Pearl's Passover
By Jane Breskin Zalben
Simon & Schuster, $16
ISBN 0689814879

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Celebrating timeless traditions

Pearl's Passover may look like another holiday picture book with a short, albeit charming, shelf life, but it truly is what the subtitle claims: A Family Celebration Through Stories, Recipes, Crafts and Songs. The key word is family: Pearl's and the reader's own.

As Pearl prepares to celebrate Passover, she is surrounded by family, even the annoying cousins who turn out to be not so annoying. Pearl's family pops up in each of the "interruptions" of her story, during the practical how-to's that explain an activity or recipe mentioned in the narrative. When her mother makes mandelbrodt, a recipe is included on the next page. When Pearl and her cousins make puppets, the instructions are close behind. These diversions occur every couple of pages or so, like Talmudic exegesis or a link from a Web site that takes us to a new window worth bookmarking. Keeping the instructions "in character" with added details about Pearl's family is a nice touch.

Seder-enhancing projects include a cup for Elijah and Miriam, a seder plate, place cards and a tea-stained Exodus map placemat. Illustrated lists of the plagues, the order of the seder and the infamous four questions (in English and Hebrew, but not transliterated) will come in handy before and during a seder. A glossary helps out with the Hebrew and Yiddish that may not be at the tip of everyone's tongue.

Pearl's Passover can be read aloud to children of any age. Jane Breskin Zalben's intricate illustrations will be pleasantly familiar to fans of her Beni series and other Pearl books. Photographs help make the activities look appealing and doable to kids and adults.

Also noteworthy is Zalben's impressive subtlety at removing all gendered references to God. This is a tricky enterprise at best, but she pulls it off so well that a reader would have to go looking for allusions in order to notice. The payoff is that Pearl's Passover is kosher for families at any level of religious observance.

Joanna Brichetto writes from Nashville.