ryan o’rourke

#52 in an ongoing series of posts celebrating the alphabet.

Tear the ticket.
Load the freight.
Sound the whistle.
Raise the gate.

Clank! Chug-chug! Whoosh!

Alphabet trains.

All Aboard, Letter-lovin’ Railroad Buffs!

Author Samantha R. Vamos is here to tell us all about her clickety-clack-cool new rhyming picture book Alphabet Trains (Charlesbridge, 2015)!

Not too long ago, we had so much fun cruising and vrooming through Alphabet Trucks (Charlesbridge, 2013), that we were pretty excited when this shiny new book hit the rails.

Since I’m especially fond of trains (blame it on the Beatles’ “A Hard Day’s Night” and the fact that I met my husband in London while he was designing a railroad in Algeria), I was anxious to ask Samantha a few questions about writing and researching this 26-track gem.

A is for Auto Train,
Load your car on the rack.

B is for bullet train —
high speed on welded track.

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#48 in an ongoing series of posts celebrating the alphabet

Look what just zoomed in — a spiffy convoy of hardworking trucks all featured in a brand new picture book by Samantha R. Vamos and Ryan O’Rourke!

Start the engines.
Lift and load.
Shift the gears and
hit the road.

Vroom! Rumble! Zoom!
Alphabet Trucks.

Maybe you’re already wondering: could there actually be a different kind of truck for each letter of the alphabet? What about Q, V, X, and Z? We all know how much they love to cause trouble.

Relax. Clever Samantha has got those rascals covered, and along with the familiar pickup truck, tow truck, and cement mixer, she throws in quite a few less commonly known vehicles to keep things interesting: knuckle-boom truck, lowboy, winch truck.

A is for apple truck,
carting produce to the store.

B is for box truck,
with a rolling rear door.

They’re all described in jaunty rhyming couplets that explain each truck’s job, while O’Rourke’s crackerjack retro-style illustrations show the trucks in action, two per double page spread. Young readers will enjoy studying each scene, especially because the upper and lower case letters take on a life of their own — sitting in apple trees, bouncing along the street, being picked up by a crane or carried by movers one by one.

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