Pumpkin Circle: The Story of a Garden

by George Levenson, Shmuel Thaler (Photographer)

Overview

This educational exploration of a pumpkin's life-cycle is a must for any aspiring scientist or farmer!

We can be sure of this: It's a circle without end. It's pumpkin seeds to pumpkins to pumpkin seeds again! This treat of a picture book comes cloaked in the colors of fall. Bouncy verse and glowing photographs show a backyard pumpkin patch move through its natural cycle-a bug's eye and a bird's high view of seeds sprouting, flowers blooming, bees buzzing, pumpkins growing . . .and then going back to earth.

An author's note explains how to grow your own pumpkin.

Awards
Parent's Guide Award

Reviews
"If you weren't a pumpkin lover before, you will be after checking this neat book out."
-Fast Forward magazine

"Eye-catching full-color photography and rhyming text. . . . An excellent choice for fall pumpkin studies."
-Public Schools of North Carolina's Infotech

"Your books will help us put an emphasis on early reading and help improve the stereotypes and misconceptions surrounding farmers and agriculture."
-American Farm Bureau Foundation for Agriculture

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781582460789
Publisher:	Random House Children's Books
Publication date:	08/07/2002
Edition description:	Revised ed.
Pages:	40
Sales rank:	168,482
Product dimensions:	8.56(w) x 9.81(h) x 0.14(d)
Age Range:	5 - 8 Years

About the Author

SHMUEL THALER lives in Santa Cruz, California.


Bread lover GEORGE LEVENSON's films, which include the widely praised Sadako and The Thousand Paper Cranes, are available in most schools and libraries in North America. This story was inspired by the wheatgrass growing in his backyard in Santa Cruz, California.

Read an Excerpt

The pumpkin seed
Makes the pumpkin plant, and the
Pumpkin plant
Makes pumpkins

Deep within each pumpkin the air is damp and cool. The walls are lined with teardrop seeds, each one a slippery jewel.

Scrape them from their orange cave. Wash away squishy mush.
Save a few to grow next spring, and have a bunch to munch.

Editorial Reviews

From pumpkin seeds to jack-o'-lanterns to pumpkin seeds again, the intriguing life cycle of the pumpkin is presented using large, colorful photographs from a pumpkin patch. Catchy rhyming text and tips on growing the perfect pumpkin complete this unique nonfiction selection.
—Bookbag Magazine

Therese Durhman

For those who have seen the charming video of the same name, this will be an unhappy example of what happens when one medium is translated into another. Those who come to this without preconceived notions, however, will find glorious full-color photographs that capture pumpkin marvels, from the mountain of golden orange delights with a girl perched on them to the gorgeous close-ups of green sprouts, feathery buds, and full yellow flowers. The singsong text is often clumsy, rhyming "seeds" with "leaves," "hair" with "appear," and "vine" with "time." The fascinating story of the growth of the pumpkin (and the pumpkin patch), from seed to jack-o-lantern, and then back, decaying, into the earth, is more fully conveyed in the pictures. (Picture book. 4-8)

Kirkus Reviews