The House Baba Built ─ An Artist's Childhood in China

I knew nothing could happen to us within those walls, in the house Baba built.

In Ed Young's childhood home in Shanghai, all was not as it seemed: a rocking chair became a horse; a roof became a roller rink; an empty swimming pool became a place for riding scooters and bikes. The house his father built transformed as needed into a place to play hide-and-seek, to eat bamboo shoots, and to be safe.

For outside the home's walls, China was at war. Soon the house held not only Ed and his four siblings but also friends, relatives, and even strangers who became family. The war grew closer, and Ed watched as planes flew overhead and frends joined the Chinese air force. But through it all, Ed's childhood remained full of joy and imagination.

This powerful, poignant, and exquisitely illustrated memoir is the story of one of our most beloved children's illustrators and the house his baba built.

Caldecott Medalist Ed Young is the illustrator of more than eighty books for children, seventeen of which he has also written. Born in Tientsin, China, he grew up in Shanghai and later moved to Hong Kong. As a young man, he came to the United States on a student visa to study architecture but turned instead to his love of art. A graduate of the Art Center College of Design, Young has since taught at the Pratt Institute, Yale University, Naropa Institute, and the University of California at Santa Cruz. Ed Youn was awarded the Caldecott Medal for his book Lon Po Po, and The Emperor and the Kite and Seven Blind Mice were named Caldecott Honor Books. Wabi Sabi, was a New York Times Best Illustrated Children's Book in 2008.