Jessie Haas

Jessie Haas is an American author who writes children’s books for all ages.  Her picture books are a particular delight:  the first one of hers I came across was Runaway Radish, which was a delight.  Jessie has the rare gift of being able to write for all ages of children

There's great attention to to detail in all the Jessie Haas titles reviewed here. For me they all pass the most important test of a book for a small child: I could read them over and over with conviction, and not want to suggest to my child that surely, now, it must be time for cbeebies?

For more information on the author, please see my other pages on her here.

Young Readers/Picture Books

Appaloosa Zebra: A Horselover’s Alphabet, 2002
Be Well, Beware, 1996
Beware and Stogie, 1998
Beware the Mare, 1992
A Blue for Beware, 1995
Runaway Radish, 2001
Scamper and the Horse Show, 2004
Hurry!, 2000
Runaway Pony, 2004
Mowing, 1994
Sugaring, 1996
No Foal Yet, 1995

Reviewed here:
Appaloosa Zebra
Scamper & The Horse Show
Sugaring

Jessie Haas:  Appaloosa Zebra - A Horselover’s Alphabet
Greenwillow Books, 2002 £8.65
Rating:  «««««

Appaloosa Zebra - a Horse Lover's Alphabet looks delicious. It would have been easy to go for a simple A is for Appaloosa approach, but Jessie Haas is more subtle than that and so we have hard hats and hacks as well as Haflingers; colts and Connemaras as well as Clydesdales. The book works on several levels: it's a delight to read, but it's also a stepping stone onto much more. You can enjoy the pictures and the text, or talk about the different breeds or disciplines mentioned (my daughter asked me about Lipizzaners, and now knows much more than perhaps she wanted to about her Mama's visit to Wembley to see them), or talk about just what the farrier is doing. It's a book that you, the adult reader will find enough in not to start screaming if it becomes the one and only book your lamb will read (and it might).
 

You might learn something too. The Icelandic Yakut is a new one on me, and I thought I had read and absorbed Elwyn Hartley Edward's Encyclopaedia of the Horse, the reference book cited, in its entirety.

The book does of course reflect the world of American equitation, and some of the breeds mentioned are unfamiliar but there is an article at the back of the book explaining more about the vaquera and the Yakut and all the rest. It is a beautifully pitched piece: not patronising, but giving you just enough information to feel satisfied.

The illustrations work wonderfully with the text.  It’s an excellent book:  I can heartily recommend it.