Peek behind the scenes and celebrate a woman whose achievements shaped Disney magic.
Steering clear of the spotlight, Lillian Disney (neé Bounds) found her own way to leave her mark on the Disney legacy.
Born the last of 10 siblings in 1899, Lilly had a knack for finding magic in the everyday despite her tough beginnings—after her father died when she was 17, she helped her mother make ends meet. She stumbled upon the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio after moving to Los Angeles. Though women were rarely hired in animation at the time, Walt and Roy Disney took a chance on Lilly. She became an inker and a painter, filling animators’ drawings with pigment, cell by cell. Enamored by her boss’s creativity, Lilly fell in love with Walt, and they were soon married. When Walt sketched a cartoon mouse named Mortimer, Lillian suggested that “Mickey” would be a catchier name. Though Lilly preferred to stay behind the scenes while supporting her husband, she left a lasting impact on the company: dreaming up cartoon ideas, testing theme park rides, and even innovating Disneyland’s trash-collection system. Richman sprinkles pixie dust on one woman’s influence on the Disney we know today; still, young readers eager to take center stage may be frustrated with Lillian’s willingness to play second fiddle to Walt. Digital illustrations are rendered with a muted palette that evokes the period but feels a bit dull, directly depicting the events described in the text rather than building on them.
Peek behind the scenes and celebrate a woman whose achievements shaped Disney magic. (author’s note, timeline, sources) (Picture-book biography. 5-8)Pub Date: June 3, 2025
ISBN: 9781665962742
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: March 22, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2025
Blandly inspirational fare made to evoke equally shrink-wrapped responses.
An NBA star pays tribute to the influence of his grandfather.
In the same vein as his Long Shot (2009), illustrated by Frank Morrison, this latest from Paul prioritizes values and character: “My granddad Papa Chilly had dreams that came true,” he writes, “so maybe if I listen and watch him, / mine will too.” So it is that the wide-eyed Black child in the simply drawn illustrations rises early to get to the playground hoops before anyone else, watches his elder working hard and respecting others, hears him cheering along with the rest of the family from the stands during games, and recalls in a prose afterword that his grandfather wasn’t one to lecture but taught by example. Paul mentions in both the text and the backmatter that Papa Chilly was the first African American to own a service station in North Carolina (his presumed dream) but not that he was killed in a robbery, which has the effect of keeping the overall tone positive and the instructional content one-dimensional. Figures in the pictures are mostly dark-skinned. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Blandly inspirational fare made to evoke equally shrink-wrapped responses. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Jan. 10, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-250-81003-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
A picture book more than worthy of sharing the shelf with Alan Schroeder and Jerry Pinkney’s Minty (1996) and Carole Boston...
A memorable, lyrical reverse-chronological walk through the life of an American icon.
In free verse, Cline-Ransome narrates the life of Harriet Tubman, starting and ending with a train ride Tubman takes as an old woman. “But before wrinkles formed / and her eyes failed,” Tubman could walk tirelessly under a starlit sky. Cline-Ransome then describes the array of roles Tubman played throughout her life, including suffragist, abolitionist, Union spy, and conductor on the Underground Railroad. By framing the story around a literal train ride, the Ransomes juxtapose the privilege of traveling by rail against Harriet’s earlier modes of travel, when she repeatedly ran for her life. Racism still abounds, however, for she rides in a segregated train. While the text introduces readers to the details of Tubman’s life, Ransome’s use of watercolor—such a striking departure from his oil illustrations in many of his other picture books—reveals Tubman’s humanity, determination, drive, and hope. Ransome’s lavishly detailed and expansive double-page spreads situate young readers in each time and place as the text takes them further into the past.
A picture book more than worthy of sharing the shelf with Alan Schroeder and Jerry Pinkney’s Minty (1996) and Carole Boston Weatherford and Kadir Nelson’s Moses (2006). (Picture book/biography. 5-8)Pub Date: Nov. 7, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-8234-2047-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Holiday House
Review Posted Online: Aug. 6, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2017
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