Publishers Weekly praises ELSA’S CHESSBOARD, illustrated by Julie Downing: “this heart-tugging story considers the way a treasured object—and pastime—offers meaning across lifetimes and generations”
By Jenny Andrus, illus. by Julie Downing. Holiday House/Porter, $18.99 (48p) ISBN 978-0-8234-5408-2.
Andrus’s debut kicks off in 1906 Vienna, where young Elsa, dressed in a white pinafore and blue hair ribbon, watches her brothers play chess. Though two dismiss her, a third teaches her the rules, and she proves quite skillful. When Elsa begins to think constantly about the game, her brothers give her a wooden chess set, and she’s launched as a player. She meets her librarian husband while searching for a book on the game, and after their first child is born, “they set Elsa’s chessboard next to the table, softly rocking their daughter to sleep as they considered their next moves.” When Europe becomes a “giant chessboard” of its own in the 1930s, the Jewish family immigrates to San Francisco, where Elsa teaches chess to fellow factory workers. Warm, naturalistic watercolor and colored pencil spreads by Downing (Night in the City) alternate between intimate family scenes and wide vistas, including the family’s first view of San Francisco’s sweeping skyline. Instead of building to a sharp climax, this heart-tugging story considers the way a treasured object—and pastime—offers meaning across lifetimes and generations. An author’s note concludes. Ages 4–8.
Illustrator’s agent: Rosemary Stimola, Stimola Literary. (Apr.)