Trainstop

On a train trip between cityscapes young girls watches as her view in a black tunnel is replaced by a vibrant countryside. When the train is flagged down mysteriously the girl notices she is the only one on the train who isn't asleep. Stepping off the train she finds a group of people gathered around a tree where a person and their plane have become lodged. What isn't apparent until she reaches the tree is that the people are all tiny, as if the remained frozen the height they were from her train window perspective. While the people are as real as the girl, the plane in the tree is one of those balsa wood planes with a rubber band powering the propeller. Once she has rescued the tiny pilot she returns to the train and resumes her ride show more home, out the of the fantasy and out of the tunnel, back to the city where she lives.

Out in front of her townhouse, standing in her stone yard, she looks up and sees the rescued pilot and a co-pilot flying toward her. They come with a gift of thanks, a small seedling for an apple tree that is planted in the crack in her stone yard. As a parting shot the girl sits on her stoop admiring her now-grown tree while all over the city other trees have begun sprouting up, no doubt from kindred daydreaming souls looking to return nature to the cities.

Lehman set herself an impossible bar with The Red Book a few years back and, unfairly perhaps, everything since has been measured against that amazing snake-eating-its-tale fantasy. If the impression -- mine at least -- was that her subsequent books (Museum Trip, Rainstorm) were increasingly weaker attempts to capture lighting in a bottle, Trainstop manages to stand apart from the others, on its own and with very sturdy legs. As with her previous books Lehman mines the theme of a child's daydream world, but here the idea of an fantasy taking place while the rest of the world sleeps, coupled with the message of bringing nature back to the cities, is perhaps the strongest, most direct message delivered yet. Where in previous books the children imagine or discover worlds for their own purposes and keeping, Trainstop gives us a child looking to share her fantasy with the world. It's almost a subtle environmental message, a quiet Lorax making a last call on those with eyes and ears enough to still listen.

For those unfamiliar with Lehman's work, the book is as wordless as her previous books, filled with the same thick-outlined ligne claire illustrations that are her trademark. Probably the simplest of her picture books to date, but no less engaging. I think what I'd really like to see is what Lehman can do with the long-form: graphic novels. Her sense of pacing, her imagination, I think make her an ideal candidate for an extended fantasy romp a la Sara Varon's Robot Dreams or, on a more picture book level, Regis Faller's The Adventures of Polo. show less

Trainstop is a wonderful book about imagination and helping others. A young girl is riding a train with her parents when the train suddenly stops in a strange, but exciting place. I love how the book teaches children the value of helping others without needing any words at all. When the young girl steps on the train she immediately sees someone in need of help and steps into action. The smile on her face shows how great it can feel to help someone in need. I also enjoyed how the author portrays the vivid imagination of children. Her colorful imagery of the imaginary trainstop in stark contrast to the dull trainstop in the real world, reminds us how refreshing it can be to see the world with an open mind, and the beauty in letting our show more minds wander.
Lehman, B. (2008). Trainstop. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. show less

I don’t like books with no words just pictures but here’s what I got out of looking at the illustration. A young girl goes on a train ride with her parents when it becomes boring just looking out the windows passing towns and buildings and parks. She uses her imagination and the train makes a stop in this magical town where she is a giant to the small town people. Seems like the town people are having a problem which they need very tall person to help fix it. Lucky she was there to save the day and help get an person who was in a airplane down that had crashed into a tree. The town people were very happy she saved the day they celebrated and thanked her but the train called out for departure. She waved bye and hurried back to the show more train. When she made it back to her stop she seemed sad and wanted to go back to the magical town maybe. show less

This wordless picture book can teach readers how important teamwork is, and also the idea that one can be helpful no matter their size. The author’s ability to carefully detail the sequence of events acts as a guide to the reader as to what exactly is happening in the specific frame. I thought it was interesting also that the illustrator chose to include 6 different illustration frames in one page. I thought this pointed directly to guiding the reader through the story more fluently and in a flow-like fashion, which in turn helps the reader better understand the theme of teamwork – especially when the main character helps the “little citizens” save someone from the tall tree. The use of multiple frames on a single page displayed show more each step the people had to make to save the person from the tree, and their celebration afterwards. The theme of this book was unclear, however – the author could have utilized more creative tools to better depict what exactly the theme was – whether that would be more detailed illustration, more environmental print, etc. show less

I gave this wordless picture book a 4/5 because the message it gives off is a little unclear. Although it is unclear, it still gives off a positive message. The sequence of events, her getting off the train and then being bigger than everyone else, speaks about how someone can have an upper hand but not take advantage of it. This book demonstrates what it looks like to be a kind person and shows how to help others if you do have an advantage. In addition, I like how it shows the girl who is bigger than everyone else in a positive light. It goes to show that just because someone is different, it doesn't mean that are weird or mean.

I chose two books by this particular author because I found her wordless books to be the most imaginative and interesting of all that I saw, save Alda’s. In Trainstop, the heroine, a young girl, takes a train ride. She looks out the windows and sees the world rushing past. When the train stops, she sees all of the adults asleep. She ventures out to have a very Brobdinagian experience with some tiny people who have lost their small plane in the tree. She retrieves it for them, runs back to the train and continues on. When she gets home, the little people fly in and give her a gift in thanks.

In The Red Book, a young girl finds a red book in the snow. Inside she sees an island with a beautiful warm beach. On this same beach, a boy finds show more a red book in the sand. He opens it to see the young girl in the snow. The young girl buys tons of balloons and floats away to the island, where she meets the young boy. However, in her flight, she drops the red book. She arrives at the island, and the last picture is of a man on a bike finding the red book.

Both of these books have fantastic illustrations. The style itself is pretty simple, but it is the story behind, that one must create! I really like wordless books because they inspire so much discussion and imagination, and the basic premise of each of these books is already extremely imaginative. They inspire so many questions, such as, where did the little people come from? How many red books are there? How do the little people know where the girl lives? How does the girl get to the island without the red book? What will happen to the man on the bicycle, now that he has the red book? I love imagination-inspiring literature, and Lehman’s work does this in spades. If I had to choose between the two, I would pick The Red Book, because I think the premise is just so fantastic. I am using another of her books, Rainstorm, for my Narration assignment. show less

I give this book a rating of four stars out of five because the story plot is somewhat vague. The book focuses on a little girl while she is riding on a train and follows her to a new location where she helps and plays with other characters. This book speaks to the imagination of young children and encourages them to come up with their own story line. While those are both important concepts for children to work on, I with the story had a little more detail or meaning for children to relate to and learn from.