In spare verse, Lowry reflects on moments in her childhood, including the bombings of Pearl Harbor and Hiroshima.
When she was a child, Lowry played at Waikiki Beach with her grandmother while her father filmed. In the old home movie, the USS Arizona appears through the mist on the horizon. Looking back at her childhood in Hawaii and then Japan, Lowry reflects on the bombings that began and ended a war and how they affected and connected everyone involved. In Part 1, she shares the lives and actions of sailors at Pearl Harbor. Part 2 is stories of civilians in Hiroshima affected by the bombing. Part 3 presents her own experience as an American in Japan shortly after the war ended. The poems bring the haunting human scale of war to the forefront, like the Christmas cards a sailor sent days before he died or the 4-year-old who was buried with his red tricycle after Hiroshima. All the personal stories—of sailors, civilians, and Lowry herself—are grounding. There is heartbreak and hope, reminding readers to reflect on the past to create a more peaceful future. Lowry uses a variety of poetry styles, identifying some, such as triolet and haiku. Pak’s graphite illustrations are like still shots of history, adding to the emotion and somber feeling. He includes some sailors of color among the mostly white U.S. forces; Lowry is white.
A beautiful, powerful reflection on a tragic history. (author’s note, bibliography) (Memoir/poetry. 10-14)Pub Date: April 7, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-358-12940-0
Page Count: 80
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2020
Categories: CHILDREN'S POETRY | CHILDREN'S BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | CHILDREN'S HISTORY
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PROFILES
Fleeing domestic abuse, a girl and her family begin a hard but hopeful journey to healing.
Eleven-year-old Lacey is shocked that Mama has called the police to take them, along with Lacey’s 4-year-old sister, Jenna, to safety—and unhappy at leaving the family dog behind. The girls are fearful and confused; Daddy’s rules prohibit leaving the house without him. Though he is put in jail, feeling safe will take time. Moving to transitional housing brings challenges. Lacey, home-schooled, has never had a friend. Daddy’s control over the family was absolute even when he wasn’t home to enforce it. Now Mama must learn to make her own decisions. Initially, Lacey misses Daddy’s rules, terrifying but known; she’s anxious at having new rules to follow, though breaking her father’s rules doesn’t bring retribution. With community help and support, the three timidly expand into their new life. Mama revives her artistic ambitions and, gaining strength, nurtures her daughters’ artistic gifts. Reading about Rachel Carson, Lacey finds life lessons in the natural world: observing how a sunflower grows from a seed and how a winding creek finds its own way. Lowell, who in an author’s note describes herself as a domestic-abuse survivor, focuses here on healing; the abuse is portrayed retrospectively—fitting, given her audience. Like her gentle illustrations, the verse format suits her story, a mosaic of small epiphanies that cumulatively chart a path from darkness into light. Characters’ race and ethnicities aren’t described explicitly.
A moving, age-appropriate, and convincing portrayal of family resilience after trauma. (Fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: May 10, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-593-10961-8
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Nancy Paulsen Books
Review Posted Online: June 22, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2022
Categories: CHILDREN'S POETRY | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S FAMILY
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For budding artists, here’s a heartening reminder that 17 unconventional greats—not to mention all the rest—started out as children too.
The pseudonymous Stabler (Robert Schnakenberg in real life) adopts a liberal admissions policy for his latest gathering of anecdotal profiles (Kid Presidents, 2014, etc.). In a chapter on the influence of nature and wildlife on early artistic visions, Leonardo da Vinci and the young Vincent van Gogh rub shoulders with Beatrix Potter and Emily Carr; in another focusing on overcoming shyness or other personal, social, or economic obstacles, Jackson Pollock hangs out with Charles Schulz, Yoko Ono, and Jean-Michel Basquiat. In a third chapter that highlights the importance of a supportive parent, teacher, or other cheerleader, fathers do for prodigious young Pablo Picasso and polio-stricken Frida Kahlo, his mother for Andy Warhol, art instructors for Jacob Lawrence and Keith Haring. The author owns an easy, readable style, and though he leaves out quite a lot—Diego Rivera goes unmentioned in the Kahlo entry, nor do van Gogh’s suicide, Basquiat’s heroin addiction, or anyone’s sexual orientation come up—he’s chosen his subjects with an eye toward diversity of background, upbringing, and, eventually, style and media. Horner lightens the overall tone further with cartoon vignettes of caricatured but recognizable figures.
Noncanonical entries make this a natural companion or follow-up for Kathleen Krull’s essential Lives of the Artists, illustrated by Kathryn Hewitt (1995). (bibliography) (Collective biography. 10-13)Pub Date: Aug. 9, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-59474-896-7
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Quirk Books
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2016
Categories: CHILDREN'S BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR
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