In today’s nonfiction picture books, rich back matter abounds! I love the way back matter extends the experience of reading a book. Often author essays explore issues of research as well as showing their personal connection to subject matter. Rich back matter also opens up books to different kinds of audiences–kids who are passionate about numbers may find statistical information fascinating; kids who love history may be drawn to timelines; kids who are visually oriented may find the comparison between photographs in the back matter and illustrations in the main text telling.

Here are three recent books, each with multiple spreads of the book given to rich back matter.

Cover of book shows part of Yogi Berra's face

Yogi: The Life, Loves, and Language of Baseball Legend Yogi Berra by Barb Rosenstock has four spreads devoted to back matter! The “Author’s Note” is a biographical essay, filling out details covered in the book and covering his personal as well as professional life. It’s accompanied by two black and white photos. I’d love to dive into the photos with students, asking them what details from the book they can find confirmed by the photos.

The second spread devoted to back matter is full of baseball statistics. I wonder what arithmetic problems kids could write based on this page?

The third spread has information about a Yogi Berra Museum and includes the bibliography.

The fourth spread has both quotations from Yogi Berra and a short note about those quotations and it also includes source attributions for the quotations included in the book.

Cover of book shows caricactures of rap musicians

The Roots of Rap by Carole Boston Weatherford has a much more personal back matter. The “Author’s Note” and the “Illustrator’s Note” both talk about the creators’ personal connections to rap music.

Its two other spreads of back matter have a glossary of rap terms and a “Hip-Hop Who’s Who” with short biographies of 20 hip-hop artists and producers.

Cover of book shows a diamond and a boy in overalls.

Finally, The Diamond and the Boy by Hannah Holt, also has three spreads of back matter. The first spread mimics the dual structure of the book: one side is a short essay about the history of diamond mining and marketing while the opposite side of the spread has a short and very personal essay about Tracy Hall, the author’s grandfather.

The other two spreads have a timeline and a bibliography. Family photos are sprinkled throughout the back matter; my favorite is one of the author as a child getting a hug from the subject of the book.

Yogi The Life, Loves, and Language of Baseball Legend Yogi Berra by Barb Rosenstock, illustrated by Terry Widener. Calkins Creek: 2019.

The Roots of Rap: 16 Bars on the 4 Pillars of Hip-hop by Carole Boston Weatherford, illustrated by Frank Morrison. little bee books: 2019.

The Diamond and the Boy: The Creation of Diamonds & theLife of H. Tracy Hall by Hannah Holt, illustrated by Jay Fleck. Balzer + Bray: 2018.

Picture of tree going out of book with words "Nonfiction Picture Book Challenge 2019"
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