Hero of the Empire: The Boer War, a Daring Escape, and the Making of Winston Churchill by Candice Millard, read by Simon Vance (who makes anything he reads good!). Partial biography of the British prime minister, focusing on his exploits early in life in the Second Boer War in 1899-1900, which generated publicity and helped launch his political career.
Graphic Novels:
New Kid, written and illustrated by Jerry Craft, is the first graphic novel to win (in 2020) the John Newbery Medal for the most outstanding contribution to children's literature. It also won the Coretta Scott King (Author) Book Award and was a Charlotte Huck Award Honor book. This book is set in middle school and aimed at that audience. The graphic novel format is fitting, as the main character, Jordan, loves to draw and would rather go to art school than the New York City prestigious private school he attends with financial aid. There, he's one of only a few minority students, enduring some bullying and racism, but also consistent microaggression from a teacher who can't be bothered to learn the real name of one of her black students, consistently calling him by the same-letter ethnic first name of a previous black student.
The chapter titles are puns on book, TV, or movie titles (examples: The War of Art, The Hungry Games: Stop Mocking J, The Socky Horror Picture Show, Field of Screams, The Farce Awakens, and Rad Men). This means some will become dated and likely vague with time. Jordan's own comics from his sketchbook (always in black and white) are included throughout. Pages 130-131 is a double-page-spread called "Judging Kids by the Covers of Their Books," contrasting mainstream lily-white adventurer books with books marketed to black kids (featuring drugs, poverty, rap, and basketball).
Stargazing, written by Jen Wang - Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature
Children’s Literature winner - middle-grade graphic novel about friendship, and fitting in, featuring two very different Asian-American girls. In an interview, author Jen Wang says both girls (and their experiences) are modeled on her real life. The illustrations by Chinese-Americans Wang and colorist Lark Pien were penciled with a mechanical #2 pencil, inked with an Uni Jetstream ballpoint pen, and colored digitally in Photoshop.
Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up with Me, by Mariko Tamaki, illustrated by Rosemary Valero-O’Connell - Michael L. Printz Award for excellence in literature written for young adults - Honor Book; also Walter Dean Myers Award for Outstanding Children’s Literature, Winner, 2020
Kind of surprised some people in my homophobic small town haven't requested a ban of this graphic novel about LGBQT+ relationships (romantic and platonic) between teen girls (the one with the Laura Dean of the title being rather toxic). The detailed, expressive illustrations are all in black, white, gray, and light pink.
Picture books
Fry Bread: A Native American Family Story by Kevin Noble Maillard, illus. by Juana Martinez-Neal - This book won the 2020 Robert F. Sibert Informational Book Award. It was also an American Indian Youth Literature Award Picture Book honor title, a Charlotte Huck Award Commended title, and a Charlotte Zolotow Award Honor Book. The illustrations were done in acrylics, colored pencils, and graphite on hand-textured paper and have a soft feel to them. The author provides a recipe for fry bread at the end, as well as a page with references and [end]notes. In between the recipe and that last page, there is a lengthy eight-page author's note where the author provides lots more details about each double-page spread, including what's in the illustrations. Those spreads all start out "Fry bread is ___," (specifically, food, shape, sound, color, flavor, time, art, history, place, nation, everything, us, you) with a few other descriptive sentences, making this book usable with younger children, while the author's note can extend the usage for older kids.
Bowwow Powwow written by Brenda J.Child - The cartoonish illustrations of this book did not appeal to me. However, the drawings of dancing costumes worn by anthropomorphized dogs of different breeds were intriguing, and a historical note at the end of the book about the costumes would have been quite interesting. Published by Minnesota Historical Society Press with bilingual text in English and Ojibwe, this book was the 2020 American Indian Youth Literature Award Picture Book winner.
The Book Rescuer: How a Mensch from Massachusetts Saved Yiddish Literature for Generations to Come, by Sue Macy, illustrated by Stacy Innerst - This picture book biography of Aaron Lansky, whose interest in the Yiddish language led to his founding of the Yiddish Book Center, was the 2020 Sydney Taylor Book Award Picture Book winner, presented annually to outstanding books for children and teens that authentically portray the Jewish experience. Author Sue Macy includes an afterword by Lansky, an author's note, source notes and a brief bibliography, and a two-page glossary of Yiddish terms and expressions. The illustrations by Stacy Innerst were done in acrylic and gouache on gessoed illustration board, with fabric textures added digitally, and were inspired by Marc Chagall's work (according to the illustrator's note).
Theodor Seuss Geisel Award for the most distinguished beginning reader book
Honor Book: Flubby Is Not a Good Pet! written and illustrated by J. E. Morris - Well duh - Flubby is a cat, so of course Flubby is not a good pet. The book is very easy to read, but otherwise, I'm not impressed.
What Is Given from the Heart, illustrated by April Harrison, winner, written by Patricia C. McKissack - This was the last book by Patricia McKissack, a three-time Coretta Scott King Award winner and Newbery Honor author, published after she died in 2017. It's a touching story of a poor family that makes gifts for another family worse off than themselves--gifts from the heart. It is a debut picture book for illustrator April Harrison (who won the 2020 Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe New Talent Illustrator Award), who uses mixed media (acrylics, collage, art pens, and found objects) to make her subtle but glowing pictures. A lovely tribute to the author.
Touch and Explore - The Ocean - This is a touch-and-feel board book, but larger in size than most, and full of informative facts that extend the book's life beyond the toddler stage. Touchable pages include a scaly fish, sandpaper shark, and soft feathery bird. There are also a couple flaps to open. I bought this as a gift for a cousin's one-year-old, but it arrived too late for the birthday party. Two other books from the series (Farm and Pets) did arrive in time, and my cousin reports "these are already some of the books she always reaches for!"
Other children's/YA books
Other Words for Home, written by Jasmine Warga - Newbery Honor Book - novel in verse about a young teenage girl, Jude, and her pregnant mother who leave Syria when violence escalates, moving in with the mother's brother in Cincinnati. Jude's father and brother (who is active politically) stay behind. Jude has to deal with being a refugee and Muslim, but she makes friends and the ending is positive.
Genesis Begins Again, written by Alicia D. Williams was a 2020 Newbery Honor Book, Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe New Talent Author Award winner, and William C. Morris Award finalist. Genesis is a 13-year-old black girl who thinks her skin is too dark and her hair too kinky. She looks more like her dad, a drunk who gambles the rent money and keeps getting them evicted, than her beautiful light-skinned mother. Somehow her dad gets the family in a home in a mostly-white Detroit suburb. A judgmental grandmother who epitomizes colorism is not helpful, but a sympathetic music teacher is. Eventually Genesis makes some real friends at her new school and starts to think better of herself. The book is a little long for a middle-grade book (364 pages), and Genesis takes some extreme steps to try to be "prettier," so parents might want to keep that in mind. In an NPR interview with debut author Alicia D. Williams, she noted that the kindergartners she taught, when asked "to pick out a crayon that reflected their skin tone, ... something heartbreaking happened: Out of a spectrum of multicultural options, 'Never, never, never do our kids of color choose a skin tone that's close to theirs. They go as light as possible.'"
Book Club:
Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult - set in Connecticut, no way could it be in the South. Funny food-related puns on page 263 of large-print edition. Some passages I liked -
page 132 (large print), in an aside describing his father-in-law Francis, supremicist Turk Bauer says, "Old skinheads don't die. They used to join the KKK, but now they join the Tea Party. Don't believe me? Go listen to an old Klan speaker and compare it to a speech by a Tea Party Patriot. Instead of saying Jew, they now say Federal government. Instead of saying Fags, they say Social ilk of our country. Instead of saying Nigger, they say Welfare."
page 385 (large print), when Turk's friend Raine explains why he got out of the supremicist movement, primarily due to his young daughter: "'Maybe the shit we've been saying all these years isn't legit. It's the ultimate bait and switch, man. They promised us we'd be part of something bigger than us. That we'd be proud of our heritage and our race. And maybe that's, like, ten percent of the whole deal. The rest is just hating everyone else for existing. Once I started thinking that, I couldn't stop. Maybe that's why I felt like shit all the time, like I wanted to fucking bust someone's face in constantly, just to remind myself that I could. That's okay for me. But it's not how I want my kid to grow up.'"
page 132 (large print), in an aside describing his father-in-law Francis, supremicist Turk Bauer says, "Old skinheads don't die. They used to join the KKK, but now they join the Tea Party. Don't believe me? Go listen to an old Klan speaker and compare it to a speech by a Tea Party Patriot. Instead of saying Jew, they now say Federal government. Instead of saying Fags, they say Social ilk of our country. Instead of saying Nigger, they say Welfare."
page 385 (large print), when Turk's friend Raine explains why he got out of the supremicist movement, primarily due to his young daughter: "'Maybe the shit we've been saying all these years isn't legit. It's the ultimate bait and switch, man. They promised us we'd be part of something bigger than us. That we'd be proud of our heritage and our race. And maybe that's, like, ten percent of the whole deal. The rest is just hating everyone else for existing. Once I started thinking that, I couldn't stop. Maybe that's why I felt like shit all the time, like I wanted to fucking bust someone's face in constantly, just to remind myself that I could. That's okay for me. But it's not how I want my kid to grow up.'"
Miss Dreamsville and the Collier County Women's Literary Society by Amy Hill Hearth - This is a funny book, set in 1962 in what was then quiet Naples, Florida. Jackie is a transplanted Yankee not really trying to fit in. She starts a book club whose members are a bunch of other social misfits in the area. She also secretly becomes "Miss Dreamsville," host of a late-night radio show that becomes quite popular. I read this because my local book club will be reading and discussing the sequel in a couple months. I'm glad I read it and I look forward to the sequel.
© Amanda Pape - 2020
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