Clever Beatrice - Margaret Willey

Her mother would say that Beatrice was the

most clever girl in the whole north woods. 

Beatrice could not wait to hear it. 

I've had the book Clever Beatrice by Margaret Willey (and beautifully illustrated by Heather Solomon) sitting in my apartment since the start of class. It caught my eye in Swem Library in my original trek there to retrieve books and I finally got around to reading it. Clever Beatrice is categorized as a Canadian conte, which the author describes as follows - 

The upper peninsula of Michigan is rich and varied in the tradition of Native American and European folktales, including the Canadian conte. Like the Finns, Swedes, and Irish, French-Canadians were lured to northern Michigan by the lumber boom of the late 1800s. Canadian contes were told originally in lumber camps and iron mines and were known for wild exaggerations, comic detail, and rhythmic dialect. 

I had never heard of a conte before, but this tale seemed to be similar to what we've categorized in class as a tall tale. Regardless, the book was a pleasant one - short, sweet, funny, and a little fantastical. Willey starts the story with Beatrice, who is described as "sharp as a tack" and by people saying whenever she walked by - "She's a clever one, that Beatrice." Beatrice and her mother ran out of money and porridge, so they needed more money, but the only way in their community to get money was to be a lumberjack or to go bet against the giant. Beatrice decided to take her chances, and by outsmarting the giant and scaring him with her wit, she brought home a bag of coins for her mother. Then, the story ends. 

Clever Beatrice won the Charlotte Zolotow Award, which is awarded annually for a children's picturebook that contains excellent writing (age birth through age 7 is the typical age categorization for the picturebook). I found that interesting, because although I did enjoy this book, I didn't think it was anything spectacular. I think it could serve as a fantastic way to introduce tall tales or introduce different regional traditions in the United States, but I didn't find it nearly as interesting or beautiful as the writing in other picturebooks that we've read throughout the semester. If anything, I thought the illustrations of Heather Solomon deserved a Caldecott Medal. She seamlessly blended watercolor, collage, acrylic, and oils into a beautiful book. Her illustrations added significantly to both the relationship between Beatrice and the giant and to the overall folksy "feel" of the story. 

I think that this book is worth having in the classroom, but I don't know if I would go out of my way to read it aloud or to introduce it to children. With so much great literature out there that is inspiring, this fell a little bit short for me.