These wardrobe doors open up on a world as magical as Narnia: the past.
You are what you wear.
Canales spotlights 10 distinct historical events or periods, among them the Greek Olympics, Tang-era China, the Inca state, and the French Revolution. Each spread depicts a crowd of people; at the bottom of the spread, the author lists four groups of people (for the Edo era, for instance, samurai, geishas, kabuki actors, and firefighters; for the roaring twenties, children, factory workers, flappers, and jazz musicians). Twelve accessories or apparel items are labeled, but for each of the four groups, one of the items is incorrect. The following pages go into more detail, explaining that during the roaring twenties, children wore Peter Pan collars and zip-up clothes but not long pants and that factory workers sported flat caps and house aprons but never hooped skirts, which could easily get caught in the machinery. Some anomalies are easy to spot; others are trickier. Canales’ concise, informative captions offer key facts and ask readers to actively participate, imagining what people might have worn in these eras; many readers will be spurred on to further research. Carefully composed, animated illustrations repay close scrutiny. This one isn’t just for fashionistas; it will appeal to anyone interested in world or art history. Canales concludes by speculating about what apparel people of the future might wear and identifying museums with well-known clothing collections.
These wardrobe doors open up on a world as magical as Narnia: the past. (Nonfiction. 6-12)Pub Date: May 14, 2025
ISBN: 9781838669966
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Phaidon
Review Posted Online: March 22, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2025
With young readers diagnosed with anxiety in ever increasing numbers, this book offers a necessary mirror to many.
Young Raina is 9 when she throws up for the first time that she remembers, due to a stomach bug. Even a year later, when she is in fifth grade, she fears getting sick.
Raina begins having regular stomachaches that keep her home from school. She worries about sharing food with her friends and eating certain kinds of foods, afraid of getting sick or food poisoning. Raina’s mother enrolls her in therapy. At first Raina isn’t sure about seeing a therapist, but over time she develops healthy coping mechanisms to deal with her stress and anxiety. Her therapist helps her learn to ground herself and relax, and in turn she teaches her classmates for a school project. Amping up the green, wavy lines to evoke Raina’s nausea, Telgemeier brilliantly produces extremely accurate visual representations of stress and anxiety. Thought bubbles surround Raina in some panels, crowding her with anxious “what if”s, while in others her negative self-talk appears to be literally crushing her. Even as she copes with anxiety disorder and what is eventually diagnosed as mild irritable bowel syndrome, she experiences the typical stresses of school life, going from cheer to panic in the blink of an eye. Raina is white, and her classmates are diverse; one best friend is Korean American.
With young readers diagnosed with anxiety in ever increasing numbers, this book offers a necessary mirror to many. (Graphic memoir. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 17, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-545-85251-7
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Graphix/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 11, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2019
Though a bit loose around the edges, a charmer nevertheless.
Tales of a fourth grade ne’er-do-well.
It seems that young Jordan is stuck in a never-ending string of bad luck. Sure, no one’s perfect (except maybe goody-two-shoes William Feranek), but Jordan can’t seem to keep his attention focused on the task at hand. Try as he may, things always go a bit sideways, much to his educators’ chagrin. But Jordan promises himself that fourth grade will be different. As the year unfolds, it does prove to be different, but in a way Jordan couldn’t possibly have predicted. This humorous memoir perfectly captures the square-peg-in-a-round-hole feeling many kids feel and effectively heightens that feeling with comic situations and a splendid villain. Jordan’s teacher, Mrs. Fisher, makes an excellent foil, and the book’s 1970s setting allows for her cruelty to go beyond anything most contemporary readers could expect. Unfortunately, the story begins to run out of steam once Mrs. Fisher exits. Recollections spiral, losing their focus and leading to a more “then this happened” and less cause-and-effect structure. The anecdotes are all amusing and Jordan is an endearing protagonist, but the book comes dangerously close to wearing out its welcome with sheer repetitiveness. Thankfully, it ends on a high note, one pleasant and hopeful enough that readers will overlook some of the shabbier qualities. Jordan is White and Jewish while there is some diversity among his classmates; Mrs. Fisher is White.
Though a bit loose around the edges, a charmer nevertheless. (Memoir. 8-12)Pub Date: Feb. 2, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-338-64723-5
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Nov. 17, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2020
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