Sister Tricksters, Rollicking Tales of Clever Females by Robert D.San Souci, hardcover (August House) Suggested for middle school readers (ages 12-14) but stories can be read to younger ages.
Award winning author of 65 picture books and story collections, Robert D. San Souci has written a collection of trickster tales to show that the ‘fairer sex’ can be just as clever and resourceful as their male counterparts.
San Souci’s “tricky” gals include Molly Cottontail, Miz Goose, Sis’Duck and Miz Gransshopper. These eight delightful and fun stories will capture the reader or the story-listener. I can just envision a good storyteller using a lot of gestures and body language and voices to make these stories come alive.
The stories are long, but probably when told by the storyteller, the events will happen much quicker to keep the audience as enchanted as I was reading them. There is lots of humorous dialogue and rhyming phrases to keep the listener involved. I loved the southern dialect Mr. San Souci uses for his characters to talk. The storyteller who learns one or more of the stories will really get to play with the characters.
In one story, Miz Goose has Mistah Bear sitting on a nest of pumpkins because she told him he could hatch his own family. You know there’s going to be trouble when he finds out!!
Besides Mistah Bear, there is Mistah Slickery Sly- fox and Mistah Hare to play tricks on.
Virginia Hamilton, storyteller, author, folklorist, believes “that the animal tricksters were invented by communities to perform outlandish tricks. San Souci’s retelling of these folktales will bring them back for generations of new listeners and readers.”
I’ve used the Azden WMS-PRO Wireless Microphone System for more than one year now. I am overall very satisfied. I’ve used it almost exclusively to record audio for my Sony video camera. These videos either become casual demo videos for my work or I take the audio from the tapes to use for podcasts. The audio quality has been so high that I am able to use some recordings for future CD projects of storytelling and spoken word performances. I have high standards for my CD productions, so I was more than surprised to find such a high quality in this wireless system. I have also used the system to record onto my Video Ipod (via a separate-purchase plug in microphone attachment) where situations did not lend themselves to using a video camera.
Battery life seems to be good. I do, as a matter of caution, put new 9v batteries in the mic and receiver whenever I am working on a project that is important. I’ve never had a dead battery during a performance, so we’ve managed to eke out at least three hours from a standard 9v battery set. I use the batteries I’ve taken out for other low-power 9v items and I am surprised how much power is left in them. I know that’s not very technical, but this process of replacing batteries has played well for me and I have no concerns about the battery life for this Azden system.
Initially, due to the light plastic construction, I thought that these mics were just "toys." I resisted the urge to send them back to Amazon immediately and I am glad that I gave them a chance to work for me. The set has proven to be very durable after having crossed the USA in my carry on bags dozens of times. I’d buy them again if I needed an additional set. They moved from my "quick, cheap fix until I can get expensive mics" to my everyday sound system for my work. I can’ t remember the last time I used just the video camera microphone for anything other than recording my children playing with the dogs.
The only problem I’ve ever had was using this set in a very large high-school auditorium. The sound cut out a few times, but only for a moment. The camera was at the farthest point possible from my place on the stage behind some 700 people. I have used the set in a similar situation with fewer bodies in the audience, so I am ready to believe that the number of people insulated the frequency for this particular event. I also noticed that the sound cut out when I turned quickly up stage or down stage. In those events where I have little movement, there has never been any sound loss at all.
I’d suggest this system to anyone who might want to try out the "next step" from their current on-camera microphone.
