Ambitious and enthralling.
A portrait of both the man and the movement that transformed Saint-Domingue into Haiti.
Leslie places Toussaint Louverture within the colony’s rigidly divided society, where Blancs, free people of color, and enslaved Noirs held different relationships with freedom and power. Drawing a parallel with Spartacus, the enslaved gladiator who “led a revolution that shook all of Rome,” she follows Toussaint from enslavement through emancipation. Rather than smoothing that trajectory into inevitable heroism, Leslie makes room for her subject’s contradictions: Concerned with protecting his family, Toussaint initially refused to take part in the 1791 uprising before eventually recognizing the limits of individual freedom and committing himself to ending slavery. Military victories, political negotiations, shifting alliances, and disagreements among revolutionaries accumulate briskly; Leslie stresses that leadership was a skill that Toussaint had to develop over time and freedom was something thousands of people fought together to achieve. Cotard’s vigorous acrylic and oil-pastel illustrations never reduce revolution to mere battlefield spectacle. Traditional Haitian fabrics join sweeping scenes of armies and upheaval with intimate images of family and community, while recurring landscapes keep the country itself visually present as homeland rather than backdrop. An afterword and a further reading list carry the history beyond 1804, addressing the devastating post-independence indemnity that France demanded of its former colony and celebrating the transformation of soup joumou from a food forbidden to enslaved Haitians into a tradition of freedom (a recipe is included).
Ambitious and enthralling. (Picture-book biography. 6-10)Pub Date: Jan. 5, 2027
ISBN: 9781250820594
Page Count: 56
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Aug. 31, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
Blandly inspirational fare made to evoke equally shrink-wrapped responses.
An NBA star pays tribute to the influence of his grandfather.
In the same vein as his Long Shot (2009), illustrated by Frank Morrison, this latest from Paul prioritizes values and character: “My granddad Papa Chilly had dreams that came true,” he writes, “so maybe if I listen and watch him, / mine will too.” So it is that the wide-eyed Black child in the simply drawn illustrations rises early to get to the playground hoops before anyone else, watches his elder working hard and respecting others, hears him cheering along with the rest of the family from the stands during games, and recalls in a prose afterword that his grandfather wasn’t one to lecture but taught by example. Paul mentions in both the text and the backmatter that Papa Chilly was the first African American to own a service station in North Carolina (his presumed dream) but not that he was killed in a robbery, which has the effect of keeping the overall tone positive and the instructional content one-dimensional. Figures in the pictures are mostly dark-skinned. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Blandly inspirational fare made to evoke equally shrink-wrapped responses. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Jan. 10, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-250-81003-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
An inspirational look at one girl’s quest to make sure that all skin tones are visible and available in the classroom.
A Black girl’s simple observation propels her into activism.
Woodard, who launched the More Than Peach Project—which arranges for classrooms and children in need to receive kits that include art supplies and boxes of multicultural crayons (crayons in a variety of skin tones)—relates the incident that sparked her journey. As the book begins, she is dropped off at school and notices that her family’s skin tone differs from that of her classmates. While it is clear that she is one of a few children of color at school, that difference isn’t really felt until her friends start asking for the “skin-color” crayon when they mean peach. She’s bothered that no one else seems to notice that skin comes in many colors, so she devises a unique way of bringing everyone’s attention to that fact. With support from her family and her school, she encourages her fellow classmates to rethink their language and starts an initiative to ensure that everyone’s skin tone is represented in each crayon box. Appealing, realistic artwork depicts Woodard’s experiences, while endpapers feature More Than Peach crayon boxes and childlike illustrations of kids of different ethnicities doing various activities. The story is stirring and will motivate budding activists. (This book was reviewed digitally; the review has been updated for factual accuracy.)
An inspirational look at one girl’s quest to make sure that all skin tones are visible and available in the classroom. (note from Woodard, information on Woodard’s journey into activism, instructions on starting a drive) (Picture-book biography. 6-10)Pub Date: July 26, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-338-80927-5
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: April 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2022
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