This welcome addition to the field of female fliers will be informative as well as inspirational for girls.
This biography of Kathy Sullivan joins the ranks of picture books about women who have taken to the air.
Her name is not familiar to most people, yet her achievements were major. As a child, she dreamed of having a pocketful of airplane tickets so she could see the whole world. Unlike her female friends, she wanted to be an adventurer, like a spy or a diplomat. She ignored the taunts (“Girls don’t like those jobs”), and when she was a teenager, she learned to be a pilot. Attractive watercolor-and-ink illustrations visually use alternating, double-page spreads to show how, throughout her childhood and young adulthood, her determination became the impetus for her adult challenges. This back-and-forth perspective, between childhood and adulthood, is effective for the age group. In 1978, she became one of the first six women selected to join NASA, and she was the first American woman to walk in space, in 1984. Notes, each a full page long, from the author and Sullivan herself encompass her adventurous spirit and encourage girls to “set big goals.” Concluding thumbnail biographies profile 13 other woman astronauts, including Sally Ride, Kalpana Chawla, Mae Jemison, and Ellen Ochoa.
This welcome addition to the field of female fliers will be informative as well as inspirational for girls. (Picture book/biography. 5-9)Pub Date: Jan. 5, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-58089-644-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Charlesbridge
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2015
A beautifully designed book that will resonate with children and the adults who wisely share it with them.
An inspirational ode to the life of the great South African leader by an award-winning author and illustrator.
Mandela’s has been a monumental life, a fact made clear on the front cover, which features an imposing, full-page portrait. The title is on the rear cover. His family gave him the Xhosa name Rolihlahla, but his schoolteacher called him Nelson. Later, he was sent to study with village elders who told him stories about his beautiful and fertile land, which was conquered by European settlers with more powerful weapons. Then came apartheid, and his protests, rallies and legal work for the cause of racial equality led to nearly 30 years of imprisonment followed at last by freedom for Mandela and for all South Africans. “The ancestors, / The people, / The world, / Celebrated.” Nelson’s writing is spare, poetic, and grounded in empathy and admiration. His oil paintings on birch plywood are muscular and powerful. Dramatic moments are captured in shifting perspectives; a whites-only beach is seen through a wide-angle lens, while faces behind bars and faces beaming in final victory are masterfully portrayed in close-up.
A beautifully designed book that will resonate with children and the adults who wisely share it with them. (author’s note, bibliography) (Picture book/biography. 5-8)Pub Date: Jan. 2, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-178374-6
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Nov. 18, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2012
Weatherford and Christie dazzlingly salute African-Americans’ drive to preserve their dignity and pride.
Count down the days until Sunday, a day for slaves in New Orleans to gather together and remember their African heritage.
In rhyming couplets, Weatherford vividly describes each day of nonstop work under a “dreaded lash” until Sunday, when slaves and free blacks could assemble in Congo Square, now a part of New Orleans’ Louis Armstrong Park and on the National Register of Historic Places. Musicians “drummed ancestral roots alive” on different traditional instruments, and men and women danced. They also exchanged information and sold wares. The poetry is powerful and evocative, providing a strong and emotional window into the world of the slave. Christie’s full-bleed paintings are a moving accompaniment. His elongated figures toil in fields and in houses with bent backs under the watchful eyes of overseers with whips. Then on Sunday, they greet one another and dance with expressively charged spirits. One brilliant double-page spread portrays African masks and instruments with swirling lines of text; it is followed by another with four dancers moving beautifully—almost ethereally—on a vibrant yellow collage background. As the author notes, jazz would soon follow from the music played in Congo Square.
Weatherford and Christie dazzlingly salute African-Americans’ drive to preserve their dignity and pride. (foreword, glossary, author’s note) (Picture book. 5-9)Pub Date: Jan. 5, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4998-0103-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Little Bee Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 13, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2015
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