Renne Benoit
Renné Benoit is living her childhood dream of being an artist. Trained in graphic design, she is the award-winning illustrator of more than 15 books for children. Her awards include the Ruth and Sylvia Schwartz Award for Children's Literature for Proud as a Peacock, Brave as a Lion; the OLA Silver Birch Express Award for The Secret of the Village Fool; and the Christie Harris Illustrated Children's Literature Prize for both Fraser Bear and Goodbye to Griffith Street. The latter was also nominated for the Amelia Frances Howard Gibbon Award. Big City Bees was nominated for the Governor General's Literary Award for Children's Illustration, and A Year of Borrowed Men was a finalist for the TD Canadian Children’s Literature Award, among others. Renné lives in St. Thomas, Ontario.

I was seven when the French prisoners of war arrived at our house. It was 1944. Mummy told us the government had sent them because all our men were gone to war, and someone needed to keep the farms running. She said we were just borrowing the French men. When the war was over, we would give them back.

Time to bake! Put on an apron. Here are a big bowl and measuring cups and spoons.



Clean Sweep! Frank Zamboni's Ice Machine

Clean Sweep! Frank Zamboni's Ice Machine





John stood up and stepped away. There, in the snow, lay an angel. Three paces away, he stepped a small circle in the snow and made a star. John smiled. He'd done it. An angel for Mrs. Wright and a star for her little black dog, Queenie.


Tonight the moon shines like a polished pearl, round and fat. It glows bigger and brighter than I have ever seen.
Tonight is a special night.
Tonight I am allowed to stay up late. Soon there will be mooncakes to eat, sweet and chewy. They are round like the moon. They make a circle for me and Mama and Baba. They make a circle for my family.
Outside we light paper lanterns. I made one all by myself using my favorite colors. The lanterns and stars light up the sky. The moon makes everything shine like silver and water.


Proud as a Peacock, Brave as a Lion




