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Start giftingBuilding Our House
This audiobook uses AI narration.
We’re taking steps to make sure AI narration is transparent.
Learn moreA New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice
Winner of the 2013 Boston Globe Horn Book Award for Best Picture Book
A Kirkus Reviews Best Book of 2013
A New York Times Book Review Notable Children's Book of 2013
In this unique construction book for kids who love tools and trucks, readers join a girl and her family as they pack up their old house in town and set out to build a new one in the country. Mom and Dad are going to make the new house themselves, from the ground up. From empty lot to finished home, every stage of their year-and-a-half-long building project is here. And at every step their lucky kids are watching and getting their hands dirty, in page after page brimming with machines, vehicles, and all kinds of house-making activities!
As he imagines it through the eyes of his older sister, Building Our House is Jonathan Bean's retelling of his own family's true experience, and includes an afterword with photographs from the author's collection.
JONATHAN BEAN received an M.F.A. from New York's School of Visual Arts and now lives in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. A two-time winner of the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, for At Night and Building Our House, he is also the illustrator of Big Snow, two picture books by Lauren Thompson, and Bad Bye, Good Bye by Deborah Underwood.
Matthew Brown has voiceover experience in many different areas, including commercials (national and regional), audiobooks, ESL, feature film ADR/looping and animated projects both feature film and television. His narration credits include Matthew Dicks’s Memoirs of an Imaginary Friend and Mary E. Pearson’s Fox series. He received a 2011 AudioFile Best Audiobook Award for Young Adult & Fantasy for his reading of The Adoration of Jenna Fox.
Reviews
“Children ages 3–10 who already like tools and diggers aren't the only ones who will respond to the warmth and optimism in these clear, detailed, gently color-washed pages.” —The Wall Street Journal
“Shot through with pioneer spirit . . . Bean's terrific illustrations show a loving family, living in a mobile home as they gather lumber and pour concrete . . . Children will enjoy the comforting solidity of shoring up foundations and sawing strong boards.” —The New York Times Book Review (Editors' Choice)
“* Raise the roof for this picture book. It's something special.” —Kirkus Reviews, starred review
“* Lovingly told, this captivating tale will help satisfy a child's curiosity of what it takes to create a building from scratch.” —School Library Journal, starred review
“* Bean creates an engaging story as well as a glimpse into a warm family setting.” —The Horn Book, starred review
“A warm look at the nuts and bolts of building a house and turning it into a home.” —Publishers Weekly
“Wonderfully detailed, often humorous.” —BCCB
“What's heartwarming throughout is the depiction of a tight-knit family (‘My family makes up a strong crew of four').” —Booklist
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