Nursery Crimes

by Arthur Geisert

Jambo and Marva emigrated from France to Iowa and opened a small tree nursery.They and their piglets were skilled topiarists. Every autumn, they sculpted giant turkey topiaries, for which there was a big demand. One morning, Jambo awoke to discover all of their turkeys stolen! Things looked grim, but Marva had a plan. Glowing etchings fill the pages with dramatic images of giant turkey topiaries.

Genres: Picture Books, Thanksgiving, Childrens, Halloween, Holiday, Mystery, Fiction

32 pages, Hardcover

First published September 24, 2001

About the author

Arthur Geisert grew up in Los Angeles, California, and claims not to have seen a pig until he was an adult. Trained as a sculptor in college, Geisert learned to etch at the Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles. Geisert has published just about a book a year for the past thirty years. Every one of his books has been illustrated with etchings. His work has appeared in The New Yorker and The Horn Book Magazine. In 2010 his book Ice was selected as a New York Times Book Review Best Illustrated book of the year. Geisert currently lives in a converted bank building in Bernard, Iowa.

Reviews

[Shiloah · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fall holiday mystery for kids. Cute!

[Alex Hurst · Rating 5 out of 5]

Delightfully weird. There is something that feels just OFF about every phrase in this book. Details that kids wouldn’t pick up on that have nothing to do with the story. “Jambi and Marva also dealt in giant pumpkins and salvage to make ends meet.” HUH? Why their farm also a salvage yard? Why are the pigs from France? Why is their house so fantastical (and detailed and lovingly drawn)? Just about every page felt like the slightly stilted setup for a punchline that never arrived, or that relied on references that I didn’t pick up. But I think it’s just this story’s completely unique tone. I haven’t tried reading this to my kids and Indont know whether they’d like it at all, but I loved it.

[Kelly Warren · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was great at teaching problem solving and using a twist since the characters were from other nursery rhymes. It was a great mystery with tension building and stakes rising until the mystery was finally solved.

[Rachelle Kilgo · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have no idea what certain something this book has that makes me love it so much, but I read it almost every autumn either for Halloween or Thanksgiving. It always delights me.

[Kaitlyn Petkowski · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Nursery Crimes" by Arthur Geisert follows the story of a family of pigs. Each year, the family makes turkey shaped topiaries to sell to their neighbors. The family wakes up one morning to find that all of their hard work has been stolen. Without the income from the sales of the topiaries, the family will have a rough winter. The pigs must find who stole their hard work before Thanksgiving comes.

I chose this book because it was located in holiday section and labeled as halloween with pictures of pumpkins on the front. I was slightly disappointed when the story had nothing to do with Halloween, but the story and artwork made up for the mismarking. The colors have a lot of contrast making the pictures very pleasing to the eye. The story is simple enough for a child to understand, but descriptive enough to keep anyone entertained. The only thing I did not enjoy about the book was the amount of words that a young reader would not understand. If I was to read this in a class of younger children I would have to stop often to have the children use context clues to determine the meaning of the words. I would recommend this to older children for this reason.

[Eyehavenofilter · Rating 4 out of 5]

The pigs in this story won me over! They came from France and they are accomplished topiary artists! Can you imagine that? They also sell pumpkins on the side, at Halloween to keep a steady income of money coming in. But after clipping turkey topiary pine trees for Thanksgiving, they wake up the next day to find their trees have been stolen!
They follow footprints to the estate of Volpar ( a known thief ) but even with the help of the local Police they can't tell the trees apart. They head home empty handed.
They decide to take matters into their own little hooves clip more trees, and to stay up all night hiding in hallowed out pumpkins. But being exhausted they fall asleep, and those trees are stolen as well.
Who stole them this time... No one seems to know?
The little piggies were clever however, the trees they clipped this time 'round were leafed trees and without water the leaves turned within a day or two, and the culprit is easily caught! So who was it? You'll have to read the book to find out!

[Leanna · Rating 3 out of 5]

After finishing Jasper Fforde’s Nursery Crime Division novel, I couldn’t resist picking up Arthur Geisert’s picture book Nursery Crimes.

In this case, the word nursery refers to a place where plants grow. A couple, Jambo and Marva, moves from France to Iowa to start a tree nursery. Unfortunately for the couple, and their twelve children, someone keeps stealing their topiaries. Jambo and Marva fret over money and plot to catch the thieves.

The storyline is rather serious—particularly when the couple expresses money woes—but the illustrations save the book from absolute dreariness. Without the pictures, I would never have known that Jambo, Marva, and their children are pigs. I also wouldn’t know they live in a railroad station/school bus.

Despite the charming illustrations, and they are charming, the story just might cause both children and parents financial nightmares.

[Skylar Burris · Rating 3 out of 5]

We picked this up in the Halloween holiday book section of the library, but it's really more of a Thanksgiving book (despite the jack-o-lanterns on the front). It might serve well as a cross-over holiday book, to be read the first week of November. It is a rather random and strange tale of pigs (with strange names, no less) who cut trees into the shape of turkeys, only to fall prey to topiary thieves. I think I don't like having to say the word "topiary" so many times when reading a children's book.

[Heidi-Marie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think the best part of this book is its title. Still makes me smile. The book had its moments of humor, but I still was a bit "uh, ok" about the book overall. It's not bad. I think it was me. Perhaps because I had hopes that this would work in a storytime. I think the book may be for older readers, considering some of the humor might not be gotten and some of the details are really small.

[Taylor Troncin · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was read for Wesley’s summer reading club. Wesley is my (soon to be five year old) son. This review is what we used for his reading club.
***

This was not the story Wesley and I were expecting. It was still pretty cute though.
***

This book might also be a nice one for a sense of diversity.

[Paul Farbman · Rating 4 out of 5]

This story follows the nighttime theft of turkey shaped bushes and carved jack-o-lanterns from a family or topiarers.

The technique utilized in these illustrations is copperplate etchings. This involves drawing the pictures with a needle. This makes for very detailed and interesting illustrations. Lines grouped closely together often represent shadows, colors provide warmth.

[The Brothers · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting story about a family of pigs who are topiarists. They create turkey topiaries for the fall season, but they end up being stolen. They know who stole them, but they need some proof to have the thief brought to justice. The mom pig comes up with a good plan to capture the thieves.

Really neat, interesting illustrations.

[Libby · Rating 4 out of 5]

My 3 year old son asked me to read this over and over again. He was very curious about the concepts of "stealing", a "thief", and "jail"- which are brought up by this book. I would probably only give it 3 stars, but my son requested it sooo much that....

[N · Rating 4 out of 5]

A notorious topiary thief causes a family of farming pigs (of course it's a Geisert book)to defend their livelihood.

[louisa]

Whimsical, off children's book that makes me wonder about the pitch meeting. Loved more for the writing than the illustrations (copperplate etchings) though.

[Debbie Tanner · Rating 3 out of 5]

A mystery about topiary carving pigs. Short on clues and suspects. Not particularly wonderful.

[The Styling Librarian · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was NOT what I expected. Stealing topiary turkeys in a mystery setting, very interesting.

[Amy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Meh. Cheryl in CC NV's review says it all.

[The Reading Countess · Rating 2 out of 5]

Pig topiarists are robbed. Um, okay...

[Teri · Rating 4 out of 5]

My kids vote four stars.

[Becky · Rating 3 out of 5]

Clever title. Lame illustrations. Limited character and plot development.

[Elle · Rating 1 out of 5]

A fall seasonal book with Jack o' lanterns and a family of pigs that make topiaries shaped like turkeys. The story focuses on the theft of the topiaries but was drawn out and didn't hold my interest.

[Michael Fitzgerald · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not one of Geisert's best.

[Lindsay · Rating 2 out of 5]

A very strange book.

[Annie ⚜️ · Rating 5 out of 5]

My son loves this one and asks for it.

[R. G. Nairam]

A little all over the place.