SIDE BY SIDE: FIVE FAVORITE PICTURE-BOOK TEAMS GO TO WORK by Leonard S. Marcus

1. Bibliographic Information

Marcus, Leonard S. 2001. Side by Side: Five Favorite Picture-Book Teams Go to Work. New York: Walker & Company. 0-8027-8778-9.

2. Plot Summary

Side by Side: Five Favorite Picture-Book Teams Go to Work is a book about how five different teams: Arthur Yorinks and Richard Egielski (Louis the Fish, 1980), Alice Provensen and Martin Provensen (The Glorious Flight: Across the Channel with Louis Blériot, 1983), Julius Lester and Jerry Pinkney (Sam and the Tigers: A New Telling of Little Black Sambo, 1996), Joanna Cole and Bruce Degen (The Magic School Bus series), and the three-member team of Jon Scieszka, Lane Smith, and Molly Leach (The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales, 1992). One chapter is devoted to each team and describes each member’s artistic background, how team members met, and how they worked together as a team to create picture books. Drafts, dummy sketches of artwork, and other interesting bits of information are included. Marcus also includes a bibliography of works for each team.

3. Critical Analysis

Side by Side: Five Favorite Picture-Book Teams Go to Work gives insight into the creative collaboration that takes place behind the scenes in the world of picture books. This text provides readers with the opportunity to learn more about the inspiration behind some of their favorite books.

Leonard S. Marcus provides great detail and interesting anecdotes about how each team met and worked together. The beginning of each chapter shows a picture of the team, one of their popular books, and the illustrator’s art medium. The chapters are easy and fun to read because the author breaks up his narrative by using a lot of dialogue. The visual aides (book covers, sample artwork, rough drafts) help the reader experience each team’s process in creating their picture book. At the end of each chapter, the reader gets a sense of how the team collaborated to tell stories through words and pictures. These chapters show how important the story and illustrations are in a picture book. Not only are they individually significant, but it is their collaboration – pictures and words – that creates the magic of the book.

While the text is simply written, I think that Side by Side: Five Favorite Picture-Book Teams Go to Work is appropriate only for middle school students or higher. The text is smaller and most of the pages are filled with words, not pictures. This is also more of an informational text, which will lose out to other books in the minds of young readers. For those who are interested in the world of picture books, Side by Side: Five Favorite Picture-Book Teams Go to Work gives a wonderful view.

4. Review Excerpts

"Marcus describes the creative collaborations of five author-artist teams whose processes prove as varied as their books. . . . Readers snared by their interest in the teams behind favorites such as the Magic School Bus series and The Stinky Cheese Man will appreciate the insights into the inner workings of bookmaking, and may well end up appreciating the books more for the energy and ingenuity it takes to create them." - Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"Teachers and librarians who want to promote collaboration in the classroom or just share their enthusiasm for the creative process and those who practice it will find plenty of good material in this well-written and beautifully designed book." - Booklist (starred review)

"With his broad knowledge of the field and the imagination to communicate that knowledge to others, Leonard Marcus here provides unusual insight into the topic of artistic partnerships. . . . What raises this book to the level of art and literary criticism is Marcusís analysis of a pivotal work by each of the five teams, with clear explanations and plenty of visual material to further clarify those explanations. . . . A book that lives up to its subject." - The Horn Book

"If ever a book created an occasion to head to the library for more, this is the one. . . . Marcus opens up a world of creativity with this new offering." - Riverbank Review

5. Connections

Related Books:

Marcus, Leonard S. 1998. A Caldecott Celebration: Six Artists and Their Paths to the Caldecott Medal. New York: Walker & Co. 0802786561.

Marcus, Leonard S. 1997. The Making of Goodnight Moon: A 50th Anniversary Retrospective. Harper Collins. 0064461920.

Marcus, Leonard S. 1999. Margaret Wise Brown: Awakened by the Moon. Harper Collins. 0688171885.