Will serve to empower children who feel as powerless as Thurgood Marshall once felt.
Born, raised, and educated in segregated early-20th-century Baltimore, Thurgood Marshall did not allow what he saw around him to determine who he could become.
Though he was too young to make changes to the systems that kept Black people from enjoying the same rights and spaces as White people, Marshall knew that he wanted to find a way to improve the world in which he lived. It was a fateful day when he was caught misbehaving and was punished by being forced to read the U.S. Constitution. That punishment developed his interest in the law and, eventually, debate. Readers learn that not only did Marshall win the case that integrated the University of Maryland, the institution that barred him from attending its law school, but he presented several cases before the Supreme Court—including Brown v. Board of Education—before he became a justice in 1967. Marshall’s life is detailed in bite-size pieces that make this book incredibly useful for reading and research by young students. The backmatter includes a timeline of Marshall’s life, a list of his major cases, and a bibliography for further reading. Many of Freeman’s illustrations incorporate text; in one scene, a young Marshall confronts a dizzying array of “Whites Only” and “Colored Section” signs; in another, he’s framed in a crossword-puzzle grid including terms such as justice and equality. (This book was reviewed digitally with 12-by-18-inch double-page spreads viewed at actual size.)
Will serve to empower children who feel as powerless as Thurgood Marshall once felt. (Picture book/biography. 5-8)Pub Date: Jan. 5, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-06-291251-0
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Quill Tree Books/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Nov. 17, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2020
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Bridges Goes to School, but here the sensibility is more personal, and the sometimes-shocking historical photos have been replaced by uplifting painted scenes.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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