Nine Months: Before a Baby Is Born

by Miranda Paul, Jason Chin (Illustrator)

Overview

Join a family of three who spend nine whole months waiting, from a frosty winter through a sun-dappled summer, until finally . . . a baby is here.

A Boston Globe - Horn Book Honor Recipient
An NSTA Outstanding Science Trade Book for Students
A Capitol Choices Noteworthy Title

A soon-to-be big sister and her parents prepare for the arrival of a new baby in the family. Alternating panels depict what the family is experiencing in tandem with how the baby is growing, spanning everything from receiving the news about the new baby to the excitement of its arrival.

In this pregnancy book unlike any other one out there, watch what's actually happening through meticulously detailed, actual size illustrations, perfectly paired with a lyrical yet informative text, and culminating in a warm, joyful birth scene.

Complete with backmatter that includes an elaboration on pregnancy, a list of amazing things babies can do before they're born, and more, Miranda Paul and Caldecott Medalist Jason Chin deliver another spectacular nonfiction picture book.

A Kirkus Reviews Best Book of the Year
A Horn Book Best Book of the Year
A Bank Street Best Book of the Year - Outstanding Merit

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780823441617
Publisher:	Holiday House
Publication date:	04/23/2019
Pages:	32
Sales rank:	1,120,231
Product dimensions:	8.50(w) x 10.60(h) x 0.40(d)
Lexile:	AD230L (what's this?)
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

About the Author

Miranda Paul is an award-winning author of children's books whose work includes Water Is Water (also illustrated by Jason Chin), Are We Pears Yet (illustrated by Carin Berger), and One Plastic Bag: Isatou Ceesay and the Recycling Women of the Gambia. She lives in Wisconsin.

Jason Chin is a celebrated author and illustrator of children's books. He received a Caldecott Medal for his illustrations in Andrea Wang's Watercress, a Newbery Honor book and APALA award winner. His book Grand Canyon was awarded a Caldecott Honor, a Sibert Honor, and the NCTE Orbis Pictus Award. His other acclaimed nonfiction titles--Coral Reefs, Redwoods, Gravity, and Island: A Story of the Galapagos--have received numerous starred reviews and other accolades. He is also the illustrator of Stephanie Parsley Ledyard's debut title Pie Is for Sharing, which has received four starred reviews. He lives in Vermont.

Editorial Reviews

★ 01/31/2019

Realistic, light-infused paintings by Chin (Grand Canyon) and spare rhymes by Paul (Are We Pears Yet?) highlight a fetus’s developmental milestones inside a mother’s womb while outside, a family lovingly prepares, month by month, for the baby’s arrival. Labeled illustrations of dividing cells, an embryo, then a fetus (depicted actual size from months four to nine) sit opposite inviting scenes of the family at the same stage getting ready to welcome its newest member. “Lips./ Flips./ Curve, dip, and groove./ She has a face./ She likes to move!” declares the “Month Five” spread, which attends the family assembling a crib. Along the way, the expecting parents proffer a “big sister” T-shirt to their preschool-age child, and mother and daughter share tender tummy-touching moments prior to the birth, which is marked by a close-up of the squalling newborn. Illustrated back matter explains the gestational stages in greater depth. Additional sections compare human and animal gestation spans and straightforwardly answer questions about multiple and premature births, as well as miscarriages. This appealing treatment of the subject strikes a perfect balance between biology—minus the birds and bees—and a gentle relevancy for young, soon-to-be siblings. Ages 4–8. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly

★ "[T]his isn’t just a story about the nine months of gestation; it’s also a tale—told mostly with illustrations—of a family happily awaiting a baby’s arrival.  As left-hand pages track a zygote’s transformation, first into an embryo (there’s a tail!) and then into a fetus, right-hand pages show slice-of-life scenes of a mom, dad, and soon-to-be big sister (details in the watercolor and gouache illustrations indicate the family is Latinx). . . . During the third trimester, the left-hand illustrations begin to push onto the right-hand pages, ultimately taking over the entire double-page spread. It’s another whimsical touch in this joyful celebration of the nine months leading up to a baby’s birth."—The Horn Book, Starred Review
 
"[T]he real value lies in the blend of informational text and illustrations that will allow kids a concrete sense of the growth covertly occurring in the maternal abdomen. Chin’s intrauterine illustrations start oversized . . . but the little one quickly catches up and art is to scale; then she begins to push across the spread gutters as her size becomes too large to be contained to a single page. The result is a solid family discussion starter about a possible new addition to the family that allows a listening kid to take the questions in a medical or emotional direction or both, and fascinated youngsters will pore over the growth scenes and be stunned by the information that they, too, started that way."—Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books


★ "This touching book describes milestones both inside and outside of a mother's belly over the course of nine months. . . . Children both young and old will be captivated by the details of fetal development and the story of a family preparing for and welcoming a new member."—Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review 


"It’s a riveting chronicle, full of wonderment and the kind of information that will allow even very young prospective brothers and sisters to track the progress of their own forthcoming siblings."—The Wall Street Journal
 
★ "Caldecott Honoree Chin's detailed gouache and watercolor illustrations skillfully depict the changes in the fetus month to month, they also show the family of three and their activities. Verso pages have drawings of the fetus developing while the recto pages show the family’s movements as they wait and prepare for the new infant. Pictures of Month Four through Month Nine reveal the actual size of the growing baby, while the illustrations of the first three months tell what the size would be and show a magnified illustration."—Booklist, Starred Review
 
★ "This appealing treatment of the subject strikes a perfect balance between biology—minus the birds and bees—and a gentle relevancy for young, soon-to-be siblings."—Publishers Weekly, Starred Review

"A bright, savvy heads-up for younger children in growing families; equally useful for shaping expectations and providing realistic glimpses of what’s going on inside a pregnant person." —School Library Journal

"Nine Months is a beautifully balanced celebration and explanation of how babies develop in utero, and how families prepare, just right for siblings-to-be and their parents." —Shelf Awareness

From the Publisher

02/01/2019

K-Gr 4—Beginning with a fertilized egg ("Small. Ball. The point of a pin. Then it divides…"), Paul tracks the gestation of a human fetus in poetic yet matter-of-fact language. In exacting detail (later images are labeled "actual size"), Chin depicts the developing child at specified days or weeks on one side, while on the facing pages he follows a couple and their preschool-age daughter as they share a bilingual "new baby" book, visit the doctor to see an ultrasound image, go about daily routines in their suburban house, set up furniture and supplies, and finally gather with doting grandparents at the bed where mother and newborn baby girl nestle. The author expands on her terse narrative at the end in engaging observations that include notes on fetal hiccups, how taste buds develop immersed in amniotic fluid that is actually flavored by what the mother eats, what unborn children can sense, and other wonders—plus a brief, sensitive acknowledgement that miscarriages happen but it's nobody's fault. Sex at one end of the process and cesarean sections at the other go unmentioned. Though the bibliography leaves Robie H. Harris out of the mix, it does include several comprehensive resources for parents. VERDICT A bright, savvy heads-up for younger children in growing families; equally useful for shaping expectations and providing realistic glimpses of what's going on inside a pregnant person.—John Peters, Children's Literature Consultant, New York

School Library Journal

★ 2019-01-15

What happens when a new baby is on its way? This touching book describes milestones both inside and outside of a mother's belly over the course of nine months.

A small family consisting of a mother, a father, and a small girl (all people of color with light skin and black hair) are having a fine winter's day out. Meanwhile, detailed illustrations of a single egg and its divisions begin the story of what's happening inside the mother. Each page turn brings spare, poetic text that illuminates another month of the baby's development on the left side and that also complements the scenes unfolding on the right side: a new "big sister" T-shirt, seeing the ultrasound, putting together a crib. Captions also inform readers about the timeline of fetal development and sizes. As the mother's belly grows, the verso illustrations begin to expand, and by the eighth and ninth months, an actual-size painting of a fully developed fetus takes up most of the spread, while a grandmother arrives in the squished panel on the right. Then, finally, "Loved ones arrive": both baby and family. As usual, Chin's (Pie is for Sharing, 2018, etc.) watercolor-and-gouache paintings are exquisite, conveying both scientific details and a loving extended family. Four pages of backmatter about gestation and babies follow, including a sensitive paragraph on "What if…something goes wrong?"

Children both young and old will be captivated by the details of fetal development and the story of a family preparing for and welcoming a new member. (bibliography) (Informational picture book. 3-8)

Kirkus Reviews