Ms. April & Ms. Mae (A Fable)

Ms April & Ms Mae is a finalist for Foreword Magazine’s 2009 Book of the Year.

Lively, charming art illuminates this zesty modern fable. Ms. April loves her field and forest, pond and hill. When widespread land development forces animals from their rural homes, Ms. April invites them to live safe and protected on her land.  With Ms. Mae, a resourceful fox (and her closest friend), she shelters the animals until the day she falls ill and greedy enemies seize the moment to invade her land, bulldozers poised. At this moment of peril, Ms. Mae steps in to match wits with their adversaries.

In this book, Karen Dugan asks: "What would an intelligent animal do if her relatives and their homes were threatened? As human beings, we’d call the police, go to court, or fight a war. But in these pages I suggest another way. I am talking about the possibility of civility to all, of walking as gently as possible upon this earth."

Karen Dugan speaks to the kinship of beings and the need for a secure home for all creatures.

Karen Dugan, author and artist, has published twenty previous books, many of them prizewinners (Reading Rainbow selection winner; Skipping Stone Honor Award; Winner, Scientific American Young Reader’s Book Awards—Multicultural; Winner, International Reading Association; and Honor, Notable Children’s Book of the Year). Her most recent title is Mazes & Labyrinths (Lankford / HarperCollins, 2007). A graduate of the Parsons School of Design, she lives a rural life in North Attleboro, Massachusetts.