It is a wonderful package, adding the women who made it work to the men we thought we all knew.
ABC and NPR correspondent Roberts and Caldecott Honoree Goode forge an attractive and compelling version for young people of Roberts’ adult book of the same title.
Goode’s illustrations are often breathtaking. On the endpapers, she has reproduced in sepia tones with antique pens some of the source documents that allow readers to know these women. Roberts’ lively text is illuminated with flourishes and curlicues along with winsome or whimsical portraits in what looks like ink and watercolor. Some women get two-page illustrated spreads, like Esther DeBerdt Reed, who wrote one of the endpaper pieces and who raised thousands of dollars for Washington’s troops. They bought linen for 2,000 shirts for the soldiers, and into each was sewn the name of the woman who made it. There are briefer vignettes on women writers and women warriors, as well as an illustrated timeline from 1765 to 1815. Abigail Adams, Dolley Madison and Martha Washington are included of course, and there’s also Mercy Otis Warren, who wrote letters and poems championing the cause of freedom, and Eliza Lucas Pinckney, whose “little schemes” included raising silkworms and cultivating indigo as a cash crop. Roberts’ “Letter of Introduction” sets the stage, and the acknowledgments from writer and illustrator tell a compelling story of research and support.
It is a wonderful package, adding the women who made it work to the men we thought we all knew. (websites) (Nonfiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-06-078002-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Nov. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
Reluctant historians may find Virgil's "ghostory" appealing.
History is more haunted than readers may think.
Disney might have some believing that castles are clean, pink and full of unicorn tapestries. But Virgil Dante, youngest Master Ghostorian in London, is here to disabuse readers of that notion, ostensibly with the help of his raven, Thor, and a passel of ghosts. They tour history with the assistance of a cursed pocket watch and look in on castles, dungeons, palaces and graveyards. Here and there, they learn a thing or two from a “real” ghost from the locale and time period they are visiting. More often, Virgil just lectures in a colloquial narrative voice or offers maps, lists and diagrams of horrible places and things in world history. The usual suspects get the eye: The Tower of London and the Bastille figure prominently, but there are also lesser-known nests of nastiness like Himeji Castle in Japan and Castle Neuschwanstein in Bavaria. Everett and Scott-Waters have put together an instructive, amusing-enough gross-and-horrible history title. However, it feels a bit scattered, and the ghosts are few and far between. Abundant black-and-white illustrations are grisly and spooky enough to hold interest.
Reluctant historians may find Virgil's "ghostory" appealing. (timeline, maps, resources) (Nonfiction. 8-12)Pub Date: July 17, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-8050-8971-4
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Christy Ottaviano/Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: April 17, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2012
An inviting collection of insightful, interesting and often wacky and weird facts and stories about U.S. presidents and...
A fascinating and entertaining insider's intimate view of the White House through the eyes of 70 children and grandchildren of our commanders in chief.
Through first-person accounts from letters and interviews, Rhatigan reveals the perks and problems of living in America's most famous residence. A bowling alley in the basement and chefs available to make any food you want sound great, but you also have to put up with reporters following your every move and Secret Service agents never letting you out of sight. Readers learn how life in the White House has changed since John Adams and his family first occupied the mansion, who were the worst behaved presidential children, about the menageries of animals that have come and gone, and what kind of relationships children had with their parents. Factoids sprinkled throughout the text offer anecdotes about White House weddings, gifts presidential kids received and ghosts that supposedly haunt the mansion. Attractively designed in a scrapbook format with appropriate use of red, white and blue, the text is abundantly illustrated with photographs and archival images.
An inviting collection of insightful, interesting and often wacky and weird facts and stories about U.S. presidents and their families. (appendices, bibliography, index) (Nonfiction. 8-12)Pub Date: July 1, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-936140-80-0
Page Count: 96
Publisher: Imagine Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 29, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2012
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