A short heartfelt desecration of Audubon's work in sentimental verse and pretty pictures. The clear eyed respect for his subject that shines from Audubon's drawings is nowhere in this bit of fluff. ( )

I did not know that John Audubon was an artist, I had a clue that he was related to animals some kind of way because of the name of our zoo here in NOLA. I also did not realize he took interest in birds either. Interesting fact that I learned about him. This book was written in poetry form, but a letter to his father. It was really beautiful. I did find that students may have trouble reading this book because it does have script writing in it, that really was a factor I think I would have to address if I had this in my classroom library or using it with in a lesson. ( )

I had mixed feelings about this book. I really liked it for one reason, but then the other part really drew me back from enjoying it. I really liked how the author used two ways to describe and explain John James Audubon. The author first wrote the story about John James Audubon and his dreams and then underneath each story excerpt was a little part of a journal entry written by John. This may not be his actual journal writings, but the author put it in script handwriting and it gave readers the chance to see how Audubon was feeling and what he was thinking about during certain moments in his life. I didn’t really like the story aspect of this book. It didn’t really teach me much about John James Audubon, it only described his dream and how he was trying to gain acceptance from his father. The story was also told in rhymes which I didn’t deem appropriate for a biography. This definitely would make it more appealing for readers to want to read, but I didn’t find it helpful in learning anything about the man. The main message of this story would be to explain John James Audubon’s dreams to readers. ( )

The art by Minor tells more of the story than the text by Burleigh, I think. It's gorgeous. I think it's rather a shame it overwhelms the samples of Audubon's own work; I hope readers are inspired to look for more of those classic works. I definitely appreciated the sample of text from Audubon's journals... but it's a shame they were in a script my old eyes couldn't quite make out completely.

In any case, this book beautifully captures the essence of the man and his lifework, but it's not a real biography with enough detail for a school report or such. However, I do recommend it. ( )

This is a great book to read to my students about nature and its surroundings. This book is also about James Audubon which would be a great topic to talk about since we have a zoo that is named after him. I would make a lesson plan about things relating to Audubon and nature to help students get a learning experience of him as well as nature. ( )