Contenders: Two Native Baseball Players, One World Series by Traci Sorell; illus. by Arigon Starr Primary Kokila/Penguin 48 pp. 4/23 9780593496472 $18.99 e-book ed. 9780593406489 $11.99 Baseball’s 1911 World Series was the first to feature a match-up between two Native players. Future Hall-of-Fame pitcher Charles Bender (Ojibwe) would pitch in three...
It's Pi Day (3.14)! Because we're always in the market for a good book about...pie (yum!), last year we recommended Matt James's Nice Try, Charlie! (Groundwood) (and before that Pie in the Sky, Pie Is for Sharing and Pies from Nowhere), and this year we're serving up three recent books featuring pie:...
Classified: The Secret Career of Mary Golda Ross, Cherokee Aerospace Engineer by Traci Sorell; illus. by Natasha Donovan Primary, Intermediate Millbrook 32 pp. g 3/21 978-1-5415-7914-9 $19.99 e-book ed. 978-1-7284-1901-5 $9.99 Sorell (We Are Still Here!, rev. 5/21) opens the book with a note on four “Cherokee values” that she...
We Are Still Here!: Native American Truths Everyone Should Know by Traci Sorell; illus. by Frané Lessac Primary, Intermediate Charlesbridge 40 pp. g 4/21 978-1-62354-192-7 $17.99 e-book ed. 978-1-63289-973-6 $9.99 In this informational picture book by the team behind We Are Grateful: Otsaliheliga (rev. 11/18), a diverse group of students...
For as long as I can remember, I have had three loves: jazz, poetry, and history. Those passions merged in my 2000 nonfiction title The Sound That Jazz Makes — a manuscript that was rejected more than a dozen times. The book’s first review was so negative that I cried....
Indian No More by Charlene Willing McManis with Traci Sorell Intermediate Tu/Lee & Low 209 pp. g 9/19 978-1-62014-839-6 $18.95 This novel (based on McManis's childhood) is set against the background of U.S. government actions beginning in the 1940s that terminated the status of many Native Nations and forced relocation of families living on reservations. With a stroke of the pen, in 1954, eight-year-old Regina Petit...
TRACI SORELL: Some books seem to make their way in the world even if there wasn’t a clear intention to do so at the beginning. Such is the case with We Are Grateful: Otsaliheliga. I had written a few contemporary picture-book manuscripts featuring Cherokee children and culture before I penned this one....
We Are Grateful: Otsaliheliga by Traci Sorell, illustrated by Frané Lessac (Charlesbridge, 5–8 years), is a lushly illustrated, through-the-seasons look at a contemporary Cherokee community's daily life, pausing for celebrations of traditional observances (e.g., Cherokee New Year) and making special note of gratitude.1. "Cherokee people say otsaliheliga to express gratitude....