Prairie Town

Bonnie Geisert has written four picture books based on various types of towns in the United States.  Each one was illustrated by her husband Arthur Geisert.  The first, published in 1998, is Prairie Town.  Next came River Town, which was followed by Mountain Town and Desert Town.

Although I haven’t read Desert Town yet, I expect it to have the same style as the others.  In each one, Geisert uses simple narration to describe the town over the course of a year and explain how the seasons affect it and the people living there.  Her husband’s birds’-eye-view illustrations make readers feel they are silent, secret observers.

These books are great for depicting towns and people across the United States.  They are realistic examples of specific parts of America.  Although they’d be great for geography lessons, these books work best in one-on-one reading.  The details in the pictures are best seen up close.  With so much detail in the pictures, however, the story is new every time it’s read.

At the end of each book, Geisert also includes a note to mention events that happened throughout the year (a wedding, carnival, dedication, etc.) that the reader may have missed.  It’s fun to go back through the pages of the story to find evidence of those events in the town.  These are definite reads for anyone interested in small towns across the country.