A niche offering.
An impassioned musician shared her talents globally.
Jewish singer/songwriter Debbie Friedman (1951-2011) loved music and her faith. When she was a child, her family moved from upstate New York to St. Paul, Minnesota, where she felt adrift before enrolling in Hebrew school. Deeply religious, she found solace in prayers and rituals. Later, working at a Jewish summer camp, she found comfort in music and grew to love the popular folksongs of the 1960s. Yearning to play guitar, Friedman worked hard to earn money to buy her own instrument. As a skilled guitarist, she led singalongs at Jewish youth group meetings and synagogues around the United States. Friedman wished to emphasize Jewish music at her concerts to help Jews connect, spiritually and musically. She began to compose songs, setting English translations of Hebrew prayers to her original tunes. Shortly after writing her first song, she introduced it to a youth group, and the teens wholly embraced it. Eventually, the author avers, Friedman’s religious songs brought Jews of all ages and levels of spirituality together. Friedman’s story should be more widely known. However, this book, written in present tense, is superficial, though her passion comes across. The illustrations are colorful but otherwise undistinguished and static. There is no glossary or pronunciation guide, which would have helped with some Yiddish and Hebrew words. This volume will be best appreciated in Jewish-school and synagogue-library collections. Friedman and her family present White; background characters are diverse in terms of age and race. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A niche offering. (author’s note) (Picture-book biography. 6-9)Pub Date: Dec. 6, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-68115-610-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Apples & Honey Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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 unique angle on a watershed moment in the civil rights era.
The New Orleans school child who famously broke the color line in 1960 while surrounded by federal marshals describes the early days of her experience from a 6-year-old’s perspective.
Bridges told her tale to younger children in 2009’s Ruby Bridges Goes to School, but here the sensibility is more personal, and the sometimes-shocking historical photos have been replaced by uplifting painted scenes. “I didn’t find out what being ‘the first’ really meant until the day I arrived at this new school,” she writes. Unfrightened by the crowd of “screaming white people” that greets her at the school’s door (she thinks it’s like Mardi Gras) but surprised to find herself the only child in her classroom, and even the entire building, she gradually realizes the significance of her act as (in Smith’s illustration) she compares a small personal photo to the all-White class photos posted on a bulletin board and sees the difference. As she reflects on her new understanding, symbolic scenes first depict other dark-skinned children marching into classes in her wake to friendly greetings from lighter-skinned classmates (“School is just school,” she sensibly concludes, “and kids are just kids”) and finally an image of the bright-eyed icon posed next to a soaring bridge of reconciliation. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A unique angle on a watershed moment in the civil rights era. (author and illustrator notes, glossary) (Autobiographical picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Sept. 6, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-338-75388-2
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Orchard/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: June 21, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
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