Informative and inspiring.
This finely researched volume introduces readers to seven trailblazing American women from the Golden Age of Magic (1860-1930) who have since faded into obscurity.
At a time when they had few professional options beyond teaching, domestic service, or nursing, these women bucked convention. Many had similar trajectories—coming from modest beginnings, they entered the theater before enjoying successful second innings as illusionists and conjurers. Anna Eva Fay began as a medium, moving from private parlor sittings to the stage. Dancer Adelaide Herrmann brought dazzle to the magic shows she performed with her husband. Dixie Haygood rose to fame as strongwoman Annie Abbott, while Mary Ann Ford was skilled at sleight of hand; she reinvented herself as Talma, Queen of Coins. Beatrice Houdini was a charismatic performer—and pivotal to her husband Harry’s meteoric success. Margaretha Gertz (Snelling) dubbed herself Minerva, the Queen of Handcuffs, becoming a formidable escape artist who challenged Harry Houdini himself. Ellen Emma Armstrong, the only Black magician featured among the white women, endured segregation in the Jim Crow South but carried on her father’s legacy as a traveling magician and educator, using her platform to educate and uplift Black audiences by showing the science behind her many tricks. Each profile is accompanied by photographs and ephemera. McDevitt’s full-page color depictions of each subject’s signature tricks are a delightful highlight. Hays does a commendable job of entertainingly chronicling the highs and lows of the magicians’ professional and personal lives.
Informative and inspiring. (epilogue, bibliography, photo credits) (Nonfiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 9, 2025
ISBN: 9780593712559
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Bright Matter Books
Review Posted Online: June 13, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2025
For every dreaming girl (and boy) with a pencil in hand (or keyboard) and a story to share.
A multiaward–winning author recalls her childhood and the joy of becoming a writer.
Writing in free verse, Woodson starts with her 1963 birth in Ohio during the civil rights movement, when America is “a country caught / / between Black and White.” But while evoking names such as Malcolm, Martin, James, Rosa and Ruby, her story is also one of family: her father’s people in Ohio and her mother’s people in South Carolina. Moving south to live with her maternal grandmother, she is in a world of sweet peas and collards, getting her hair straightened and avoiding segregated stores with her grandmother. As the writer inside slowly grows, she listens to family stories and fills her days and evenings as a Jehovah’s Witness, activities that continue after a move to Brooklyn to reunite with her mother. The gift of a composition notebook, the experience of reading John Steptoe’s Stevieand Langston Hughes’ poetry, and seeing letters turn into words and words into thoughts all reinforce her conviction that “[W]ords are my brilliance.” Woodson cherishes her memories and shares them with a graceful lyricism; her lovingly wrought vignettes of country and city streets will linger long after the page is turned.
For every dreaming girl (and boy) with a pencil in hand (or keyboard) and a story to share. (Memoir/poetry. 8-12)Pub Date: Aug. 28, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-399-25251-8
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Nancy Paulsen Books
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2014
Though a bit loose around the edges, a charmer nevertheless.
Tales of a fourth grade ne’er-do-well.
It seems that young Jordan is stuck in a never-ending string of bad luck. Sure, no one’s perfect (except maybe goody-two-shoes William Feranek), but Jordan can’t seem to keep his attention focused on the task at hand. Try as he may, things always go a bit sideways, much to his educators’ chagrin. But Jordan promises himself that fourth grade will be different. As the year unfolds, it does prove to be different, but in a way Jordan couldn’t possibly have predicted. This humorous memoir perfectly captures the square-peg-in-a-round-hole feeling many kids feel and effectively heightens that feeling with comic situations and a splendid villain. Jordan’s teacher, Mrs. Fisher, makes an excellent foil, and the book’s 1970s setting allows for her cruelty to go beyond anything most contemporary readers could expect. Unfortunately, the story begins to run out of steam once Mrs. Fisher exits. Recollections spiral, losing their focus and leading to a more “then this happened” and less cause-and-effect structure. The anecdotes are all amusing and Jordan is an endearing protagonist, but the book comes dangerously close to wearing out its welcome with sheer repetitiveness. Thankfully, it ends on a high note, one pleasant and hopeful enough that readers will overlook some of the shabbier qualities. Jordan is White and Jewish while there is some diversity among his classmates; Mrs. Fisher is White.
Though a bit loose around the edges, a charmer nevertheless. (Memoir. 8-12)Pub Date: Feb. 2, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-338-64723-5
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Nov. 17, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2020
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