Another gift of a book.
The best things in life aren’t things….
Author/illustrator of the perennial bestseller The Wonderful Things You Will Be (2015), Martin has established herself as a picture-book maker with a talent for writing verses befitting sincere, heartfelt greeting cards. This title reaffirms that writerly gift in the best of ways as it delivers rhyming lines that describe simple pleasures and intangible treasures that define relationships and enrich a person’s life. Sometimes the gouache illustrations depict people in comfortable companionship; other spreads show a solitary person engaged in an activity alone. Text reading, “So I’ll give you this world / Like a lucky blue stone…. // The gift of alone… / And not-being-alone” is representative of the book as a whole. It never offers a narrative arc but instead presents images of racially diverse children and adults going about their days. Illustrating the aforementioned quatrain are a picture of Black-presenting adults transferring the stone from or to (it’s open to interpretation) a small Black child and, on the next double-page spread, first a different Black child painting in solitude and then a ring of racially diverse children playing. This reference to “a lucky blue stone” is echoed in closing spreads with reference to the Earth itself, lending the book a sense of cohesion and underscoring its gentle message of unity and gratitude for the simple things in life, such as the very ground on which we stand, together. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Another gift of a book. (Picture book. All ages)Pub Date: Nov. 30, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-5247-1416-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2021
This delightful debut welcomes readers in like a house filled with love.
A 13-year-old biracial girl longs to build the house of her dreams.
For Lou Bulosan-Nelson, normal is her “gigantic extended family squished into Lola’s for every holiday imaginable.” She shares a bedroom with her Filipina mother, Minda—a former interior-design major and current nurse-to-be—in Lola Celina’s San Francisco home. From her deceased white father, Michael, Lou inherited “not-so-Filipino features,” his love for architecture, and some land. Lou’s quietude implies her keen eye for details, but her passion for creating with her hands resonates loudly. Pining for something to claim as her own, she plans to construct a house from the ground up. When her mom considers moving out of state for a potential job and Lou’s land is at risk of being auctioned off, Lou stays resilient, gathering support from both friends and family to make her dream a reality. Respicio authentically depicts the richness of Philippine culture, incorporating Filipino language, insights into Lou’s family history, and well-crafted descriptions of customs, such as the birdlike Tinikling dance and eating kamayan style (with one’s hands), throughout. Lou’s story gives voice to Filipino youth, addressing cultural differences, the importance of bayanihan (community), and the true meaning of home.
This delightful debut welcomes readers in like a house filled with love. (Fiction. 8-13)Pub Date: June 12, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5247-1794-0
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Wendy Lamb/Random
Review Posted Online: March 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2018
A wonderfully charming tale of family and sisters that anyone can bond with.
Two sisters who are constantly at odds take a family road trip that covers more ground—both literally and figuratively—than they expect.
After begging her parents for a sister, Raina gets more than she bargained for once Amara is born. From the moment she was brought home, Amara hasn’t been quite the cuddly playmate that Raina had hoped. As the years pass, the girls bicker constantly and apparently couldn’t be more unalike: Raina spends her time indoors underneath her headphones, and Amara loves animals and the outdoors. The girls, their mother and their little brother all pack up to drive to a family reunion, and it seems like the trip’s just going to be more of the same, with the girls incessantly picking on each other all the way from San Francisco to Colorado. However, when the trip doesn’t go quite as planned—for a number of reasons—the girls manage to find some common ground. Told in then-and-now narratives that are easily discernable in the graphic format, Telgemeier’s tale is laugh-out-loud funny (especially the story about the snake incident) and quietly serious all at once. Her rounded, buoyant art coupled with a masterful capacity for facial expressions complements the writing perfectly. Fans of her previous books Smile (2010) and Drama (2012) shouldn’t miss this one; it’s a winner.
A wonderfully charming tale of family and sisters that anyone can bond with. (Graphic memoir. 7-13)Pub Date: Aug. 26, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-545-54059-9
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Graphix/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 13, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2014
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