A bar set stratospherically high and cleared with room to spare.
Reynolds and the Pumphrey brothers take readers on a dazzling journey through Langston Hughes’ legacy.
“There was a party for Langston at the library. / A jam in Harlem to celebrate the word-making man— // Langston, the king of letters.” And what a party! When Langston writes, words move, they collide, they big bang into the very atoms of connection. On shelves in the background, fellow Black writers and poets peer out from the spines of their books, looking on in delight as Langston’s “word-children” Maya Angelou and Amiri Baraka whirl with joy and inspiration, their own word-making mastery a credit to Langston’s legacy. Inspired by a joyous photo of Angelou and Baraka snapped in 1991 at the opening of the Langston Hughes Auditorium at the New York Public Library’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Reynolds sets a syncopated pace with his debut picture book, delivering not only a celebratory dance of a biography, but a primer in Hughes’ own jazz poetry. Not missing a beat and laying down one all their own, the Pumphrey brothers’ illustrations incorporate verses from Hughes’ poems and other words he set into motion to create a thrumming visual landscape where meaning takes literal flight. This book demonstrates that Hughes’ work is the epitome of what words can be. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A bar set stratospherically high and cleared with room to spare. (Informational picture book. 3-8)Pub Date: Oct. 3, 2023
ISBN: 9781534439443
Page Count: 56
Publisher: Caitlyn Dlouhy/Atheneum
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
PERSPECTIVES
Uplifting.
Clark-Robinson celebrates the ways in which women have opened doors for the girls and women coming after them.
Two women, one elderly and one younger, sit a girl down with tea and photographs to tell her stories of how “our mothers and all those who’ve gone before, / paved a freer path and opened a wider door.” The walls of this Black family’s home are covered in framed photographs of diverse historical and contemporary women who made their marks in the worlds of art, sports, politics, and more. As the women encourage the girl to “speak [the] names” of those who came before and recognize that they stand on the shoulders of those women, the art transitions from their home to full spreads showing the heroes in action. Toward the end, as the text repeats praise for the women leaders, the art shows the family framing a photograph of themselves and hanging it on the wall, placing them in the line of strong women as the question is posed to the girl: “Who will stand on YOURS?” Many of the icons in the images will be recognizable to informed readers, overlaying the text’s general message onto specific examples of excellence. Backmatter provides a sentence introducing each figure beneath her portrait, offering an opportunity for readers to “speak their names.” Though perhaps overly hopeful in its depiction of women’s unity across racial lines, this book achieves the effect of an intergenerational embrace. (This book was reviewed digitally with 10-by-16-inch double-page spreads viewed at 22.2% of actual size.)
Uplifting. (author’s note, illustrator’s note) (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Feb. 2, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-338-35800-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Orchard/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 14, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
Successful neither as biography nor sermon.
Our 16th president is presented as an activist for human and civil rights.
Lincoln resembles a doll with an oversized head as he strides through a first-person narrative that stretches the limits of credulity and usefulness. From childhood, Abe, bearded and sporting a stovepipe hat, loves to read, write and look out for animals. He stands up to bullies, noting that “the hardest fights don’t reveal a winner—but they do reveal character.” He sees slaves, and the sight haunts him. When the Civil War begins, he calls it a struggle to end slavery. Not accurate. The text further calls the Gettysburg ceremonies a “big event” designed to “reenergize” Union supporters and states that the Emancipation Proclamation “freed all those people.” Not accurate. The account concludes with a homily to “speak louder then you’ve ever spoken before,” as Lincoln holds the Proclamation in his hands. Eliopoulos’ comic-style digital art uses speech bubbles for conversational asides. A double-page spread depicts Lincoln, Confederate soldiers, Union soldiers, white folk and African-American folk walking arm in arm: an anachronistic reference to civil rights–era protest marches? An unsourced quotation from Lincoln may not actually be Lincoln’s words.
Successful neither as biography nor sermon. (photographs, archival illustration) (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: Jan. 14, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-8037-4083-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 19, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2013
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
