By the Letter! A Visit to Grandad: An African ABC by Sade Fadipe

A is for Adanah

and my school is on Break.

At last Adanah is old enough to visit her grandfather by herself! She packs her Bags, including her Camera so she can make pictures to show her friends. Adanah wears her best Dress for the trip.

Dad drives Adanah all the way.

There are lots of things to see and do on Adanah's visit, in Sade Fadipe's lively A Visit to Grandad: An African ABC (Cassava Republic, 2029 Am. Ed.), and part of the fun is that Adanah sees them in alphabetical order.

E is for Eagles, flying high above the trees.

But that's not all to be seen that begins with the letter E. There is a woman carrying a tray of carefully stacked Eggs, a billboard which pictures an Elephant, a sign that advertises Eyeglasses, and an artist painting on an Easel.

Riding past a patch of Forest beside the road, Adanah also sees a Fisherman with a string of Four Fish and a Falcon in the tree. And then there's the Gate in front of Grandad's yard, and he hurries out to give her a big Hug.

A visit wouldn't be a visit without Stories from Aunt Sumbo under the big Tree and splashing in the rain puddles under a big Umbrella. And when it's time to return home, Adanah climbs into the Van, where her mom has her a present--a Xylophone--to make the trip home fun. And Adanah can't wait to tell her little sister Zainab all about her trip, from A to Z. Kids just learning their alphabet will have fun matching the big capital letters on each page with the matching initial-sound objects in the illustrations on the page, and author Fadipe provides an appended list of objects found on each page for each letter.

Artist Shedrach Ayalomeh fills each page with lively activities, done with fine draftsmanship, rich colors, and lively line and details, full of busy and joyful life being lived.