Artist Mary Blair uses intense colors in world-famous creations.
When her family moves away from her childhood house, which is lemon yellow, Blair “tuck[s] her friend lemon in her pocket,” memorizing that color. Growing up, she collects color after color in her mind: russet, azure, viridian, cerulean, celadon. As one of the first women to work at Walt Disney Studios, she contributes to Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, and Peter Pan but is stymied by male bosses, who declare her work (such as magenta flying horses) “too vivid, too wild.” She leaves to do advertising, book illustration, and stage sets, but Disney himself invites her back to work on a new ride called “It’s a Small World.” Blair, white and blonde, “had never been to places like China or Morocco or Kathmandu…but her colors had.” That assertion reads as an excuse for something Guglielmo and Tourville never mention: real-world criticism of Small World for reductive exoticism of race, nationality, and ethnicity. Other instances of color personification, in contrast, are pure fun: colors “run and dance”; they “encourage…[Blair] to leave the men with their black lines and strict rules.” Some of Barrager’s hues clash with their textual descriptions, but her playful swirls are energetic. Subtitle notwithstanding, the text is nonrhyming.
A bright homage to Blair’s bold work, though shown through rose-colored glasses. (authors’ note) (Picture book/biography. 5-8)Pub Date: Aug. 29, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4814-6131-3
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: May 24, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2017
Categories: CHILDREN'S BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR
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A memorable, lyrical reverse-chronological walk through the life of an American icon.
In free verse, Cline-Ransome narrates the life of Harriet Tubman, starting and ending with a train ride Tubman takes as an old woman. “But before wrinkles formed / and her eyes failed,” Tubman could walk tirelessly under a starlit sky. Cline-Ransome then describes the array of roles Tubman played throughout her life, including suffragist, abolitionist, Union spy, and conductor on the Underground Railroad. By framing the story around a literal train ride, the Ransomes juxtapose the privilege of traveling by rail against Harriet’s earlier modes of travel, when she repeatedly ran for her life. Racism still abounds, however, for she rides in a segregated train. While the text introduces readers to the details of Tubman’s life, Ransome’s use of watercolor—such a striking departure from his oil illustrations in many of his other picture books—reveals Tubman’s humanity, determination, drive, and hope. Ransome’s lavishly detailed and expansive double-page spreads situate young readers in each time and place as the text takes them further into the past.
A picture book more than worthy of sharing the shelf with Alan Schroeder and Jerry Pinkney’s Minty (1996) and Carole Boston Weatherford and Kadir Nelson’s Moses (2006). (Picture book/biography. 5-8)Pub Date: Nov. 7, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-8234-2047-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Holiday House
Review Posted Online: Aug. 7, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2017
Categories: CHILDREN'S BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | CHILDREN'S HISTORY
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The junior senator from California introduces family and friends as everyday superheroes.
The endpapers are covered with cascades of, mostly, early childhood snapshots (“This is me contemplating the future”—caregivers of toddlers will recognize that abstracted look). In between, Harris introduces heroes in her life who have shaped her character: her mom and dad, whose superpowers were, respectively, to make her feel special and brave; an older neighbor known for her kindness; grandparents in India and Jamaica who “[stood] up for what’s right” (albeit in unspecified ways); other relatives and a teacher who opened her awareness to a wider world; and finally iconic figures such as Thurgood Marshall and Constance Baker Motley who “protected people by using the power of words and ideas” and whose examples inspired her to become a lawyer. “Heroes are…YOU!” she concludes, closing with a bulleted Hero Code and a timeline of her legal and political career that ends with her 2017 swearing-in as senator. In group scenes, some of the figures in the bright, simplistic digital illustrations have Asian features, some are in wheelchairs, nearly all are people of color. Almost all are smiling or grinning. Roe provides everyone identified as a role model with a cape and poses the author, who is seen at different ages wearing an identifying heart pin or decoration, next to each.
Self-serving to be sure but also chock-full of worthy values and sentiments. (Picture book/memoir. 5-8)Pub Date: Jan. 8, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-984837-49-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: Jan. 8, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2019
Categories: CHILDREN'S BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES
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