A story based on a real incident involving Judy's daughter. Emma has an imagination that won't quit, and when she has to prepare a report about Viking explorer Erik the Red, she's off and running on a voyage of discovery. The more she learns, the more seeps into her journal and her everyday life she makes a Viking helmet from tinfoil, hands her brother a painted stone and renames herself Emma the Red. After the librarian shows her a newspaper ad for a 29-foot Viking ship ($7000 or best offer), Emma and her brother write to the owner proposing to pay $128, two baseball cards and a fox tooth. No one believes her when she announces she's getting a Viking ship for her birthday, but in fact it's exactly what happens, and the Viking ship arrives in her backyard along with a TV news crew and all of Emma's classmates dressed as Vikings. "See, Ollie," Emma tells her brother. "Dreams do come true." Schachner artfully crowds the slightly oversize pages with detail. Warmly realistic family scenes coexist with Emma's energetic fantasies.

Download a video from tv news crew
(Quicktime 2.5 mb) (RealMedia 1.5 mb)

Download article from Philadelphia Inquirer online
(Adobe Acrobat 102k)

Expressive and bursting with life...This buoyant book will likely launch readers on adventures of their own.

Publishers Weekly (starred)

The illustrations are lucious and rich, overflowing with humor, detail and drama, warranting prolonged and repeated stare-sessions. Schachner has consistently produced truly outstanding work and deserves more recognition in the field as a contributor of remarkable children's literature.

Madame Esme's Recommendations
www.planetesme.com

Beautifully written and rendered, Yo Vikings has the great virtue of celebrating things worth celebrating, Vikings, reading, imagination and intellectual passion.

Kenny Brechner
www.ddgbooks.com

2002 Chapman Awards for Best Classroom Read-Alouds http://www.planetesme.com/chapman.html