It's Monday - Sharing Favorites

        Visit Jen at Teach MentorTexts and Kellee and Ricki at UnleashingReaders to discover books you'll love!  Thanks to Jen, Kellee, and Ricki who share so much with us by taking time to support this meme!

I have some new books to share, and some I finally caught up with! Thanks to Candlewick for these first two books.

          One winter's night, five siblings looked out a window in their living room, noticed it was unusually blue even for dusk, and one by one, Susan, Max, Nell, Kate, and Jean tumbled through into another world. Day after day, they had to learn to fight for survival in this strange new world where people's faces looked different, and the children's faces were noticed, sometimes with fear, other times with jealousy. It would be a while before they discovered why. Susan, the oldest, then her twin, Max, both thirteen, begins the story and each has a turn as they escape dangers again and again. It reminded me of other fantastical worlds, but the horror they faced connected more to "The Knife of Never Letting Go" by Patrick Ness rather than Madeleine L'engle's "A Wrinkle In Time" or the Narnia series. 

         I enjoyed the unique voices of each child as they continued the story, and the important parts each played in their survival, even the youngest, Jean, who often felt like she didn't understand what older ones said and as if they didn't care if she did either. Each had individual quirks to learn about, to like or to dislike. And I liked the world-building, but sometimes it felt over long and even for me, some things repeated and confusing. It feels more like a book for fantasy-loving teens rather than middle school. I cannot share quotes because this is an arc, thanks to Candlewick Press, but will add that I loved much of the writing and language used by Adina Rishe Gewirtz and marked more than one page. 

          Also from Candlewick, a beginning-to-learn-colors book for toddlers, showing our joyful and colorful world. In contrast to a Black Bird, Steve Light's bold and bright illustrations travel from morning "yellow sun" through midday "green grass" to night's "blue moon". It's a great book to learn about colors and a few things in the natural world.

           Another color book, this time for young readers, all about the Festival of Colors, the Indian Festival of Holi that's celebrated in spring, when flower colors appear. The text is brief, showing two youngsters, Chintoo and Mintoo, gathering all colors of flowers to ready for the festival. There is a process of drying and grinding, then bringing the bowls of color to throw into the air on festival night. Now, the afterword says, most of the powders are pre-prepared and bought instead of being made at home. Colorful pages happily tell the story, a nice introduction to a festival that some children in the U.S. will not know of, but connect to in the celebration. 

                 The words are just enough for the story paired with the page-by-page delightful illustrations of those invited to shelter under that “big umbrella”, and page by page, everyone is invited. It’s what I call a big smile of a book, one to read, enjoy and discuss with a child or a group of children. It reminds me of the concept of everyone having a seat at the table, and it is so good!

       

Much honored at ALA Midwinter, I'm so glad I finally got this book. Is it silly for me to compare myself to a young black boy? Maybe. But I feel pretty good when I come from my shop, having a new haircut. This "ode to a fresh cut" shows the happy feelings of a boy who goes for a cut, where the barber will "drape you like royalty with that cape/to keep the fine hairs off of your neck/and your princely robes." He says his "whole school will be seasick from the rows and rows of ripples. You'll have more waves on your head than the Atlantic Ocean." The uproar over a haircut plays out with his descriptions of all the other men in the shop, one with "a faux-hawk, deep part, skin fade. He looks presidential." Another "looks majestic." A favorite page is a dream where, when his cut is done, everyone will rise to give a "round of applause for being so fly". He is so happy, there, looking great, ready to go out into the world "Magnificent. Flawless. Like royalty."  This young boy's voice in the words by Derrick Barnes show the feelings, stunning illustrations by Gordon C. James show the celebration. 

            In the author's note, Derrick Barnes tells about his own experience with a Mr. Tony, says when black boys "highly approve of their reflections in the mirror. . .Deep down inside, they wish everyone could see what they see: a real life, breathing, compassionate, thoughtful, brilliant, limitless soul that matters--that desperately matters." It's a book for all, but especially for black boys.

          Frank Martin’s beautiful, strong children grace the pages of this inspiring story about the children who marched for freedom from segregation in Birmingham, 1963. They marched, then went to jail, and they were noticed across the world. This was the beginning of the loosening of the laws and it was children who did it. Monica Clark-Robinson tells the story from the beginning conversation where parents are scared they’d lose their jobs, they had a family to feed. Then the children spoke and said they could march, they didn’t have a job to lose, but much to gain. The end papers show the timeline from the opening to the ending pages with children holding what could be protest signs with the particular date to celebrate. What a good book to introduce this struggle to today’s children who could do further research about our important history.

         Reading this, I am reminded of the children of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High school who will be carrying their signs also to effect change.

        I hope this message will help all ages. It spoke to me, too. This is a book I'd have in the classroom, it's the book I'll share with my granddaughters and anyone else who happens to drop by. After taking one tiny chance and falling flat, a young one decides not to take one more. He ignored them all but begins to wonder why those chances never come his way anymore. Thinking through his misgivings, he says, "Maybe I don't have to be brave all the time. Maybe I just need to be brave for a little while at the right time." It's a beautiful message, made all the more powerful with the dream-like illustrations by Mae Besom.

Still Reading: The Tender Bar, by J.R. Moehringer.  

Nearly Done: In Sight of Stars by Gae Polisner, from NetGalley, out in a couple of weeks. 

Next: another arc from Candlewick, a verse novel about the beginnings of the Revolutionary War, Siege, by Roxane Orgill and I have The Serpent's Secret by Sayantani Dasgupta!