Have you heard the one about Grandpa walking through three feet of snow—uphill both ways—just to get home when he was a kid? Well, you haven't heard it like this! During one sudden and relentless blizzard, lively Walt gets stuck for days in a barn by himself. "Awful!" Meanwhile, shy Fred is trapped in an inn full of people. "Horrible!" They both have to dig their way out. "The worst." "You said it." What a terrible storm! But what a terrific —and funny—story! Kindergarten-Grade 3—From their creaky front-porch rocking chairs, Walt (a social butterfly) and Fred (his polar opposite) recall New England's Great Blizzard of 1888, when they were young men. "Eh-yah, didn't think it would amount to much," muses Fred. But it did, and caught both of them unhappily by surprise: shy Fred found himself stuck in a lively, crowded tavern in town, while Walt was forced to take cover alone in his barn. When the snow eventually stopped, and they could finally dig themselves out, the two friends passed each other on the road-one desperate to get out of the bustling pub, the other equally desperate to get in. Schindler's ink-and-watercolor art captures the rolling, leafless, brown-and-gray landscape of Massachusetts in March, and then buries it in dense white snow. The art is infused with period details, from delivering milk in a horse-drawn cart to dinners lit by candlelight. Hurst's call-and-response narrative approach, consisting solely of the old men's terse dialogue, works well with the page layout and captures the rhythms of a story told, back and forth, many times over. A first choice for large collections, and a good supplemental purchase for all others.— Catherine Threadgill, Charleston County Public Library, SC Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. *Starred Review* "My grandfathers grew up in the hills around Westfield, Massachusetts, and were friends from the time they were boys." Then personable Grandpa Walt and shy Grandpa Fred, now old men, take over the narrative, recounting the story of the big snow of 1888. At this point, Schindler's sharp, sly art cuts the pages in half, and, telling the tale in tandem, each man describes what happened that day. Walt was chopping wood, and Fred was delivering milk when the storm began. The well-wrought pictures show the snow flying progressively harder across several spreads until the men finally find shelter in the worst place possible given each man's personality--Walt in a lonely barn, and Fred with a houseful of neighbors. The same terse text sometimes relates to both the top and the bottom picture on each page; "Not much of a place to sleep" refers to Walt sleeping on a haystack covered by cats as well as Fred sleeping with a bunch of people who are scattered all over the bedroom. Humor is everywhere, but the funniest pictures show the men shoveling out of the snow, passing one another through the drifts. This lively, clever story, based on a real storm, neatly captures both the oddities of nature and how differing natures view the same event. Ilene Cooper Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved Have you heard the one about Grandpa walking through three feet of snow—uphill both ways—just to get home when he was a kid? Well, you haven't heard it like this! During one sudden and relentless blizzard, lively Walt gets stuck for days in a barn by himself. "Awful!" Meanwhile, shy Fred is trapped in an inn full of people. "Horrible!" They both have to dig their way out. "The worst." "You said it." What a terrible storm! But what a terrific —and funny—story! Carol Otis Hurst is a storyteller, teacher, children's book critic, and columnist for Teaching K-8 Magazine . She is the author of the Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Book Rocks in His Head . S. D. Schindler is the popular illustrator of many bestselling picture books, including How Santa Got His Job , Big Pumpkin , the Math Start title Betcha! , and the 2005 Newbery Honor Book Whittington . S. D. Schindler lives in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.