Olivia Goes to Venice

Irrepressible porcine wonder Olivia returns in this, the sixth picture-book chronicling her madcap adventures. Setting off with her family for a vacation in Venice, Olivia has to be forced to leave her snorkel and flippers behind - the city is sometimes underwater, she tells her mother - enjoys being searched by security at the airport, and sets a frenetic pace once in the city of their destination. From eating lots of gelato to riding a gondola, Olivia and family do lots of typical Venetian things. But when selecting a souvenir, our piglet heroine chooses something with rather atypical results...

Although I have greatly enjoyed previous installments of Ian Falconer's Olivia series, in the end I found Olivia Goes to Venice somewhat show more wanting. It started out promisingly enough, with lots of Olivia humor - I loved the fact that our eponymous heroine enjoyed getting patted down at the airport! - and wonderful illustrations that join Falconer's usual charcoal and gouache artwork with sepia-toned photographs of Venice. The whole thing started to go south for me, however, when Olivia loots a brick from an important monument, leading to its total destruction. I understand that this was meant to be humorous - and, as always, humor is very idiosyncratic - but as a student of antiquity I couldn't help but cringe at the very idea of casually destroying an important artifact, structure, or work of art, simply to gain a souvenir. Sadly, this sort of cultural vandalism has had disastrous results, here in the real world, so the 'humor' of this plot point was a little thin for me. If you can overlook that aspect of the story, or even find it funny, then this will be an Olivia story to enjoy. Otherwise, I say give it a miss. show less

Olivia is, as always, charming. The larger-than-life pig leaves her mark (quite literally) on the city of Venice as she accompanies her family there on spring vacation. The running joke of eating too much gelato will be appreciated by children and adults alike (the disgruntled gondolier's miffed "tourists!" is a wry poke at Americans abroad). Olivia's search for the perfect souvenier brings out, as always, her unique and discriminating personality: never satisfied with the everyday things that would content the average person (pig?), never willing to settle for anything less than the most unique and memorable piece of Venice she can find. It's a lesson for children in seeking out things of more than passing value. Indeed, the whole book show more is about throwing oneself wholeheartedly into the experience of another culture: even if you're going to be doing the "tourist thing," do it to the hilt, and leave nothing out. End up, like Olivia, utterly exhausted, on a plane trip home, with your dreams and your big, big imagination to immortalize your experiences. Youth is not wasted on the young, if you can embrace your world as Olivia does. show less

Olivia and her family go to Venice for her school spring break vacation, eating lots of gelato and having other adventures.

This book started out cute, with a fairly reasonable expectation for young readers about what vacation might entail (e.g., packing, going through security at the airport, flying on a plane, etc.). It then travels along to the family doing some sight-seeing / touristy things, like eating local foods, strolling through a piazza, going on a gondola ride. But after that it takes a wild turn when Olivia wants a souvenir and ends up pulling out a brick from the bell tower, causing the whole thing to come crashing down. I haven't read enough Olivia books to know if this out-sized antic is typical for the series or not, but show more it seemed a bit out of place with the rest of the story to me.

There's also a line or two in which the Italian pigs comment on how Olivia's family has eaten too much gelato, which came across a bit like fat shaming, so I wasn't the hugest fan of that.

On the other hand, the illustrations were really neat. Actual photographs of Venice are overlaid with the illustrations of Olivia and her family, making for a really cool effect. show less

In my opinion, this was an absolutely fabulous book. In the book, Olivia and her family are going to Venice, Italy for spring break. The author does a great job of informing and showing children about Venice. In the beginning of the book, Olivia is packing and her mother has to inform her that she doesn't need her snorkel, flippers, and water skis. Olivia replies, "Mother, apparently the city is often under water." I thought this was a great way of informing the audience that Venice is built around water. The book also did a great job of incorporating Italian words. For example, when Olivia's mom asks her if she wants ice cream, Olivia informs her that it is called "gelato" in Italy. When Olivia and her family are about to go on a show more gondola ride, the gondolier welcomes them aboard with a gallant "Prego." an Italian word for welcome. I think my favorite part of this book was how it showed the sights of Venice. The illustrations are pictures of the sights Olivia's family goes to, like the Piazza San Marco, Grand Canal, Rialto Bridge, and the basilica with Olivia and her family drawn into the scenes. I really like the illustrations this way because it shows readers what Venice actually looks like, but the drawings are done in a way where it doesn't look weird that a family of pigs are roaming around Venice. I think the main idea of this book was to show children a different city in a country besides America and some of the famous landmarks of that city. show less

I found this picture book to simply be laugh-out-loud funny. Olivia is on another adventure, this time overseas! Falconer shifts slightly from his usual minimalist style of penciled pigs and red strips to include realistic depictions of the sights of Venice (with Olivia drawings on top!). I enjoyed both the subtle humor of Olivia planning her own perfume line, and the slap-stick humor at the end. A great read I would recommend to others.

Olivia's back and this time she's got an entire city in her clutches. As usual, she faces all delights and challenges with equal aplomb and fortifies herself with massive quantities of gelato along the way. With more color than usual, Falconer sets the scene of classically romantic Venice perfectly juxtaposed with Olivia's touristy, piggy family.

In this installment of the Olivia collection, Falconer takes the reader along with the beloved pig on an adventure through Venice. Olivia experiences going through an airport, many famous locations in Venice, and plenty of gelato. This is another great example of a fantasy from Falconer because everything Olivia does is well within the realm of human possibility, but all task are accomplished by a pig. The only variation from this was the end in which Olivia wants to take a souvenir, so she takes a brick from a building, which causes a building to fall. Olivia's mom tells her that doing things like that aren't okay because if everyone did it, there would be nothing left of Venice. It was a great little moral at the end of another show more hilarious adventure with Olivia. It would be very useful when talking about traveling, as Olivia talks about her experience with airport security, or when teaching about Italy or Europe in general.
Media: charcoal, gouache, digitally altered photos show less