At 109 years old and still burning (and in the Guinness Book of World Records), a real light bulb hanging in a California firehouse not only merits admiration for its durability but also provides a natural anchor for a look at how a small settlement grows over a century into a city. Nolan takes it decade by decade as, in Lafrance’s folk art–style acrylics, ever-larger buildings go up around one fire house after another, a hand-pulled hose cart gives way to a succession of fire trucks and the professional firefighters who succeed volunteer companies put out fires, perform rescues and march in parades. Beneath the bulb they welcome generations of marveling visitors in changing period dress. Unlike Juliette Goodrich’s Little Light Shines Bright, illustrated by Roseanne Lester (2008), there’s but one actual photo, but the little-town-over-time theme—and the fire trucks—exert plenty of child-friendly appeal. The bulb has its own website and webcam. (afterword) (Informational picture book. 6-8)
Pub Date: May 25, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-58246-298-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Tricycle
Review Posted Online: Jan. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2010
Categories: CHILDREN'S HISTORICAL FICTION
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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Rappaport examines the salient successes and raw setbacks along the 144-year-long road between the nation’s birth and women’s suffrage.
This lively yet forthright narrative pivots on a reality that should startle modern kids: women’s right to vote was only achieved in 1920, 72 years after Elizabeth Cady Stanton organized the first Women’s Rights Convention in Seneca Falls, New York. Indeed, time’s passage figures as a textual motif, connecting across decades such determined women as Stanton, Sojourner Truth, Susan B. Anthony, and Lucy Stone. They spoke tirelessly, marched, organized, and got arrested. Rappaport includes events such as 1913’s Women’s Suffrage Parade in Washington, D.C., but doesn’t shy from divisive periods like the Civil War. Faulkner’s meticulously researched gouache-and-ink illustrations often infuse scenes with humor by playing with size and perspective. As Stanton and Lucretia Mott sail into London in 1840 for the World Anti-Slavery Conference, Faulkner depicts the two women as giants on the ship’s upper deck. On the opposite page, as they learn they’ll be barred as delegates, they’re painted in miniature, dwarfed yet unflappable beneath a gallery full of disapproving men. A final double-page spread mingles such modern stars as Shirley Chisholm and Sonia Sotomayor amid the historical leaders.
Rappaport makes this long struggle palpable and relevant, while Faulkner adds a winning mix of gravitas and high spirits. (biographical thumbnails, chronology, sources, websites, further reading, author’s note) (Picture book/biography. 6-8)Pub Date: Feb. 23, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-7868-5142-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2015
Categories: CHILDREN'S HISTORICAL FICTION
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Not much is heard about President Lincoln’s children, so Rabin fills a gap with this brief snapshot into the lives of two of them, Tad and Willie, which Ibatoulline illustrates with a softly drenched light that suggests yesteryear and a hint of melancholy, his images often evoking hand-tinted daguerreotypes. Working from historical documents, then embellishing to give the story a narrative, Rabin pleasingly draws two little rascals, full of practical jokes and absolute entitlement to their father’s attention, which the old stoic gives with imperturbable, beatific grace (while his aides bite their tongues). When the boys have second thoughts after condemning a toy soldier to death, they go to their father for a pardon; Abe consents with a wry “it makes me feel rested after a hard day’s work, to find some good excuse to save a man’s life.” An author’s note explains the genesis of the story and fleshes out the principals, including Tad and Willie, who, like their father, lived too-brief lives. (Picture book. 6-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-670-06169-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2008
Categories: CHILDREN'S HISTORICAL FICTION
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