by Moe Zilla

Created on: February 28, 2010

"It was a long way from my grandparents' home in Illinois. A long, long way..."

"Dandelions" tells the story of a pioneer family's move to a new homestead in Nebraska. They pull their covered wagon with two oxen - named Brownie and Blackie - with a cow named Moo following behind the wagon. All they see is vast prairie land, and the two little girls wonder when they'll finally see a tree. "Miles and miles of free land," says Papa.

"But it's so lonely," says Mama...

Eve Bunting was 67 years old when she wrote this story. But she'd immigrated to America from Ireland in 1959, according to the book's jacket, "So she knows well how Zoe and her family felt..." In her story, the father points out it's the same stars overhead as the one's the girls used to see from their bedroom window. And this makes the little girl cry...

Illustrator Greg Shed created some beautiful paintings for the story. To prepare for this book, he visited Nebraska's lonely prairies, the book's jacket reveals, "to see the vast grasslands and wide skies that pioneer families like the Boltons found." The realistic paintings use light, almost washed out colors, to suggest the sunlight during the hot days of traveling. The outlines of the shapes, including the people, are indistinct, leaving the reader imagine the details of the historic trip.

"This is where we are to live our lives?" Mama asks. They have neighbors, Papa assures her, just a three-hour ride away. "It will be different soon. Other settlers will come." He promises one day it will be crowded.

The book does a good job of describing the details of their daily lives. Visiting the neighbors, they discover that their house is built out of sod, with a single window. Bits of dirt - and twice, even a black beetle - will fall from the ceiling as they're eat their dinner. Papa promises that their house will have a window too...

There's poignant details that gradually slip into the story. The little girl overhears her father talking to her mother in a voice that was almost pleading. ("Don't you see? I could never have made a life for us in Illinois...") The mother misses china plates and wallpaper, and she stand for hours staring at the distant horizon. And on a journey into town, the father makes a confession to his small daughter.

"Oh, I pray to God I've done right by her..."

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