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Flying Patchwork Quilt
Carl is told to keep his eye on his sister, Ellen. Ellen thinks she can fly, but needs a little help. Carl finds an old patchwork quilt for Ellen to use as a cape. Soon Carl realizes he has lost Ellen in the skies.
Hardcover
First published January 1, 1965
9 people want to read
About the author
Barbara Brenner
104 books12 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.
Barbara Brenner is a respected, award-winning author, specializing in works of both juvenile fiction and nonfiction educational material that deals with animals, nature, and ecology. Her interests range from the natural world (i.e. Thinking about Ants) to American history (e.g. Wagon Wheels), all of which are reflected in the wide scope of her work. Brenner discussed with Contemporary Authors Online her influences and how they have affected her literary career, concluding that “all the circumstances of my life conspired to make me a writer--just lucky, I guess.”
Brenner was born Barbara Lawrence on June 26, 1925, in Brooklyn, New York, to Robert Lawrence (a real estate broker) and Marguerite (Furboter) Johnes. Tragically, her mother died when Brenner was just a year old, and, according to Brenner, this has been a large influence on her career, with Contemporary Authors Online showing how this has added a certain level of “sensitivity” to her work. She also defines Brooklyn as a place which gave much “color” to her work, and where her father’s ambitions for her helped to develop Brenner’s intellectual curiosity.
Brenner attended Seton Hall College (now University) and Rutgers University from 1942-46, whilst also working as a copy editor at Prudential Insurance Co. from 1942 – 46. Her freelance work as an artist’s agent prepared her for a literary life, as after the birth of her two children she began work on her first book Somebody’s Slippers, Somebody’s Shoes, published in 1957. She followed this book with an educational picture book entitled Barto Takes the Subway, designed to improve reading comprehension and sight vocabulary.
Her artistic development continued when she began to collaborate with her husband, illustrator Fred Brenner, on The Flying Patchwork Quilt. Her next book, On the Frontier with Mr. Audubon, was selected by School Library Journal as “The Best of the Best” among children’s books published over 26 seasons. In a review of On the Frontier with Mr. Audubon, Paul Showers wrote in the New York Times Book Review that “Brenner again demonstrates her gift for invention and respect for facts . . . [it is] written in the polite but colloquial language of the frontier sketching in Audubon’s biographical background and recording events of the journey as they might have been observed by a serious, very perceptive 13- year-old.” One of her best-selling titles was Wagon Wheels (published in 1978), which deals with the trials and tribulations of a close-knit African American family. This true to life story is “exciting and realistic” according to Gisela Jernigan (writing in the children literature journal Booklist), and was named a 1978 American Library Association Notable Book.
Throughout the ‘80s and ‘90s Brenner continued to publish, many of her works being influenced by the careers and interests of her sons. Speaking to Contemporary Authors Online Brenner explains that as their sons are both grown, and their respective careers as a “biologist . . . and musician” have both had an influence on her writing (i.e. Dinosaurium 1993). In 1986, Brenner was honored with the Pennsylvania School Librarians’ Association’s Outstanding Pennsylvania Author Award. Brenner’s most celebrated book is a collection entitled Voices: Poetry and Art from around the World, for which she was chief editor. This book received an ALA Notable Book for Children mention and an ALA Best Book for Young Adults award. According to the Horn Book Guide from Spring 2001, “more than three hundred and fifty poems from six continents evoke the specific and the universal” with contributions from both “celebrated and unknown poets, Nobel prize winners, and children” allowing the book to demonstrate Brenner’s skill in celebrating “place” and the “shared feelings” of the people about whom the book is written.
Barbara Brenner is a respected, award-winning author, specializing in works of both juvenile fiction and nonfiction educational material that deals with animals, nature, and ecology. Her interests range from the natural world (i.e. Thinking about Ants) to American history (e.g. Wagon Wheels), all of which are reflected in the wide scope of her work. Brenner discussed with Contemporary Authors Online her influences and how they have affected her literary career, concluding that “all the circumstances of my life conspired to make me a writer--just lucky, I guess.”
Brenner was born Barbara Lawrence on June 26, 1925, in Brooklyn, New York, to Robert Lawrence (a real estate broker) and Marguerite (Furboter) Johnes. Tragically, her mother died when Brenner was just a year old, and, according to Brenner, this has been a large influence on her career, with Contemporary Authors Online showing how this has added a certain level of “sensitivity” to her work. She also defines Brooklyn as a place which gave much “color” to her work, and where her father’s ambitions for her helped to develop Brenner’s intellectual curiosity.
Brenner attended Seton Hall College (now University) and Rutgers University from 1942-46, whilst also working as a copy editor at Prudential Insurance Co. from 1942 – 46. Her freelance work as an artist’s agent prepared her for a literary life, as after the birth of her two children she began work on her first book Somebody’s Slippers, Somebody’s Shoes, published in 1957. She followed this book with an educational picture book entitled Barto Takes the Subway, designed to improve reading comprehension and sight vocabulary.
Her artistic development continued when she began to collaborate with her husband, illustrator Fred Brenner, on The Flying Patchwork Quilt. Her next book, On the Frontier with Mr. Audubon, was selected by School Library Journal as “The Best of the Best” among children’s books published over 26 seasons. In a review of On the Frontier with Mr. Audubon, Paul Showers wrote in the New York Times Book Review that “Brenner again demonstrates her gift for invention and respect for facts . . . [it is] written in the polite but colloquial language of the frontier sketching in Audubon’s biographical background and recording events of the journey as they might have been observed by a serious, very perceptive 13- year-old.” One of her best-selling titles was Wagon Wheels (published in 1978), which deals with the trials and tribulations of a close-knit African American family. This true to life story is “exciting and realistic” according to Gisela Jernigan (writing in the children literature journal Booklist), and was named a 1978 American Library Association Notable Book.
Throughout the ‘80s and ‘90s Brenner continued to publish, many of her works being influenced by the careers and interests of her sons. Speaking to Contemporary Authors Online Brenner explains that as their sons are both grown, and their respective careers as a “biologist . . . and musician” have both had an influence on her writing (i.e. Dinosaurium 1993). In 1986, Brenner was honored with the Pennsylvania School Librarians’ Association’s Outstanding Pennsylvania Author Award. Brenner’s most celebrated book is a collection entitled Voices: Poetry and Art from around the World, for which she was chief editor. This book received an ALA Notable Book for Children mention and an ALA Best Book for Young Adults award. According to the Horn Book Guide from Spring 2001, “more than three hundred and fifty poems from six continents evoke the specific and the universal” with contributions from both “celebrated and unknown poets, Nobel prize winners, and children” allowing the book to demonstrate Brenner’s skill in celebrating “place” and the “shared feelings” of the people about whom the book is written.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
March 25, 2024
Found this book yesterday while unpacking things. Oh my goodness; I LOVED this silly story as a kid. I remember my brother and I tying on "capes" trying to fly. I was going to get rid of this book until I read it again. It's a keeper!
October 17, 2014
Have you ever read 'Uncle Shelby's ABZ Book'? If not, I highly recommend doing so, as it is a hilarious satire of children's alphabet books. In that book, under the heading for the letter 'O', the narrator asks if the child reading this book would like to go to the magical land of Oz and have an amazing magical adventure there. It concludes by flatly saying, "Well, you can't. Maybe someday you can go to Detroit."
This is the actual, non-satirical children's book version of that. If you're worried about encountering spoilers for a fifty year-old children's book, read no further, but take my advice and do not give this to a child that you love. Save it for one whose dreams you want to crush.
My mother gave this to me to read when I was a kid; she gave me many books and encouraged my love of reading, so I will not hold this single incident against her. I'm not certain what lesson Mrs. Brenner intended to pass along to kids reading this, but I can tell you what messages it left with me, which I still recall with a sting of resentment some thirty-odd years later: having a younger sibling is the worst, because they will misbehave, get you into trouble, and steal everything worth having from you, and being "the good one" will not prevent this from happening. While that is certainly the perception of many older siblings in real life, it wasn't completely true, and I am glad to have had both an older brother and a younger sister. I regret the things I did to them when I was being a rotten kid, and we enjoy good relationships with each other as adults. What I'm saying here is that while focusing on that childish fear is a good way to enter a children's story, because kids can identify with that, it is not the note on which you want to *end* your story.
In 'The Flying Patchwork Quilt,' the protagonist, Carl, has a younger sister, Ellen, who is five and is, in his words, "always going through a stage." She's your average five year-old child. Carl is responsible and well-behaved, relatively mature for his age. His flaw seems to be that he disapproves of the goofiness that his sister gets up to, which currently is trying to fly by any means possible. Carl is left in charge of his sister while their mother's away shopping, and Ellen gets into an old chest, pulling out their mother's antique quilt. Carl tells her not to - "That's Mother's!" - but after she begs his indulgence, he reluctantly agrees to let her use it as a cape for one flying attempt and then put it away.
Here's where the storybook magic enters in: it actually works! The dream of every little kid imagining themselves as a superhero comes true - wear the quilt like a cape, and you can fly. But Ellen doesn't know how to control it, and begins to panic as she flies away. Carl races across town to rescue his little sister. Along the way, he encounters adults that he considers asking for help, but decides against it because he knows they'd never believe him. Eventually, he loses sight of his sister and, defeated and hopeless, returns home. He knows no one will believe him, and wonders if even the police would listen. As he's about to break the terrible news to his mother that he's lost his sister, Ellen miraculously returns. Carl and Ellen put the quilt back into the chest, deciding to keep its power a secret.
But, like any kid in his right mind, Carl imagines all of the cool things he could do with a flying quilt. He sneaks out, gets the quilt out of the chest, and prepares to pin it on himself and begin his wonderful, magical flying adventures!
Unfortunately, our author apparently thought this was far too great a reward for the normally stolid, responsible Carl, so the quilt flies out the window and disappears before he can put it on.
Sorry, kid. Maybe someday you can go to Detroit.
Now, to be fair to Mrs. Brenner, I note upon an adult re-reading of this book that there is a coda in which Carl and Ellen's mother buys an old rug, and there is a suggestion that maybe, just *maybe,* it might be able to fly, too. The book ends with an illustration of a Persian rug in the air. Is it flying, or just being carried along on a particularly strong wind after being hurled out of the window? Is it real, or is it the possibility that Carl is imagining? No one is depicted as actually riding on the carpet. The image is very much dependent on the reader's interpretation of it. Was this ending meant to convey that Carl has been too uptight and unimaginative all this time, and now is freed to imagine magical possibilities around every corner? I don't know. All I know is that, as an adult thirty years later, I forgot that this last part was even there, but I could keenly recount the unfairness of losing something magical and amazing and a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to someone who doesn't fully appreciate it or to random, cruel luck.
I give this book one star, and that is earned solely on the strength of the artwork. I'm not sure if I read a later edition of the book, because I don't recognize the cover pictured here and the internal artwork of my copy looked as though it was drawn in the 70s or the 80s. The illustrations are quite lovely, and despite their age, they don't really look dated; I would have no problem presenting this book to a kid nowadays. If I didn't like them. Sadly, the artwork is in service of a story that seems to hate children who have dreams of wonder. It would be bad enough if it were just discouraging children from dreaming of magical things happening to them. This book goes the extra mile and offers them the promise of their dreams coming true, before yanking the rug - or the quilt - out from under them. That takes malice.
This is the actual, non-satirical children's book version of that. If you're worried about encountering spoilers for a fifty year-old children's book, read no further, but take my advice and do not give this to a child that you love. Save it for one whose dreams you want to crush.
My mother gave this to me to read when I was a kid; she gave me many books and encouraged my love of reading, so I will not hold this single incident against her. I'm not certain what lesson Mrs. Brenner intended to pass along to kids reading this, but I can tell you what messages it left with me, which I still recall with a sting of resentment some thirty-odd years later: having a younger sibling is the worst, because they will misbehave, get you into trouble, and steal everything worth having from you, and being "the good one" will not prevent this from happening. While that is certainly the perception of many older siblings in real life, it wasn't completely true, and I am glad to have had both an older brother and a younger sister. I regret the things I did to them when I was being a rotten kid, and we enjoy good relationships with each other as adults. What I'm saying here is that while focusing on that childish fear is a good way to enter a children's story, because kids can identify with that, it is not the note on which you want to *end* your story.
In 'The Flying Patchwork Quilt,' the protagonist, Carl, has a younger sister, Ellen, who is five and is, in his words, "always going through a stage." She's your average five year-old child. Carl is responsible and well-behaved, relatively mature for his age. His flaw seems to be that he disapproves of the goofiness that his sister gets up to, which currently is trying to fly by any means possible. Carl is left in charge of his sister while their mother's away shopping, and Ellen gets into an old chest, pulling out their mother's antique quilt. Carl tells her not to - "That's Mother's!" - but after she begs his indulgence, he reluctantly agrees to let her use it as a cape for one flying attempt and then put it away.
Here's where the storybook magic enters in: it actually works! The dream of every little kid imagining themselves as a superhero comes true - wear the quilt like a cape, and you can fly. But Ellen doesn't know how to control it, and begins to panic as she flies away. Carl races across town to rescue his little sister. Along the way, he encounters adults that he considers asking for help, but decides against it because he knows they'd never believe him. Eventually, he loses sight of his sister and, defeated and hopeless, returns home. He knows no one will believe him, and wonders if even the police would listen. As he's about to break the terrible news to his mother that he's lost his sister, Ellen miraculously returns. Carl and Ellen put the quilt back into the chest, deciding to keep its power a secret.
But, like any kid in his right mind, Carl imagines all of the cool things he could do with a flying quilt. He sneaks out, gets the quilt out of the chest, and prepares to pin it on himself and begin his wonderful, magical flying adventures!
Unfortunately, our author apparently thought this was far too great a reward for the normally stolid, responsible Carl, so the quilt flies out the window and disappears before he can put it on.
Sorry, kid. Maybe someday you can go to Detroit.
Now, to be fair to Mrs. Brenner, I note upon an adult re-reading of this book that there is a coda in which Carl and Ellen's mother buys an old rug, and there is a suggestion that maybe, just *maybe,* it might be able to fly, too. The book ends with an illustration of a Persian rug in the air. Is it flying, or just being carried along on a particularly strong wind after being hurled out of the window? Is it real, or is it the possibility that Carl is imagining? No one is depicted as actually riding on the carpet. The image is very much dependent on the reader's interpretation of it. Was this ending meant to convey that Carl has been too uptight and unimaginative all this time, and now is freed to imagine magical possibilities around every corner? I don't know. All I know is that, as an adult thirty years later, I forgot that this last part was even there, but I could keenly recount the unfairness of losing something magical and amazing and a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to someone who doesn't fully appreciate it or to random, cruel luck.
I give this book one star, and that is earned solely on the strength of the artwork. I'm not sure if I read a later edition of the book, because I don't recognize the cover pictured here and the internal artwork of my copy looked as though it was drawn in the 70s or the 80s. The illustrations are quite lovely, and despite their age, they don't really look dated; I would have no problem presenting this book to a kid nowadays. If I didn't like them. Sadly, the artwork is in service of a story that seems to hate children who have dreams of wonder. It would be bad enough if it were just discouraging children from dreaming of magical things happening to them. This book goes the extra mile and offers them the promise of their dreams coming true, before yanking the rug - or the quilt - out from under them. That takes malice.
June 25, 2012
I used to think I could fly, but I was 40 at the time. In my dreams my mother didn't believe me either!
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews