking like typewriters, and crunching like a voracious […]

9 Engaging Books About Cars, Trucks, and Trains For Kids Who Love Them

It’s practically a rite of passage: the phase a child goes through where they are utterly fascinated by all things wheeled that go beep and vroom. Granted, vehicles are pretty great; it’s just that for most adults (auto racing enthusiasts not withstanding), that glow of excitement has faded over the years. Fortunately for us, our kids are here to help reignite it; fortunately […]

Gr 3–5—It all started with "a new road of rails/made for people to ride" where "covered wagons used to crawl." Almost 150 years ago-just after the Civil War-the completion of the transcontinental railway radically changed both this country's landscape and the opportunities of its people. The book traces the advent of cross-country train travel, focusing on an early trip from Omaha to Sacramento. As in Moonshot (2009) and Lightship (2007, both S & S), Floca proves himself masterful with words, art, and ideas. The book's large format offers space for a robust story in a hefty package of information. Set in well-paced blank verse, the text begins with a quick sketch of "how this road was built" and moves abruptly to the passengers on the platform and the approaching train. The author smoothly integrates descriptions of the structure and mechanics of the locomotive, tasks of crew members, passing landscapes, and experiences of passengers. Simply sketched people and backgrounds, striking views of the locomotive, and broad scenes of unpopulated terrain are framed in small vignettes or sweep across the page. Though a bit technical in explaining engine parts, the travelogue scheme will read aloud nicely and also offers absorbing details for leisurely personal reading. Substantial introductory and concluding sections serve older readers. There's also a detailed explanation of the author's efforts and sources in exploring his subject. Train buffs and history fans of many ages will find much to savor in this gorgeously rendered and intelligent effort.—Margaret Bush, Simmons College, Boston

School Library Journal

In 1869, not long after the golden spike is driven into the rails at Promontory Summit, a mother and her two children climb aboard the Transcontinental Railroad, leaving behind their old life in Omaha for a new one in California, where Papa awaits. Floca (Moonshot) chronicles their journey from multiple perspectives: documentarian, poet, historian, tour guide, and irrepressible railroad geek. With the rhythmic, verselike text that’s become his signature; expressive typography; and handsome, detailed watercolor, ink, and gouache paintings, he celebrates the majestic (the passing western landscape), the marvelous (the engineering and sheer manpower required to keep the engine safely on its course), and the mundane, from the primitiveness of the toilets to the iffiness of depot food (“If the chicken/ tastes like prairie dog,/ don’t ask why”). It’s a magisterial work (even the endpapers command close reading), but always approachable in its artistry and erudition. And readers will come away understanding that the railroad wasn’t just about getting a group of passengers from Point A to Point B; it carried an entire nation into a new, more rapid world: “Faster, faster, turn the wheels,/ faster, faster breathes the engine!/ The country runs by, the cottonwoods and river./ Westward, westward,/ runs the train,/ through the prairies,/ to the Great Plains,/ on to the frontier.” Ages 4–10. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

* “Floca follows up the acclaimed Moonshot: The Flight of Apollo 11 (2009) with this ebullient, breathtaking look at a family’s 1869 journey from Omaha to Sacramento via the newly completed Transcontinental Railroad…. It’s impossible to turn a page without learning something…multiple wow moments...will knock readers from their chairs. Fantastic opening and closing notes make this the book for young train enthusiasts.

Booklist

* "Floca took readers to the moon with the Apollo 11 mission in Moonshot (2009); now he takes them across the country on an equally historic journey of 100 years earlier.
In a collegial direct address, he invites readers to join a family—mother, daughter and son—on one of the first passenger trips from Omaha to Sacramento after the meeting of the Union Pacific and the Central Pacific in May 1869. With encyclopedic enthusiasm, Floca visually documents the trip, vignettes illustrating the train’s equipment as well as such must-know details as toilet and sleeping conditions. Full- and double-page spreads take advantage of the book’s unusually large trim for breathtaking long shots of the American landscape and thrilling perspectives of the muscular engine itself. The nameless girl and boy provide touchstones for readers throughout, dubiously eyeing an unidentifiable dinner, juddering across a trestle, staring out with wide-eyed wonder. Unjustly undersung as a writer, Floca soars with his free-verse narrative, exploiting alliteration, assonance and internal rhyme to reinforce the rhythms of the journey. Frequent variations in font and type (“HUFF HUFF HUFF!” is spelled out in ornate, antique letters) further boost the excitement. Front endpapers provide detail on the building of the transcontinental railroad; back endpapers show the steam engine in cross section, explaining exactly how coal and water made it go.
Nothing short of spectacular, just like the journey it describes."

From the Publisher

Floca took readers to the moon with the Apollo 11 mission in Moonshot (2009); now he takes them across the country on an equally historic journey of 100 years earlier. In a collegial direct address, he invites readers to join a family--mother, daughter and son--on one of the first passenger trips from Omaha to Sacramento after the meeting of the Union Pacific and the Central Pacific in May 1869. With encyclopedic enthusiasm, Floca visually documents the trip, vignettes illustrating the train's equipment as well as such must-know details as toilet and sleeping conditions. Full- and double-page spreads take advantage of the book's unusually large trim for breathtaking long shots of the American landscape and thrilling perspectives of the muscular engine itself. The nameless girl and boy provide touchstones for readers throughout, dubiously eyeing an unidentifiable dinner, juddering across a trestle, staring out with wide-eyed wonder. Unjustly undersung as a writer, Floca soars with his free-verse narrative, exploiting alliteration, assonance and internal rhyme to reinforce the rhythms of the journey. Frequent variations in font and type ("HUFF HUFF HUFF!" is spelled out in ornate, antique letters) further boost the excitement. Front endpapers provide detail on the building of the transcontinental railroad; back endpapers show the steam engine in cross section, explaining exactly how coal and water made it go. Nothing short of spectacular, just like the journey it describes. (Informational picture book. 4-10)

Kirkus Reviews

Related collections and offers

Overview

Product Details

About the Author

Related Subjects

Customer Reviews