Ma Dear's Aprons (Anne Schwartz Books)

You can read piles of books for kids and think they're just fine--until you hit one that reminds you how truly wonderful a children's book can be. Patricia C. McKissack's Ma Dear's Aprons is such a book. Graceful and deceptively simple, it tells the story of a week in the life of a turn-of-the-century boy and his mother: McKissack's great-grandmother.

Floyd Cooper's illustrations, misty as memory, bring readers so close, and with such warmth and welcome, that youngsters may feel that they, too, sit in the lap of Ma Dear's apron, a little sleepy, and very happy to be there.