Author: Gloria Jean Pinkney
Illustrator: Jerry Pinkney
Category: Book by Illustrator Jerry Pinkney
The Sunday Outing is the story of Ernestine, a young African-American girl living in Philadelphia and longing to ride the train down south to visit her mother’s family on a farm in North Carolina. The book ends as Ernestine boards the train and waves goodbye to her family, finally able to ride the train instead of just watching it. I liked the book because the language and dialogue seemed genuine. The exchanges between Ernestine and her Great-Aunt Odessa were simple, yet convincing. My husband and I took our seven-year-old son to ride a train in Stearns, Kentucky back over the summer. He absolutely loves trains. I thought of him as I read this book and observed Ernestine’s delight at the wonder of these amazing machines. “The Sunday Outing” refers to her trip with her great-aunt down to the train station just to watch the trains. Although the book doesn’t say it clearly, it is implied that these outings are a regular occurrence for Ernestine. She even turns down a Sunday afternoon of playing with her friends just to go watch the trains. When she finally gets the chance, Ernestine is anxious about traveling by herself. As I read, I remembered the first time I traveled by myself far from home without my parents or sister. It was 1991 and I was sixteen years old. I rode a bus to Orlando, Florida with a bunch of other teenagers for an event called Nazarene Youth Conference. I was much older than young Ernestine and I wasn’t traveling completely alone, but I was a little anxious nonetheless. The insight that I gained from this book is that the dialogue and language in a book should fit the situation or the story, rather than adhering to “proper” rules for language and grammar. Reading this book and Miracle’s Boys for a previous blog post made me realize how important the dialogue can be for setting the mood of a story or making the reader identify with the characters.
Jerry Pinkney has illustrated over one-hundred children’s books since the 1960’s. His other works include The Talking Eggs, The Patchwork Quilt, I Want to Be, The All-I-Ever-Want Christmas Doll, and The Lion and the Mouse. After looking at some of the other books Jerry Pinkney has illustrated, I can see that many of his books share a common African-American theme, including: Mirandy and Brother Wind, In For Winter Out For Spring, Tanya's Reunion, Goin' Someplace Special, Ain't Nobody a Stanger to Me, and The Moon Over Star. This book fits right into that category and is very similar to the titles just listed. The Sunday Outing is unique in that it is authored by his wife, Gloria Jean Pinkney. Other books by Jerry Pinkney illustrate familiar fairy tales or folk tales, including: Little Red Riding Hood, The Little Red Hen, Aesop's Fables, The Ugly Duckling, Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, and The Tales of Uncle Remus.
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