PATRICK AND THE PRESIDENT

Name: PATRICK AND THE PRESIDENT
Author: Ryan Tubridy
ISBN: 978-0-7636-8949-0

by Ryan Tubridy ; illustrated by P.J. Lynch ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 14, 2017

A bit histrionic for easy belief, but meeting the president is always going to be a memorable moment, whoever’s holding the...

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It’s not every day that an Irish lad gets to shake hands with the president of the United States.

Recasting his 300-plus–page JFK in Ireland: Four Days that Changed a President (2011) into considerably briefer form, Tubridy commemorates John F. Kennedy’s 1963 visit to his ancestral country and hometown through the eyes of a (fictional) schoolboy. It’s one peak moment after another, as the news that Kennedy is coming to Wexford has Patrick’s dad and dog dancing around the kitchen while his mam sighs “I’m only dying to see him. He’s like something from the movies!” Patrick’s own class is selected to welcome the distinguished guest with a song, then later the two come face to face at a reception. Lynch captures the narrative’s fevered tone in splendidly realistic scenes of close-packed crowds and excited pale faces. Kennedy looks suitably tall, grand, and genial, and Patrick is the very picture of freckle-faced concentration as he slices a Swiss roll and offers it to the great man. “Don’t ever wash that lucky hand of yours!” says the boy’s mam after.

A bit histrionic for easy belief, but meeting the president is always going to be a memorable moment, whoever’s holding the office. (historical note with photos and itinerary) (Informational picture book. 6-9)

Pub Date: Feb. 14, 2017

ISBN: 978-0-7636-8949-0

Page Count: 48

Publisher: Candlewick

Review Posted Online: Dec. 5, 2016

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2016

Categories:

CHILDREN'S HISTORICAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE FIRST CHRISTMAS SWEATER (AND THE SHEEP WHO CHANGED EVERYTHING)
by Ryan Tubridy ; illustrated by Chris Judge

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THE ADVENTURES OF HENRY WHISKERS

From the Adventures of Henry Whiskers series , Vol. 1

by Gigi Priebe ; illustrated by Daniel Duncan ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 3, 2017

Innocuous adventuring on the smallest of scales.

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The Mouse and the Motorcycle (1965) upgrades to The Mice and the Rolls-Royce.

In Windsor Castle there sits a “dollhouse like no other,” replete with working plumbing, electricity, and even a full library of real, tiny books. Called Queen Mary’s Dollhouse, it also plays host to the Whiskers family, a clan of mice that has maintained the house for generations. Henry Whiskers and his cousin Jeremy get up to the usual high jinks young mice get up to, but when Henry’s little sister Isabel goes missing at the same time that the humans decide to clean the house up, the usually bookish big brother goes on the adventure of his life. Now Henry is driving cars, avoiding cats, escaping rats, and all before the upcoming mouse Masquerade. Like an extended version of Beatrix Potter’s The Tale of Two Bad Mice (1904), Priebe keeps this short chapter book constantly moving, with Duncan’s peppy art a cute capper. Oddly, the dollhouse itself plays only the smallest of roles in this story, and no factual information on the real Queen Mary’s Dolls’ House is included at the tale’s end (an opportunity lost).

Innocuous adventuring on the smallest of scales. (Fantasy. 6-8)

Pub Date: Jan. 3, 2017

ISBN: 978-1-4814-6575-5

Page Count: 144

Publisher: Aladdin

Review Posted Online: Sept. 18, 2016

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2016

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ACTION & ADVENTURE FICTION | CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S HISTORICAL FICTION

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ELIZABETH STARTED ALL THE TROUBLE

by Doreen Rappaport ; illustrated by Matt Faulkner ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 2016

Rappaport makes this long struggle palpable and relevant, while Faulkner adds a winning mix of gravitas and high spirits.

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Rappaport examines the salient successes and raw setbacks along the 144-year-long road between the nation’s birth and women’s suffrage.

This lively yet forthright narrative pivots on a reality that should startle modern kids: women’s right to vote was only achieved in 1920, 72 years after Elizabeth Cady Stanton organized the first Women’s Rights Convention in Seneca Falls, New York. Indeed, time’s passage figures as a textual motif, connecting across decades such determined women as Stanton, Sojourner Truth, Susan B. Anthony, and Lucy Stone. They spoke tirelessly, marched, organized, and got arrested. Rappaport includes events such as 1913’s Women’s Suffrage Parade in Washington, D.C., but doesn’t shy from divisive periods like the Civil War. Faulkner’s meticulously researched gouache-and-ink illustrations often infuse scenes with humor by playing with size and perspective. As Stanton and Lucretia Mott sail into London in 1840 for the World Anti-Slavery Conference, Faulkner depicts the two women as giants on the ship’s upper deck. On the opposite page, as they learn they’ll be barred as delegates, they’re painted in miniature, dwarfed yet unflappable beneath a gallery full of disapproving men. A final double-page spread mingles such modern stars as Shirley Chisholm and Sonia Sotomayor amid the historical leaders.

Rappaport makes this long struggle palpable and relevant, while Faulkner adds a winning mix of gravitas and high spirits. (biographical thumbnails, chronology, sources, websites, further reading, author’s note) (Picture book/biography. 6-8)