Reviews of the Week
Jane Against the World: Roe v. Wade and the Fight for Reproductive Rights by Karen Blumenthal High School Roaring Brook 373 pp. g 2/20 978-1-62672-165-4 $19.99 Multiple legal, social, religious, and medical strands comprise the history of reproductive rights in America. Blumenthal, in her trademark straightforward journalistic style (Tommy: The Gun That Changed...
The List of Things That Will Not Change by Rebecca Stead Intermediate Lamb/Random 218 pp. g 4/20 978-1-101-93809-6 $16.99 Library ed. 978-1-101-93810-2 $19.99 e-book ed. 978-1-101-93811-9 $9.99 From the outside it appears that Bea lives a charmed life. She has loving (albeit divorced) parents; an involved extended family; a kindly, funny teacher; a loyal...
My Best Friend by Julie Fogliano; illus. by Jillian Tamaki Preschool Atheneum 32 pp. 3/20 978-1-5344-2722-8 $17.99 e-book ed. 978-1-5344-2723-5 $10.99 What begins on the title spread as a small redheaded girl hesitantly approaching another girl on a tire swing becomes an ode to making friends. Our narrator gleefully shares this discovered joy:...
The Only Woman in the Photo: Frances Perkins & Her New Deal for America by Kathleen Krull; illus. by Alexandra Bye Primary, Intermediate Atheneum 48 pp. 2/20 978-1-4814-9151-8 $18.99 e-book ed. 978-1-4814-9152-5 $10.99 President Roosevelt usually gets credit for the New Deal programs that helped pull America out of the...
Prairie Lotus by Linda Sue Park Middle School Clarion 260 pp. g 3/20 978-1-328-78150-5 $16.99 e-book ed. 978-0-358-33083-7 $9.99 In 1880, fourteen-year-old Hanna and her father settle in the (fictional) town of LaForge, in Dakota Territory. Papa is white; Hanna’s late mother immigrated from China and had both Chinese and...
A Girl like Me by Angela Johnson; illus. by Nina Crews Preschool, Primary Millbrook 40 pp. g 2/20 978-1-5415-5777-2 $19.99 e-book ed. 978-1-5415-7891-3 $18.99 It seems not even the sky’s the limit for the imaginative, adventurous, inventive girls depicted in this inspirational picture book. Johnson’s upbeat text, paired with Crews’s...
Mother Jones and Her Army of Mill Children by Jonah Winter; illus. by Nancy Carpenter Primary, Intermediate Schwartz & Wade/Random 40 pp. 2/20 978-0-449-81291-4 $17.99 g Library ed. 978-0-449-81292-1 $20.99 e-book ed. 978-0-449-81293-8 $10.99 Creating a first-person narration (partly adapted from the labor activist’s letters and speeches, as explained in...
Yes No Maybe So by Becky Albertalli and Aisha Saeed High School Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins 440 pp. g 2/20 978-0-06-293704-9 $18.99 e-book ed. 978-0-06-293705-6 $11.99 In alternating chapters, teens Maya (a Muslim girl) and Jamie (a Jewish boy) narrate a story set amidst a longshot Georgia state senate campaign. Pushed...
Johnny’s Pheasant by Cheryl Minnema; illus. by Julie Flett Primary Minnesota 32 pp. g 11/19 978-1-5179-0501-9 $16.95 Minnema (a member of the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe) and Flett (of Cree-Métis descent) present an engaging and humorous intergenerational story of patience, hope, and surprise. Johnny spots a motionless pheasant in...
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