Young readers need the lessons offered here, but this poorly written attempt is more likely to confuse and bore than inspire.
Nagara’s newest activist story (Counting on Community, 2016, etc.) uses the author’s wedding portrait to introduce civil disobedience.
“When kids visit our house,” starts Nagara, “they often ask about a particular photo that hangs on the wall.” It’s of his wedding. “But as you can see, there is something different about this wedding portrait!” (He and his wife smooch in front of a riot squad.) The following pages attempt to explain various protests around the world, from the Colombian oil blockades to the campaign for Indian independence to Black Lives Matter. Such terms as SIT-IN and SOLIDARITY are capitalized and loosely defined, though this technique is inconsistently applied. The illustrations are powerful and attractive but cannot save the text from cloying didacticism, a dizzying lack of structure, and too much complicated information combined with not enough developmentally appropriate depth. For example, a discussion of farmworkers’ rights asks, “If someone offered you a cheap tomato, but it was cheap because it was picked by a kid just like you who had to work all day for no pay and wasn’t allowed to go home, would you buy it anyway? I didn’t think so.” But children usually don’t control their groceries, and most Americans benefit daily from the exploitation of others; readers are given no opportunity to reflect on this reality.
Young readers need the lessons offered here, but this poorly written attempt is more likely to confuse and bore than inspire. (Informational picture book. 6-10)Pub Date: Oct. 10, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-60980-802-0
Page Count: 36
Publisher: Triangle Square Books for Young Readers
Review Posted Online: Aug. 20, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2017
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Bridges Goes to School, but here the sensibility is more personal, and the sometimes-shocking historical photos have been replaced by uplifting painted scenes.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
PERSPECTIVES
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
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