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$17.95 each

Author Tim Tingle, a member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, is a popular presenter at storytelling and folklore festivals across America. 
Tingle was featured at the 2002 National Storytelling Festival. 

 

Crossing Bok Chitto
8 1/2" x 11" Hardback with Jacket Cover

This 40 page book contains 18 full-spread color works of art by Jeanne,
beautifully illustrating this wonderfully touching story.

Each book is autographed and dated by the Artist.

**Starred Review**
Quoted from Publisher's Weekly, March 13, 2006 issue

"Bridges, a Cherokee artist making her children's book debut, joins Tingle (Walking the Choctaw Road) in a moving wholly original story about the intersection of cultures.  The river Bok Chitto divides the Choctaw Nation from the plantations of Mississippi.  "If a slave escaped and made his way across Bok Chitto, the slave was free," writes Tingle.  "The slave owner could not follow.  That was the law."  But Bok Chitto holds a secret:  a rock pathway that lies just below the surface of the water.  "Only the Choctaws knew it was there, for the Choctaws had
built it," Tingle explains.  When a slave boy and his family are befriended by a Choctaw girl, the pathway becomes part of the ingenious plan that enables the slaves to cross the river to freedom - in plain view of a band of slave hunters during a full moon. 

Bridges creates mural-like paintings with a rock-solid spirituality and stripped-down graphic sensibility, the ideal match for the down-to-earth cadences and poetic drama of the text.  Many of the illustrations serve essentially as portraits, and they're utterly mesmerizing - strong, solid figures gazing squarely out of the frame, beseeching readers to listen, empathize and wonder.

List of Major Awards

Five Civilized Tribes Museum, Muskogee, Oklahoma
Exhibit of Originals & Sketches, August 2009
Tennessee Volunteer State Award Master List 2010-11
Exhibit of all the Book Original Paintings & Sketches
at the Museum of Art, Fort Wayne, Indiana 2009
American Indian Library Association, 2008 Picture Book Award
Texas Blue Bonnet Master Award List 2008-2009
Oklahoma Sequoyah Masterlist 2009
Arkansas Diamond Award List 2008-09
South Dakota Prairie Pasque Children's Book Award 2008
2007 Jane Addams Peace Award Honor Book
2007 American Library Association Notable Children's Book - Caldecott Competition
2007 Oklahoma Children's Book of the Year
Jeanne Rorex Bridges - Oklahoma Illustrator of 2007
2007 Paterson Prize - Children's Book Award
2007 Skipping Stone Honor Book
2007 Anne Izard's Storytellers' Choice Award
2007 American Indians in Children's Literature Award
2006 Teddy Award - Texas Writer's League
2006 Children's Book - Texas Institute of Letters
Plus Many Enthusiastic Reviews
in several Publications and Lists, including
Publisher's Weekly & The New York Times