A beautiful account of a young woman who knew that all she needed to reach her dream was courage and a chance to try.
National Young People’s Poet Laureate Engle brings to children the story of Aída de Acosta, who in 1903 became the first woman to fly a motorized aircraft.
In her trademark free-verse style, Engle tells the story of Aída, a white Hispanic teenager from New Jersey who, on a trip to Paris, is dazzled by the sight of a balloon gliding by with an air boat dangling beneath and a man inside it. Determined to fly too, Aída approaches the inventor of the airship: Alberto Santos-Dumont, a Brazilian inventor known in his country as the father of aviation, achieving flight six months before the Wright brothers. Aída learns to fly, and fly she does, much to the consternation of her contemporaries: “girls, they bellowed, should never / be taught how to fly / huge machines.” Palacios’ exuberant mixed-media artwork is vibrant and colorful, in tune with Aída. Readers will chuckle at her portrayal of an aerial dinner with the waiters on stilts. In a closing note the author gives additional detail, including Aída’s promise to her father that she would keep her daring deed a secret and, later in life, after losing an eye to glaucoma, her becoming the director of the first eye bank in America.
A beautiful account of a young woman who knew that all she needed to reach her dream was courage and a chance to try. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: March 6, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4814-4502-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: Nov. 21, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2017
An inspiring and appealing snapshot of a strong woman and activist, her world and her legacy, told with warmth and charm
A city is more than the sum of its parts!
Full of curiosity from a young age, Jane is a keen observer. Colorful and appealing illustrations tinged with gentle humor show Jane as she explains how the world around her functions to a cadre of imaginary friends. She discovers that manholes look like waffles, and she later sees that gas, water, steam, electricity, and sewage all have their places in structures underground. Animals, plants, and weather are part of an ecosystem. And a city is an ecosystem, too. “It is made of different parts—sidewalks, parks, stores, neighborhoods, City Hall…and people, of course. When they all work together, the city is healthy.” As an adult, Jane becomes a journalist, marries, has children, and fights against city planners who want to tear down neighborhoods to build a series of high-rises. When her own community comes under fire, Jane Jacobs becomes a full-fledged activist, joining rallies, writing letters, and even closing off a park to effectively stand up against big developers who initially dismiss her as a mere mother. While notably addressing character traits such as resilience and integrity, the accessible text is infused with a sense of joie de vivre and a love of cities and community, very successfully showing how social action can develop from belief, dedication, and enthusiasm. Boivin’s soft-edged illustrations depict appealing urban neighborhoods populated by diverse residents who surround Jacobs as the determined, bespectacled white woman ages with vigor.
An inspiring and appealing snapshot of a strong woman and activist, her world and her legacy, told with warmth and charm . (Picture book/biography. 4-8)Pub Date: April 3, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-77138-653-1
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Kids Can
Review Posted Online: Jan. 21, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2018
A salutary, mission-driven tribute to hard work and persistence.
There are many ways to meet a challenge, and they all don’t have to come from inside.
Two of the great fruits of McGillivray’s story are that it applies to so many people and it is true. True stories let us know that our dreams really can come true. Dave is a small white kid, and the games for big bruisers are just out of his league. But then he catches the running bug. Dave has dreams of standing tall on the podium, but his first marathon, at 17, is a bust (he’d only been training for a year and hadn’t touched 26.2 miles). Dave is crestfallen, but his grandpa counsels, “You didn’t fail. You discovered something…you discovered that big dreams don’t just come true. They take work, hard work.” Well, Grandpa isn’t there to see it, but Dave does train hard, and although he breaks down on his second try, he also gets up with the memory of hard work and completes the marathon. In a wonderful turnaround, today Dave is race director of the Boston Marathon. “And guess what? I always come in last.” It’s a consciously inspiring story, straightforwardly told with the help of Feeher. The mostly-white cast of Himler’s rather washed-out watercolor illustrations says a lot about how the sport has grown both more international and more diverse.
A salutary, mission-driven tribute to hard work and persistence. (map) (Picture book/memoir. 4-8)Pub Date: March 1, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-61930-618-9
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Nomad Press
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2018
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