Where The Mountain Meets The Moon by Grace Lin

1.  Bibliography
Lin, Grace.  2009.  WHERE THE MOUNTAIN MEETS THE MOON.  New York:  Little Brown And Company Books For Young Readers.  ISBN 9780316114271

2.  Plot Summary
Minli spends everyday working besides her parents in the rice fields.  Their village is in the valley of fruitless mountain.  Every night her dad tells her stories about the Jade Dragon and the Old Man In the Moon.  "What kept Minli from becoming dull and brown like the rest of the village were the stories her father told her every night at dinner" (3).  Minli decides to go on a journey to find the Old Man in the Moon to bring prosperity back to her village.  She wants her family to be wealthy and not to have to work so hard. 

3.  Critical Analysis
The book is full of beautiful illustrations that are symbols of the Asian culture.  Each chapter begins with a picture in a single color.  The first chapter shows the young girl Minli skipping with flowers.  The rest of the book contains single illustrations that are in different chapters of the story and are also in color.  The facial features and hair color of the characters are Asian.  The clothing in the story is the traditional dress of the Asian people.  The environment where the story take place is in the Asian countryside, villages, and palaces.  The architecture of the building in the illustrations are filled with symbols and colors that are traditional to the Asian culture. 

The text of the story is also full of Asian cultural markers.  The characters in the story have Asian names for example Minli, Ma, Ba, A-gong, and Green Tiger.  These are only a few of the characters that have Asian names.  There are no physical descriptions of the characters to link them to their culture.  The language patterns, dialect of the language, and forms of address link the book to the Asian culture.  Ma and Ba are what the young girl calls her parents.  The food in the book gives away the culture.  The characters drink tea and eat a lot of white rice with chopsticks. The text is full of cultural markers.

This story is full of Asian cultural markers.  There is no presence of the American culture.  The identification of the Asian culture is very clear in the illustrations and the text of this book.

4.  Review Excerpts
SCHOOL LIBRARY JOURNAL starred review:  "The author's writing is elegant, and her full-color illustrations are stunning. Minli's determination to help her family, as well as the grief her parents feel at her absence, is compelling and thoroughly human."
BOOKLIST:  "*Starred Review* In this enchanted and enchanting adventure, Minli, whose name means “quick thinking,” lives with her desperately poor parents at the confluence of Fruitless Mountain and the Jade River. While her mother worries and complains about their lot, her father brightens their evenings with storytelling."
Newberry Honor Book

5.  Connections
Story to have children read when they are learning about Asian folklore and legends.
Other stories about Chinese folklore:
Chin, Oliver and Jennifer Wood.  THE YEAR OF THE DRAGON:  TALES FROM THE CHINESE ZODIAC.  ISBN 9781597020282
Wu, Faye-Lynn.  CHINESE AND ENGLISH NURSERY RHYMES:  SHARE AND SING IN TWO LANGUAGES.  ISBN 9780804840941
Yu, Mingmei.  CHINESE CHILDREN'S FAVORITE STORIES.  ISBN 9780804835893