Yumi Heo (1964–2016)

A young girl eagerly awaits the arrival of her new baby sister in Yumi Heo's Ten Days and Nine Nights, checking off the days on her calendar until the big moment. As she and Grandpa redecorate her room in preparation for the new arrival, and Daddy brings home more furniture, Mommy is shown in a far-off country, making the final arrangements for an adoption. Finally, when there are no days and no nights left, Mommy returns, and girl meets baby for the first time...

I appreciated Heo's positive show more approach to the subject of international adoption. Her simple text depicts an older sibling who has no resentment to overcome, no problems to deal with: she's simply excited about the new addition to the family. I also liked Heo's oil, pencil and collage illustrations, in which stylized figures seem to dance in front of colorful, detailed backdrops. But although I approve of the idea, and intentions, of this book, there simply wasn't enough of a story to truly involve me in it. I found it pleasant, but not particularly memorable. Still, I think it would be an excellent selection for young readers who are facing this situation themselves, as they will no doubt take more away from it than I. show less

This book is so cute! It is about a big sister awaiting the arrival of her new baby sister. But the best part is the baby sister is being adopted! I think the main message of this book for a child could be that no matter if the person is blood related or not they can be family. Adoption is a wonderful thing, and it has the ability to give a child a life of love that they could of missed out on if a specific family didn't think about adoption. It also shows a different perspective, because show more you can always get the perspective of the parents, but the soon to be brothers and sister also have feelings, and this book depicts this soon to be big sisters feelings wonderfully. This book is a countdown to the big day, hence the title of this book. It is an easy read, but has a larger picture that it's reader should focus on. Adoption is a dream of mine someday so I really loved this book. show less

I really liked this story. It was about a young girl who was counting down the days and nights until her new baby sister came home. At the beginning of the story I did not know what she was counting down to. Then as the story progressed the reader found out what it was the young girl was counting down to. This story was fun to read and it was touching to read about a young girl's excitement for her new baby sister to arrive. I know I was not that excited when my sisters were born.

I like this book for several reasons. First, I like the illustrations. They are colorful collages that are busy to look at, which reflects the busy day that Minho and his mother had. I like how the illustrator uses the entire page to show what Minho and his mother are doing. The illustrations also do not distract the reader from the text. They enhance the text so that the reader can picture what Minho’s busy day is like. Second, I like how the author integrates onomatopoeias creatively show more into the illustrations. For example, when Minho was at the Laundromat, the machines have the words “thud” repeated inside the circular machine. Another example, is when they were at the beauty salon, the words “snip snip” was made from the hair that was being cut off. This book is filled with many onomatopoeias such as “clickety clack”, “wuf wuf wuf wuf”, “whurra whurra whurra”.Third, I like how some sentences do not end at each page. Instead, they continue on. This emphasizes how Minho’s day kept going on and on. The big idea of this book is to enjoy time with your loved ones. This is shown through Minho spending the day running errands with his mother. show less