Eye-opening for young people who often take their technology for granted.
Following Just Like Beverly, by Vicki Conrad and illustrated by David Hohn (2019), this second entry in the Growing to Greatness series, featuring creative people from the Pacific Northwest, focuses on Bill Gates and the curiosity and ambition that led to his prominence in the world of personal computing.
As the third William Henry Gates, Bill was called Trey until he switched from his public school to the strict and exclusive Lakeside School in Seattle. Bored in school, Gates was finally inspired when he and his friends discovered a ASR-33 Teletype, which spurred Bill to begin programming, suspecting this was the forefront of a home-computer revolution. At Harvard, he and his friends began creating their own software and later created a company initially called Micro-Soft. The text is lively but frequently vague, with occasional odd phrases and ideas left unexplained. For example, when Gates became concerned about poor children around the world dying of diseases for lack of inexpensive vaccines, the text states, “Bill decided to turn caring into action,” but doesn’t specify exactly what he did, missing an opportunity to showcase Gates’ philanthropic work. Mildenberger’s illustrations nicely capture the energy of the text and include brown faces of classmates and on his travels. Young readers and listeners will get the titular message loud and clear.
Eye-opening for young people who often take their technology for granted. (further information, timeline, glossary) (Picture book/biography. 5-9)Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-63217-176-4
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Little Bigfoot/Sasquatch
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
A picture book more than worthy of sharing the shelf with Alan Schroeder and Jerry Pinkney’s Minty (1996) and Carole Boston...
A memorable, lyrical reverse-chronological walk through the life of an American icon.
In free verse, Cline-Ransome narrates the life of Harriet Tubman, starting and ending with a train ride Tubman takes as an old woman. “But before wrinkles formed / and her eyes failed,” Tubman could walk tirelessly under a starlit sky. Cline-Ransome then describes the array of roles Tubman played throughout her life, including suffragist, abolitionist, Union spy, and conductor on the Underground Railroad. By framing the story around a literal train ride, the Ransomes juxtapose the privilege of traveling by rail against Harriet’s earlier modes of travel, when she repeatedly ran for her life. Racism still abounds, however, for she rides in a segregated train. While the text introduces readers to the details of Tubman’s life, Ransome’s use of watercolor—such a striking departure from his oil illustrations in many of his other picture books—reveals Tubman’s humanity, determination, drive, and hope. Ransome’s lavishly detailed and expansive double-page spreads situate young readers in each time and place as the text takes them further into the past.
A picture book more than worthy of sharing the shelf with Alan Schroeder and Jerry Pinkney’s Minty (1996) and Carole Boston Weatherford and Kadir Nelson’s Moses (2006). (Picture book/biography. 5-8)Pub Date: Nov. 7, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-8234-2047-6
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Holiday House
Review Posted Online: Aug. 6, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2017
A solid addition to the climate-change canon for those interested in saving a fragile world.
Dire consequences attend the unchecked melting of Arctic sea ice.
The more the ice melts, the more the Arctic climate changes. The more that air and ground temperatures rise, the more the frozen ecosystem’s inhabitants, including plants and insects, suffer from dwindling habitats; threats to food sources; and imbalances in feeding, breeding, and migration patterns. Solid information is packed into this brief work that lucidly raises the alarm for young readers, with each spread capturing the thrilling, chilling north in rich, dramatic blue swathes of seawater set off by icy glaciers and snowdrifts. Child-friendly, occasionally cluttered paintings, some with labels, highlight polar bears and their Arctic neighbors; a spread of vignettes illustrates how changes to plant life affect wildlife. One labeled spread explains all: As seawater warms, it absorbs sunlight, thus heating more water and melting more ice. One poignant spread depicts a bewildered polar bear mom, eyeing readers and flanked by her twin cubs, drifting on a shrinking ice floe. Two human children, one brown-skinned and one pale, occasionally appear in the illustrations as well. The book ends on a hopeful note, reassuring youngsters that “we still have time to save polar bears and slow the loss of Arctic ice.” A note in the backmatter offers conservation tips.
A solid addition to the climate-change canon for those interested in saving a fragile world. (author’s note, bibliography, additional sources) (Informational picture book. 6-9)Pub Date: Aug. 28, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-250-14319-8
Page Count: 42
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: May 13, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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