Annette Bay Pimentel

Review

19Dec

Deep in the Sahara

Posted by: annettepimentel@gmail.com Categories: Review

We lived in Khartoum, Sudan with our children. We’d lived several places in Europe before that, and I thought i was an experienced expatriate. Sudan, however, stunned me. It was so very, very different from any other place I had ever lived! I watched in surprise as my children fitted themselves comfortably into the rhythms […]

Tags: Africa historical fiction religion Schwartz & Wade

17Dec

Animal Teachers

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“Who taught you to do things? Your parents and others who care about you were your first teachers. Who teaches animals?” Each spread of this book explores a different animal which has to learn a survival behavior after it is born. It’s a layered text–you can read just the large font text and have it […]

Tags: animals biology Blue Apple layered text

15Dec

Edward Hopper Paints His World

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This lovely, quiet book tells the story of Edward Hopper’s life from the time he was a child with a new pencil box until he finished his last painting. The narrative voice is soulful, telling emotionally-charged anecdotes with vivid words, as well as reflective, using questions to organize the story: Edward wondered: will I ever […]

Tags: artists back matter biography Christy Ottaviano Books narrative voice

10Dec

Attack! Boss! Cheat Code! A Gamer’s Alphabet

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This inventive book cruises through the alphabet with specialized videogame terms. The narrative voice isn’t stuffy at all but complicit–a good buddy revealing secrets. My eleven year old son–who seldom looks at any ABC books these days–loved it. Besides being great for gamers or would-be gamers, this book could be used in the classroom or […]

Tags: ABC books jargon narrative voice Pow! Books

8Dec

Review: Ellen’s Broom

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Sometimes important historical events remain only in fragmentary records. Thank goodness for historical fiction, which lets us see what those records mean in real human lives. Inspired by the Freedmen Bureau’s Cohabitation List of 1866, Lyons has constructed a story that shows the trauma slavery inflicted on black marriages and the joy with which couples […]

Tags: Civil War historical fiction Reconstruction

5Dec

Move!

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This book is built around an insight so obvious you’ve probably never thought about it. I hadn’t! Despite what we teach toddlers, bunnies don’t only hop and birds don’t only fly. All living creatures move in different ways at different times. Page builds that insight into her clever structure: we see each featured animal move in two different […]

Tags: animals Houghton Mifflin Harcourt science structure

3Dec

Separate is Never Equal

Posted by: annettepimentel@gmail.com Categories: Review

Duncan Tonatiuh’s distinctive artwork illustrates this story of a family that brought a lawsuit to desegregate schools. The story is long–2321 words!–but Tonatiuh makes sure everything is told from young Sylvia’s point of view. The dialogue in the book keeps things lively, and I was delighted that the author included a note about that dialogue […]

Tags: Abrams Books back matter biography civil rights court cases narrative voice quotations segregation

1Dec

War Dogs

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It’s hard to find a new angle on topics that have been written about before. Over. And. Over. But Selbert does so charmingly: Rufus’ best friend, Winston Churchill, is a busy man, but most days Rufus and Winston share a walk. From this auspicious beginning, we watch Churchill save the Western world from the perspective […]

Tags: biography British Charlesbridge history pets World War II

24Nov

Those Rebels, John and Tom

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This brilliantly written book explores the differences and similarities between Thomas Jefferson and John Adams and how they helped shape their cooperation in making a new nation. The book starts with a strong opening: The true story of how one gentleman–short and stout–and another–tall and lean–formed a surprising alliance, committed treason, and helped launch a […]

Tags: American Revolution biography history John Adams narrative voice quotations Scholastic Thomas Jefferson word choice

21Nov

Benny Goodman and Teddy Wilson

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This book, about a landmark moment in jazz history, is written with a jazz-inspired narrative voice, playing with literary convention–there’s no end punctuation in the entire book–and dabbling with different poetic devices, like rhyme, alliteration, and onomatopoeia, without ever committing to one. The story’s told with staccato phrases in shotgun bursts. Ransome uses rich and […]

Tags: biography history Holiday House music narrative voice segregation word choice

19Nov

All Different Now: Juneteenth, the First Day of Freedom

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Sometimes historical fiction is the closest we can get to the past. In an “Author’s Note,” Angela Johnson explains the limitations she was under in writing about the day slaves were emancipated: I’d love to know how my great-grandparents celebrated when told they were free. But that tale has been lost to time, so I […]

Tags: Angela Johnson Civil War historical fiction history Simon & Schuster

17Nov

Look Up! Henrietta Leavitt, Pioneering Woman Astronomer

Posted by: annettepimentel@gmail.com Categories: Review Uncategorized

In writing biography, it’s tempting to start at your subject’s birth and finish at your subject’s death. But usually that’s not the structure that will best tell the story. In this biography of an astronomer, the book starts with her gazing at the stars as a child and wondering about them. We see her work […]

Tags: astronomer biography scientist Simon & Schuster structure

14Nov

Under the Freedom Tree

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This is an inspiring story with haunting art. It tells of three slaves who escape to the shelter of a Union fort during the Civil War and what follows their brave action. Van Hecke’s language is spare and evocative. She even leaves out articles to distill the language . We get unadorned image: May moon […]

Tags: art Charlesbridge Civil War history word choice

12Nov

Fish for Jimmy

Posted by: annettepimentel@gmail.com Categories: Review Uncategorized

[booknet booknumber=9780823423750] Historical fiction can be used to present troubling topics in a controlled way appropriate for young children. In this historical fiction, Yamasaki skillfully tackles a difficult subject–World War II Japanese-American internment camps. Her story shows the triumph of brotherly kindness and courage, without glossing over the institutional cruelty of the camps. Her narrative voice is […]

Tags: family history historical fiction Holiday House Katie Yamasaki World War II

5Nov

Review: The World’s Best Noses, Ears, and Eyes

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[booknet booknumber=”9780823431614″] In this inventive nonfiction picture book, each page is written in the voice of an animal who is arguing about why its nose (or ear or eye) is the “best.” These are great examples of persuasive writing, and along the way we learn a lot about how animals specialize to fit their individual environmental […]

Tags: biology Holiday House nature persuasive writing Sweden

29Oct

A Home for Mr. Emerson

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How do you summarize a life like Ralph Waldo Emerson’s for a picture book biography? Barbara Kerley did it by choosing one theme–Emerson’s desire for a home–and follows it throughout his life. We see him longing for a home as a child, building a home and community with his wife, losing his home to a […]

Tags: lists nineteenth century philosopher quotations Scholastic sensory detail

27Oct

Review: Animal School: What Class Are You?

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[booknet booknumber= “9780823430451”] Despite the title, this book doesn’t have anything to do with school or classes (check out Snow School if you’re looking for an animals-school comparison). Instead, it’s a clever rhyming picture book outlining the different characteristics of vertebrate classes: amphibians, birds, fish, mammals, and reptiles. Lord uses rhyming couplets, each with 7 or 8 […]

Tags: biology Holiday House Michael Garland Michelle Lord nature poetry vertebrates

23Oct

Review: A Boy and a Jaguar

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[booknet booknumber=”9780547875071″] This moving autobiography tells the story, in first person present tense, of a boy who stutters but can speak fluently to animals. We live with him through the despair and loneliness of school and then find, with him, the joy of researching jaguars in the wild. We see his passion to protect the […]

Tags: Alan Rabinowitz biography CáTia Chien conservation Houghton Mifflin Harcourt jaguar stuttering word choice

20Oct

Review: Feathers, Not Just for Flying

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[booknet booknumber=”9781580894302″] “Birds and feathers go together, like trees and leaves, like stars and the sky.” Melissa Stewart’s lyrical voice makes this information-packed book a great read aloud. The layered text structure is elegantly simple. Each spread compares a function of feathers to something in a child’s frame of reference–“Feathers can shade out sun like […]

Tags: back matter biology birds Charlesbridge layered text Melissa Stewart metaphor nature Sarah S. Brannen

17Oct

Lifetime The Amazing Numbers in Animal Lives

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This is not your everyday counting book! No 1-2-3 or babyish illustrations here. Instead, Lola Schaefer attacks the idea of averages for middle grade readers. The mathematics are sophisticated but she keeps the text simple and clear. Brevity and consistency are the heart of the book. Every spread has a sentence in exactly the […]

Tags: back matter Chronicle Books mathematics middle grade nature structure

15Oct

Review: Roller Derby Rivals

Posted by: annettepimentel@gmail.com Categories: Book trailer Review

“Crash!” This book plunges us into the action with its first word. We follow Toughie Brasuhn and Gerry Murray’s roller derby rivalry as we read about one day’s match. We also get a glimpse of the way sports came to television. Sue Macy’s narrative voice is fast and engaging; her present tense third person narration […]

Tags: back matter first page Holiday House Matt Collins roller derby roller derby rivals scaffolding sports Sue Macy

13Oct

Review: The Pilot and the Little Prince: The Life of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

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Sometimes brilliant book design elevates a good story into something extraordinary. In the main text of this biography of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Peter Sís uses language infused with the same tone as Saint-Exupéry’s masterpiece, The Little Prince: Long ago in France, at the turn of the last century, a little boy was born to be an adventurer. The […]

Tags: airplanes Antonie de Saint-Exupéry author back matter biography book design Farrar Straus and Giroux layered text Peter Sís

8Oct

Review: The Streak: How Joe DiMaggio Became America’s Hero

Posted by: annettepimentel@gmail.com Categories: Book trailer Review

Joe DiMaggio’s hitting streak is an amazing story in itself, but Rosenstock puts the streak in its historical context. We see how DiMaggio struggled to achieve the record and how his brilliant success gave hope to a nation facing a world war. Rosenstock sets the stage deftly on the first page where she talks about […]

Tags: back matter Barb Rosenstock baseball biography Calkins Creek history Joe DiMaggio sports Terry Widener word choice World War II

6Oct

Review: The Fabulous Feud

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[booknet booknumber= “9780439930505”] “There was a time when jolly old England was not so jolly. Children worked in factories. Queen Victoria frowned. Everything was grim. Everything was dark—except…in the make-believe kingdom of Topsy-Turvydom.” Gilbert and Sullivan’s hilarious operas can just seem strange if you don’t understand the class-bound, rule-conscious Victorian world they came from. In The […]

Tags: Arthur A. Levine books back matter biography British character education dialogue first page friendship Gilbert & Sullivan Jonah Winter Mikado music Page turn Richard Egielski theater Victorian\ Victorians

1Oct

Review: Thomas Jefferson: Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Everything

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Illustrator Maira Kalman follows up her 2012 book about Lincoln (Looking at Lincoln) with a look at another president, Thomas Jefferson. Once again, the narrator’s voice is memorable and spunky, but while the Lincoln book had a childlike narrator, this book sounds like your quirky Aunt Edna telling you stuff: But wait. We have not spoken of […]

Tags: American Revolution biography Founding Fathers Maira Kalman Nancy Paulsen Books nonfiction picture book structure Thomas Jefferson US Presidents

29Sep

Review: The Fabulous Flying Machines of Alberto Santos-Dumont

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Who was the first person to fly an airplane? This book profiles Alberto Santos-Dumont, the Brazilian contender. It’s a charming story of sophisticated Parisian life in 1903, despite clunky invented dialogue and an awkward shift in point of view in the middle of the book. Louis Blériot, the hero of Alice and Martin Provensen’s Caldecott […]

Tags: Abrams Books airplanes Alberto Santos-Dumont biography Common Core fourth grade history Louis Bleriot Paris Victoria Griffiths

24Sep

Review: Baseball Is…

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Louise Borden and Raúl Colon have created a lyrical ode to baseball and its place in American culture. Such a huge, amorphous topic must have been tough to structure into a narrative, but Borden uses chronological arcs to organize everything. She uses both the arc of a single game and the arc of an entire […]

Tags: baseball Baseball Is Louise Borden Margaret K. McElderry Books Raul Colon structure

22Sep

Review: Stone Giant

Posted by: annettepimentel@gmail.com Categories: Book trailer Review

This book opens with a giant block of marble standing in a courtyard in Florence and tells the story of how that chunk of rock became Michelangelo’s iconic statue of David. The book doesn’t break any new ground historically, and it doesn’t rely on primary documents, but the clever structure makes it a great introduction […]

Tags: artist biography Charlesbridge David Florence Jane Sutcliffe John Shelley marble Michelangelo Renaissance sculpture sensory detail Stone Giant structure

19Sep

Review: My Country, ‘Tis of Thee: How One Song Reveals the History of Civil Rights

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I don’t think I’ve sung a picture book since Iza Trapani’s Itsy Bitsy Spider, but I found myself singing page after page of this wonderful picture book. Murphy traces America’s civil rights debates since colonial times by showing how the lyrics to “My Country, ‘Tis of Thee” have been changed over and over to address new challenges […]

Tags: civil rights Claire Rudolf Murphy Henry Holt history music My Country Tis of Thee thesis

17Sep

Review: Hot Dog! Eleanor Roosevelt Throws a Picnic

Posted by: annettepimentel@gmail.com Categories: Review

How do you tell a life in picture book format? The most obvious story structure–birth to death–often flattens the historical character. It can be boring. Zeroing in on a single moment in that astonishing life, though, makes that character spring to life. In Hot Dog! Eleanor Roosevelt Throws a Picnic Leslie Kimmelman writes about Eleanor Roosevelt […]

Tags: biography British royalty Eleanor Roosevelt history hot dog Leslie Kimmelman picnic quotations Sleeping Bear Press US Presidents Victor Juhasz World War II

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