By Anne Meneely
Whether you've read a book by author Jan Brett or not, you will want to pick up a copy of her latest book. Daisy Comes Home. The beautifully illustrated story takes readers on the Li River and through the beautiful countryside of China. The main character is Mei Mei, a little girl who has the six happiest hens in China. She gives them fresh hay and baths, and when she calls them, they all run to her as fast as they can. But one of the hens, Daisy, is not so happy. She is the smallest of the hens and doesn't like being picked on. One night Daisy is asleep in a basket when it drifts onto the river. Thus begins Daisy's adventure.
Jan and her husband, Joe Hearne, traveled with their daughter-in-law Yu, and her husband to China where Yu was born. As they sailed down the Li River in the Guangxi Province, Jan was reminded of a favorite story from her childhood, The Story of Ping. But what made a lasting impression on Jan was the river itself with mountains in unusual shapes towering above and small villages along the way with their colorful markets.
...and more raves about "Daisy"
by Beth Coogan
When we saw Jan Brett at Barnes and Noble in Ladue recently, she told us that she went to China to get ideas about the story and illustrations for Daisy Comes Home. Since her illustrations are so detailed, seeing the country firsthand was important.
Her research shows in the colorful cotton clothing of the children, styles of dwellings and the varieties of goods at the marketplace. Brett includes detailed borders on each page of her books and in "Daisy" she uses blue and white designs of porcelain and strips of bamboo for Chinese motifs.
My daughter Grace likes the tiny pictures on the outside corner of each page that hint at what happened before and after the scene on each page. Grace also pointed out that "most of the animals of the Chinese zodiac are in the story." We also learned from the author that in China chickens are called by saying, "Gu-gu-gu-gu-gu!" So now we know how to speak to chickens in Chinese!
We've added Daisy Comes Home to our list of favorite stories set in China.
Jan Brett lives in a seacoast town in Massachusetts, close to where she grew up. During the summer her family moves to a home in the Berkshire Hills.
As a child, Jan Brett decided to be an illustrator and spent many hours reading and drawing. She says, "I remember the special quiet of rainy days when I felt that I could enter the pages of my beautiful picture books. Now I try to recreate that feeling of believing that the imaginary place I'm drawing really exists. The detail in my work helps to convince me, and I hope others as well, that such places might be real."
As a student at the Boston Museum School, she spent hours in the Museum of Fine Arts. "It was overwhelming to see the room-size landscapes and towering stone sculptures, and then moments later to refocus on delicately embroidered kimonos and ancient porcelain," she says. "I'm delighted and surprised when fragments of these beautiful images come back to me in my painting."
Travel is also a constant inspiration. Together with her husband, Joe Hearne, who is a member of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Jan visits many different countries where she researches the architecture and costumes that appear in her work. "From cave paintings to Norwegian sleighs, to Japanese gardens, I study the traditions of the many countries I visit and use them as a starting point for my children's books."
 
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