In this post, we feature two acclaimed creators of books for children. Author Jacqueline Briggs Martin’s award-winning books include Chef Roy Choi and the Street Food Remix, which was cowritten with June Jo Lee and was named a Sibert Honor Book. Christy Hale has created numerous acclaimed titles, including Water Land: Land and Water Forms Around the World, which was named a Bank Street Best Children’s Books of the Year, among many other honors. You can hear them speak about their new picture book, Farmer Eva’s Green Garden Life, and try their “invitation to imagine” activities. You’ll also find other resources to explore. Thanks for joining us, and let us know what you think in the comments below!
Farmer Eva’s Green Garden Life
- Written by Jacqueline Briggs Martin and illustrated by Christy Hale
- Published by Readers to Eaters
- Release date: June 25, 2024
Farmer Eva Sommaripa founded Eva’s Garden in South Dartmouth, Massachusetts, a place “so close to the ocean, she can smell the sea, so close to woods she can talk to trees.” More than 50 years later, she has grown a big green garden life of friends and neighbors; creatures that crawl, fly, and slither; and microbes that create rich soil in the brown underground. Meet farmer Eva, and share the magic, beauty, and science of caring for the farm and its land. With collage artwork by award-winning illustrator Christy Hale, Farmer Eva’s Green Garden Life is one of the first picture books to focus on a woman farmer. This fifth entry in Jacqueline Briggs Martin’s award-winning “Food Heroes” series concludes with an afterword from Eva Sommaripa, as well as extensive back matter and resources that help to further connect farming with nature, ecology, science, community.
Explore Farmer Eva’s Green Garden Life
Listen to Jacqueline Briggs Martin and Christy Hale talking with TeachingBooks about creating Farmer Eva’s Green Garden Life. You can click the player below or experience the recording on TeachingBooks, where you can read along as you listen, and also translate the text to another language.
- Listen to author Jacqueline Briggs Martin pronounce her name.
- Listen to illustrator Christy Hale pronounce her name.
- Explore TeachingBooks’ collection of activities and resources for Farmer Eva’s Green Garden Life.
Invitation to Imagine
TeachingBooks asks each author or illustrator on our Virtual Book Tour to share a writing prompt, a drawing exercise, or just an interesting question to spark curiosity and creativity. Enjoy the following activity contributed by Jacqueline Briggs Martin and Christy Hale.
Imagination Activity with Jacqueline Briggs Martin
Write or draw a garden that you would like to work in with family and friends. It can be a space on the ground, a garden box, or just a large pot. What would you like to grow? Would you like to grow food that you and your friends could eat? Perhaps a salsa garden with tomatoes, peppers, cilantro? Or flowers to attract butterflies and bees? Would you include a comfy chair or two in your garden?
Imagination Activity with Christy Hale
Draw and write about something personal that you want to grow. A talent? A friendship? Think of how farmers plant seeds and tend their plants. What will be your strategy?
Finish This Sentence . . . with Jacqueline Briggs Martin and Christy Hale
As part of our Virtual Book Tour, TeachingBooks asks authors and illustrators to complete short sentence prompts. Enjoy responses from Jacqueline Briggs Martin and Christy Hale.
“While working on this book, I was surprised to learn…”
While working on this latest project, I was surprised to learn how plant roots and microbes help each other to survive and grow. They do not compete with each other. They need each other.—Jacqueline Briggs Martin
“My favorite book as a child was…”
When our fifth-grade teacher read aloud Harriet the Spy, by Louise Fitzhugh, my best friend and I wanted to be Harriet. Naturally, we started our own detective agency. For admission to our spy headquarters, which was entered through a trapdoor in a bedroom closet, we whispered our secret password, and flashed our identification cards showing height, weight, hair and eye color, as well as fingerprints. Then, holding flashlights, we descended a ladder to the dark underground. Above ground, we dressed up in disguises and rode our bikes around the neighborhood until we found people of interest. Then, we stashed our bikes behind bushes, pulled out our secret notebooks, and recorded notes and sketches of our observations. Back at spy headquarters we shared our discoveries.
We progressed from keeping spy notebooks about other people’s lives to writing and illustrating our own stories with characters we created. We rushed home every day after school to do this. My friend grew up to be a writer and editor, and I grew up to write and illustrate children’s books. At age ten, she was my first critique partner. —Christy Hale
“I knew I would be a writer when…”
I did not know I would be a writer when I was a child, but I did always love the sounds of words. I lived on a dairy farm with Holstein cows. The cows often had three names, one name was for the farm where they were born, another was like a family name (Smith or Torres or Jackson), and the third was just a name—like Jane or Lou. One of my favorite cow names was Riverflat Blanche Wisconsin. And when I wrote a book with a cow in it, I named her Blanche Wisconsin. I still love the sound of that name. —Jacqueline Briggs Martin
“How I work is…”
To prepare illustrations for a book, I first think about the text that will go on each page. An illustrator’s role is to bring the world of the book alive visually. I make lists of questions to help me begin my research for each image. For example: What do different kinds of herbs look like? Different kinds of worms? Since this is a nonfiction book about a specific person and a specific place, I looked for all the reference images of Eva and her farm that I could find.
Next, I begin sketching my ideas in pencil. I need to make sure to place the images around the text. I am also the book designer, so I could move the text into positions that worked with my images. Sketches are then submitted to the editor/publisher for review.
The editor/publisher provides feedback and suggestions, and I begin revised sketches. This process continues until there is full approval on the black-and-white sketches.
Next, I begin working on the final color art. For this book, I chose to work in a combination of print and collage for textured, colorful art. —Christy Hale
“Where I work is…”
I work in a room at the front of our house with a big window next to my writing place. When I am thinking about what comes next, I often look out that window. I have never written in a place without a window. Next to the window is a wall where I often put pictures of what I am writing about. It helps my brain get into the world of the story. —Jacqueline Briggs Martin
More Connections to Jacqueline Briggs Martin, Christy Hale, and Farmer Eva’s Green Garden Life
- Discover books like Farmer Eva’s Green Garden Life on TeachingBooks.
- Readers to Eaters’ page about Farmer Eva’s Green Garden Life, written by Jacqueline Briggs Martin and illustrated by Christy Hale.
- Buy Farmer Eva’s Green Garden Life, written by Jacqueline Briggs Martin and illustrated by Christy Hale.
All text and images are courtesy of Jacqueline Briggs Martin, Christy Hale, and Readers to Eaters and may not be used without expressed written consent.
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