The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore

It would be a crime if my first review wasn't of the book that inspired the name of this blog.

Title: The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore
Author: William Joyce
Illustrations: William Joyce & Joe Bluhm
Published: Joyce, W. (2012). The fantastic flying books of Mr. Morris Lessmore. New York: Atheneum Books for Young Readers.
Themes: love, reading, loss, transformation, adventure

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This book was released after the short film of the same title won the Academy Award for Best Short Film. I'm seriously obsessed with this book right now. 

To say the least, it's beautiful. The pictures are breathtaking, the storyline is very "wizard of oz"-like (which I love!) and the character development is exquisite.

Classroom Ideas:
- Prediction / inference
- Similarities between the book and the film. The film is about 14 minutes and can be easily found on youtube. Prepare yourself.....have some kleenex on hand when you watch it; I bawled like a baby at the end. PS, it's a silent film (which makes it even better)!

- Have students write down any questions that they have on post-it notes when you watch the film or read the book
- This is a story that lends itself nicely to retelling (especially for older students)
- Create a character web for Morris Lessmore 
- There are some TERRFIC discussion questions found at this blog



Have you read the book? What other great ideas do you have for using this book in your classroom? I would LOVE to hear them!