The Storyteller

by Evan Turk

Overview

From Ezra Jack Keats 2015 New Illustrator Honor recipient Evan Turk comes his debut work as author-illustrator: an original folktale that celebrates the power of stories and storytelling.

Long, long ago, like a pearl around a grain of sand, the Kingdom of Morocco formed at the edge of the great, dry Sahara. It had fountains of cool, refreshing water to quench the thirst of the desert, and storytellers to bring the people together.

But as the kingdom grew, the people forgot the dangers of the desert, and they forgot about the storytellers, too. All but one young boy, who came to the Great Square for a drink and found something that quenched his thirst even better: wonderful stories. As he listened to the last storyteller recount the Endless Drought, and the Glorious Blue Water Bird, he discovered the power of a tale well told.

Acclaimed illustrator Evan Turk has created a stunning multidimensional story within a story that will captivate the imagination and inspire a new generation of young storytellers.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781481435185
Publisher:	Atheneum Books for Young Readers
Publication date:	06/28/2016
Pages:	48
Sales rank:	178,269
Product dimensions:	10.80(w) x 11.20(h) x 0.60(d)
Lexile:	AD870L (what's this?)
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

About the Author

Evan Turk is an Ezra Jack Keats Award–winning illustrator, author, and animator. He is the author-illustrator of The Storyteller, Heartbeat, You Are Home: An Ode to the National Parks, A Thousand Glass Flowers, and Hello, Moon and the illustrator of Muddy: The Story of Blues Legend Muddy Waters, which was a New York Times Best Illustrated Children’s Book; The People’s Painter; Grandfather Gandhi; and its companion Be the Change. Originally from Colorado, Evan now lives in southern California with his husband and two cats. He is a graduate of Parsons School of Design. Visit him at EvanTurk.com.

Editorial Reviews

★ 04/04/2016
Swaths of indigo swirl across detailed folk art illustrations in this intricate allegorical tale about the power of storytelling. A layered narrative featuring stories nestled within stories begins with a boy in a drought-stricken Moroccan village, where water and storytellers are scarce. Looking to quench his thirst, the boy encounters an ancient raconteur: “The man’s face cracked like dry mud to reveal a toothless grin. ‘Sit down, my boy, and your thirst shall be quenched.’ ” Various tales and their tellers are woven into the story the old man spins, with color-coordinated typefaces and borders helping readers track the different narrators. As the boy listens, his cup fills repeatedly with water, which figures prominently in the story’s climax. Turk (Grandfather Gandhi) combines primitive sketches and simple patterns to create sophisticated multimedia spreads. Fountains of blue pour from the mouths of storytellers, cementing the message that stories, like water, are life sustaining. The revelation of the final narrator brings this multifaceted tale to satisfying closure. An author’s note details the inspiration for his modern-day allegory: a real-life resurgence of the storytelling craft in one Moroccan cafe. Ages 4–8. (June)

Publishers Weekly

A veritable nesting doll of a narrative . . . this story about the power of story is a call for reconnection with tradition, oral and otherwise. Turk’s illustrations transport the reader to a Morocco of the past and present, capturing the timelessness of the country juxtaposed against the cautionary message about disappearing customs.

BCCB

*“Rich illustrations rendered in watercolor, ink, and pencil engulf the pages with desert golds and deep indigo, blending folk-art and contemporary styles. .. Turk’s layered ode to storytelling’s magic begs to be shared aloud with a group . . . [in] this beautiful, original folktale.

starred review Booklist

Visually stunning with a storyline to match, Turk is beginning to make good on his talents. This is a man with storytelling in his blood and bones. Our children reap the rewards. A can’t miss book.

Fuse #8 blog Betsy Bird

★ 05/01/2016
Gr 1–4—Folktales involving water abound in all cultures, but this tale is unusual in using water as a metaphor for story: just as we need water to nourish our physical selves, we need stories to feed our spirits. In Turk's fable, a lone storyteller remains in a Moroccan city where the water sources have all dried up. When a young boy seeks water, the water-seller has only a bowl to give him, but the storyteller tells him a tale that miraculously fills the bowl. In a series of nested stories, the boy's thirst is quenched, and by retelling the stories Scheherazade-style to a sandstorm in the form of a djinn, he is able to save the city and also replenish its water supply. In predominant hues of brown and blue, Turk's bold, semiabstract mixed-media illustrations conjure up swirls of sand and waves of water, evoking the environment and its people. The spreads contain concentric borders representing each of the stories as it is told. Using age-old literary elements and a loose, contemporary art style filled with symbolism, Turk successfully melds two equally important concerns of our time—the need to keep storytelling alive and the need to protect and conserve our drinking water. VERDICT This lush and lovely title is highly recommended for its aesthetic qualities as well as its multiple curricular tie-ins, including geography, environmental studies, language arts, and art education.—Susan Stan, Professor Emerita of English, Central Michigan University

School Library Journal

★ 2016-03-16
The art of storytelling is celebrated as a life-giving force in this enthralling picture book set in Morocco. A nameless, thirsty boy meets a storyteller and is drawn to return day after day to listen to intricately linked stories and to learn the older man's art. The stories bring not only sustenance to the boy's inner life, but water to his lips, for in this world, storytelling and water are symbolically connected. Stories will ward off the great drought if the Sahara encroaches on the cities, but only if young people keep the tradition alive. And so, in the manner of Scheherazade, the stories unfold, and the protagonist retells the story of the boy who saved the city from the sandstorm that arrived as a large djinn by telling him a story, day by day. With the stories embodying sharing, creativity, and hope, the life force of cool blue water appears in the illustrations, the antithesis of the destructive brown sand. Beautiful swirls of blue dominate many of the intricately bordered double-page spreads, fighting against the tans and browns of the djinn and the sands he represents. Each spread takes on a life of its own, sometimes highly geometric, other times full of swiftly crayon-drawn individuals, and still others with heavily inked and outlined figures. Original storytelling with the feel of the best folklore, enhanced by illustrations done in a style not seen anyplace else. (author's note, bibliography) (Picture book. 6-11)

Kirkus Reviews