Sadako

From Publishers Weekly
An abridgement of the novel Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes combined with images from a film adaptation of the work yields a complex and somewhat abstract picture book. Using a sampling of the illustrations he created for the movie version, Young ( Seven Blind Mice ) subtly accentuates the poignancy of the story without rendering it sentimental. His ethereal pastels (reminiscent of his art in The Red Thread ) seem to convey the mood, rather than the actual activity, of the text. Sweeping panoramas alternate with wispy image fragments against ample white space: a face half-concealed, a shadow darting past. Coerr's condensed text succeeds in retaining the simple lyricism of the original, allowing the leukemia-stricken Sadako to emerge as a quietly courageous girl. Given the necessary length of the text, the mature subject matter and the sophisticated artwork, this book may find its most welcoming audience among older readers, especially those who enjoyed its original version as a novel. Ages 5-9. Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal
Grade 2-6-This is the same story as the author's Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes (Putnam, 1977), told through an entirely new text. In this abbreviated version, the beautiful, limpid prose and crisp dialogue further telescope Sadako's fight with leukemia, "the atom-bomb disease," adding greater impact to her death. What was an epilogue in the novel is here an integral, if anticlimactic, part of the text due to the exceptional flow of the illustrations. Young's pastels vividly capture all the moods of the narrative, place, and characters. The use of light, most obvious as Sadako lays dying, is particularly noteworthy, as is the crane motif as a recurring symbol of hope. A masterful collaboration that will attract many new friends for Sadako.John Philbrook, San Francisco Public LibraryCopyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Ages 6-10. Rewriting her 1977 book Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes (1977) for a younger audience and using pastel illustrations first created for the award-winning videotape of the same name , this picture book tells the moving story of a young girl dying of leukemia as a result of the bombing of Hiroshima 10 years earlier. At the beginning of the book, Sadako is a healthy young runner, which makes her a more sympathetic character and her death all the more poignant. The girl's hope, seen in her folding paper origami-style into cranes (a symbol of long life), becomes the symbol of mankind's hope for peace. Coerr uses a quiet, unsentimental voice in her retelling, letting the content of the story speak for itself. And it does, powerfully. Young amplifies the story's vision with his impressionistic pastel artwork illustrating scene after scene with narrative simplicity and emotional depth. A remarkable, moving book. Carolyn Phelan

From Kirkus Reviews
Using soft-focus pastel images (created for a 1990 video) and a shortened text, Coerr's poignant story of Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes (1977) is recast in picture-book format. The author's abridgement omits transitional passages and details of Sadako's illness and rearranges events slightly, but the heart of her moving story is intact. Young's inexhaustible imagination creates images with dual meanings: the jacket closeup of Sadako's eyes is also a crane in flight and, in a series of small images on the first three pages, a mushroom cloud is transformed into a crane. A sensitive adaptation that makes a classic story accessible to a younger audience. (Biography/Picture book. 6-9) -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Card catalog description
Hospitalized with the dreaded atom bomb disease, leukemia, a child in Hiroshima races against time to fold one thousand paper cranes to verify the legend that by doing so a sick person will become healthy.


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Gr 2-6-This is the same story as the author's Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes (Putnam, 1977), told through an entirely new text. In this abbreviated version, the beautiful, limpid prose and crisp dialogue further telescope Sadako's fight with leukemia, ``the atom-bomb disease,'' adding greater impact to her death. What was an epilogue in the novel is here an integral, if anticlimactic, part of the text due to the exceptional flow of the illustrations. Young's pastels vividly capture all the moods of the narrative, place, and characters. The use of light, most obvious as Sadako lays dying, is particularly noteworthy, as is the crane motif as a recurring symbol of hope. A masterful collaboration that will attract many new friends for Sadako.-John Philbrook, San Francisco Public Library


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