Review of Sugar Changed the World, by Marc Aronson and Marina Budhos

Children's Nonfiction Review, History, Starred Review 1

Sugar Changed the World

A Story of Magic, Spice, Slavery, Freedom, and Science

by Marc Aronson and Marina Budhos

Clarion Books, Boston, 2010. 166 pages.
Starred Review

I have two more books to review from School Library Journal’s Battle of the Kids’ Books. At least two that I’ve read. I also have two holds that have just come in for books that I decided to read because of the coverage in the Battle.

Sugar Changed the World was knocked out in the first round, but it was up against the eventual winner, so that loss was no disgrace. Judge Adam Rex had some glowing things to say about it:

“SCtW is my kind of history book. Relatively uninterested in kings and politicians, this is more of a Howard Zinn-style people’s history, albeit one which far more gently grinds its axe. Christopher Columbus gets mentioned, for example, on three separate pages. The longest passage by far is only fifty-seven words. Readers will learn far more about Olaudah Equiano, an enslaved African taken to Barbados to work in sugar, or even Thomas Thistlewood, a white overseer who wrote with a kind of nauseating jocularity about the cruelties he inflicted on his charges. They’ll also learn about the university of Jundi Shapur, which flourished fifteen hundred years ago in what is now Iran and which sounds so wondrous I can’t believe I’d never heard of it before. They’ll learn that the “whitest and purest” sugar of the ancient world came from Egypt of all places. Suddenly those sugar cube pyramids we all built in grade school are elevated above the level of busywork to some kind of totemic historical metaphor.

“It would be easy to call this a bitter book about a sweet spice, and there are unquestionably some difficult truths in Sugar Changed the World. There were also, for me, odd moments of pride–it was interesting to discover that the slave trade was focused so heavily in the Caribbean and South America, for example, and when I learned that only four percent of the slaves taken from Africa ended up in North America, and that these slaves had a comparatively low death rate, I chanted the feeblest U-S-A of my life. So why did I come away from this book inspired? A section on Gandhi didn’t hurt. Likewise sections on new (to me) heroes like the Haitian leader Toussaint, and English abolitionist Thomas Clarkson, a contemporary of William Wilberforce. This is an ultimately hopeful book, and I hope it finds a place in the classroom.

“Excellent period illustrations and photos abound, including sample pages from a grim old children’s picture book that painstakingly details how sugar got from the West Indies to your sweet shop, and unintentionally details everything that was wrong about the Victorians. The back matter of SCtW contains a great set of appendices that include, among other things, a timeline, a web guide to additional images, and an essay aimed at parents and teachers that explains how the book was researched.”

I had already purchased a copy of this book for myself. The reason was another blog from School Library Journal, Heavy Medal. They had a Mock Newbery committee vote among their online followers — but they wanted people to vote only if they’d read the books on the shortlist. My library didn’t have a copy of Sugar Changed the World, so I ordered myself a copy, and was not sorry. If I had read it in 2010 (I didn’t; I read it after the New Year.), I would have included a category in my 2010 Sonderbooks Stand-outs for Children’s Nonfiction, because this book is outstanding.

This is children’s nonfiction at its finest. And highly recommended reading for adults as well. You’ve got a huge topic — how sugar changed the world — and the authors cover it with great depth and good documentation, and they bring in the personal element, making it memorable. Any reader, child or adult, will come away from this book having learned a lot. But these aren’t dry, dull facts. You will be fascinated by what you learn.

I like the way the authors talk about looking at their own family histories and discovering how each of them was hugely affected by, of all things, sugar. They are not exaggerating when they say this is a story of Magic, Spice, Slavery, Freedom, and Science.

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Review of The Day-Glo Brothers, by Chris Barton

Biography, Children's Nonfiction Review, History 0

The Day-Glo Brothers

The True Story of Bob and Joe Switzer’s Bright Ideas and Brand-New Colors

by Chris Barton
illustrated by Tony Persiani

Charlesbridge, 2009. 44 pages.
2010 Sibert Honor Book

Here’s a picture book biography that will engage the reader. It’s accessible and interesting for kids, but also offers information that adults will find interesting.

The brothers Bob and Joe Switzer had plans to be a medical doctor and a magician. But when Bob was laid up after an accident, the two brothers were playing and experimenting with ultraviolet light. One of the chemicals in their dad’s drugstore gave off a yellow glow.

“That glow lit up the Switzers’ imaginations. They brought home lots of books from the library and began learning how to use different chemicals to make glow-in-the-dark paints. In regular light they looked plain, but under the ultraviolet light they radiated bright, attention getting colors.

“Bob thought they could use the paint for more than just Joe’s magic act. They could sell it for use in store-window displays and make a little money to help cover Bob’s medical bills.”

Their fluorescent paint was indeed a big hit, and found many popular uses. But their business really took off when they discovered a way to make the colors glow even in the daylight.

The pictures in this book magnificently illustrate the story. A retro, cartoony style is used throughout. At the start, the pictures of their early life are done in black and white. When they invent the fluorescent paint that glows in the dark, that’s done with light fluorescent colors. Then, after they develop the Day-Glo colors, entire pages are covered with the eye-popping colors.

The book tells the many ways their product ended up being used, including on safety equipment during the war. I like the author’s summing up:

“When they were growing up, Bob and Joe Switzer wanted different things. Bob wanted to make his fortune by becoming a doctor, and Joe wanted to make his mark on the world through magic. At first it may seem that neither brother ended up where he wanted to be. But in that darkened basement, the Switzer brothers began to look at the world in a different light.

“One brother wanted to save lives. The other brother wanted to dazzle crowds. With Day-Glo, they did both.”

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Source: This review is based on a a book purchased at ALA and signed by the author.

Review of Truce, by Jim Murphy

Children's Nonfiction Review, History, Starred Review 0

Truce

by Jim Murphy

Scholastic Press, New York, 2009. 116 pages.
Starred Review

Jim Murphy’s book is an excellent introduction to World War I. With photographs and maps, and quotations from firsthand sources he explains the basics of why the war began and all the countries involved. Then he talks about the trenches:

“In the autumn days ahead, there would be more charges and countercharges. Heightening the misery was a series of torrential rainstorms, some lasting several days. By October, the armies had come to a grinding halt on every front. ‘The energies of [all warring] armies flagged,’ wrote historian John W. Wheeler-Bennett, ‘worn out by defeats, fighting, and the vileness of the [now] swampy country.’

“Fierce fighting continued, but no army seemed capable of driving back the enemy. Instead, soldiers struggled from village to village, then farm to farm, until the lines of battle seemed to hardly move at all. The closeness of the enemy and rising casualty rates forced the commanders of both sides to make a momentous decision. Soldiers would begin digging trenches to hide from the killing fire.”

Jim Murphy describes trench warfare and the awful conditions. Then he turns his attention to an aspect of World War One that I knew nothing about: when the soldiers in the trenches, on both sides, refused to fight for Christmas.

He quotes from people who were there, such as British soldier Graham Williams:

“Williams and the men in his company watched as more trees appeared along the enemy’s battle line. Then, suddenly, ‘our opponents began to sing “Stille Nact, Heilige Nact.”… They finished their carol and we thought that we ought to retaliate in the same way, so we sang “The First Nowell,” and when we finished that they all began clapping. And so it went on. First the Germans would sing one of their carols and then we would sing one of ours, until when we started up “O Come All Ye Faithful” the Germans immediately joined in singing the same hymn to the Latin words “Adeste Fideles.” And I thought, well, this was really a most extraordinary thing — two nations both singing the same carol in the middle of a war.'”

The story that emerges is actually an inspiring one, even though it’s coming out of war. And the story is true, as you can tell by Jim Murphy’s meticulous research. Unfortunately, the commanders and others in charge of the war were not at all happy about the Christmas truce. But the story does make you think.

I like the reflections of Major Murdoch McKenzie Wood on the last page of this story:

“Wood was in the trenches in 1914 and participated in a truce that lasted over two weeks. ‘I . . . came to the conclusion that I have held firmly ever since, that if we had been left to ourselves there would have never been another shot fired. For a fortnight that truce went on. We were on the most friendly terms, and it was only the fact that we were being controlled by others that made it necessary for us to start trying to shoot one another again.”

This focus on the Christmas Truce shines a fascinating light on this well-documented history of World War I for upper elementary and middle school kids. What a great context for examining the reasons wars are fought.

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Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a book I got at the Margaret Edwards Award Luncheon at ALA Annual Conference.

Review of Almost Astronauts, by Tanya Lee Stone

Award Winners, Children's Nonfiction Review, History 1

Almost Astronauts

13 Women Who Dared to Dream

by Tanya Lee Stone

Candlewick Press, 2009. 134 pages.
2010 Siebert Medal Winner
2010 YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction Honor Book
2009 Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Book
NCTE Orbis Pictis Award
Bank Street Flora Stieglitz Straus Award

Almost Astronauts tells the story of the “Mercury 13,” thirteen women who hoped to become astronauts back in 1961. Despite performing with outstanding test results, the women were not allowed to become astronauts because they were not jet test pilots — and they were not jet test pilots because women were not allowed to be jet test pilots.

Author Tanya Lee Stone lays out the story of these women in an organized but dramatic way, with plenty of photographs illustrating the steps of the process. She also includes newspaper and magazine articles, editorial cartoons, and even a letter to Lyndon B. Johnson about the program with “Let’s stop this now!” scrawled across the bottom.

The story is intriguing, and certainly not one I’d ever heard before. These women underwent rigorous testing and had outstanding results. They hoped to become astronauts, but lost out to the “social order” of the time.

However, I do love it that Tanya Stone ends the book with stories of women who did become astronauts. The Mercury 13 laid the foundation, and today girls can freely dream of some day traveling to outer space as the commander of a mission. Here’s how the author introduces that chapter:

“Some may read the story of these thirteen women and think that their adventure did not have a happy ending. But that depends on where you draw the finish line. The women were stopped in 1962. But they confronted NASA, exposed the trap of the jet-pilot rule, and destroyed the idea that women could not handle stress as well as men. And then Sally Ride did fly, and Eileen Collins did command the shuttle. Today, women are flying into space. But women who want their wings still continue to battle prejudice. So women continue to find inspiration in the story of these thirteen pioneers. Here are some examples of challenges women still face and of the new beginnings that are taking place.”

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Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library book from the Fairfax County Public Library.

Review of If America Were a Village, by David J. Smith

Children's Nonfiction Review, History, Mathematical, Starred Review 0

If America Were a Village

A Book about the People of the United States

written by David J. Smith

illustrated by Shelagh Armstrong

Kids Can Press, 2009. 32 pages.
Starred Review.

I think this is a very cool book. It makes statistics accessible and understandable to children — and to adults.

The premise of the book is this: America now has more than 306 million people, and numbers that big are hard to understand. So we are going to imagine that all the people who live here are reduced down to a village of 100 people. The author proceeds to describe that village, and also what the village would have been like in earlier times of American history. Each person in the village represents more than 3 million Americans in the real world.

The author is presenting percentages, but by talking about actual people in a village, it’s far simpler to visualize and comprehend.

The author discusses many different aspects of the village. What languages do we speak? Where do we come from? Where do we live? What are our families like? (Did you know there are almost twice as many households in our village without children as with?) What religions do we practice? What do we do? How old are we? How wealthy are we? What do we own? What do we use? How healthy are we?

For example:
“If the America of today were a village of 100: 15 would be of German ancestry, 11 would be of Irish ancestry, 9 African, 9 English, 7 Mexican, 6 Italian, 3 Polish, 3 French, 3 Native American, 2 Scottish, 2 Dutch, 2 Norwegian, 1 Scotch-Irish and 1 Swedish. The rest have other backgrounds.”

I don’t know about you, but I would never have guessed that breakdown, and there were many other surprising facts in this book.

In many of the sections, the author compares the American village to the rest of the world, or to America’s past.

It’s funny how talking about America as a village makes a huge list of facts suddenly much more interesting, because now they are in a form you can visualize.

The authors have another book, which I also recommend, called If the World Were a Village. There are nice resources at the end, and ideas for using the book in the classroom.

I like the author’s ending statement in the notes at the back:
“It is my hope that this book will enrich and improve that sense of community — not just who we are, where we live and what we do and believe, but also where others live and what they do and what they believe — and that kids will then be inspired to find ways to make their country and their world a better place.”

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Review of 14 Cows for America, by Carmen Agra Deedy

Children's Nonfiction Review, History, Stand-outs, Starred Review, True Stories 0

14 Cows for America

by Carmen Agra Deedy
in collaboration with Wilson Kimeli Naiyomah
illustrated by Thomas Gonzalez

Peachtree, Atlanta, 2009. 40 pages.
Starred Review
Sonderbooks Stand-out 2010: #3 Children’s Nonfiction

14 Cows for America is a gorgeous nonfiction picture book, telling a touching and beautiful story. I’ve read many books about September 11, but this one is completely different from any other.

The book takes us to a remote village of the Maasai in Kenya. One of their own, Kimeli (the collaborator on this book), has come home from his doctoral studies in America. The people ask him if he has any stories to tell, and he tells the story of the Twin Towers falling.

After telling the story, “Kimeli waits. He knows his people. They are fierce when provoked, but easily moved to kindness when they hear of suffering or injustice.”

To the Maasai, the cow is life. So Kimeli offers the people of America his only cow. Others in the tribe respond the same way. A diplomat from the United States Embassy in Nairobi comes for a day of sacred ceremony, as the Maasai give 14 cows to the people of America.

“Because there is no nation so powerful it cannot be wounded, nor a people so small they cannot offer mighty comfort.”

The story is told beautifully, with simple language. My summary doesn’t convey the charm and grandeur of the book, with its gorgeous paintings. This story can be read to very young children, but also enjoyed by adults. A double-page spread at the back has Kimeli Naiyomah explaining the background of this true story in more detail. I especially like his final paragraph:

“These sacred, healing cows can never be slaughtered. They remain in our care in Kenya under the guidance of the revered elder Mzee Ole-Yiampoi. The original fourteen have calved and the herd now numbers over thirty-five. They continue to be a symbol of hope from the Maasai to their brothers and sisters in America. The Maasai wish is that every time Americans hear this simple story of fourteen cows, they will find a measure of comfort and peace.”

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Review of Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice

Award Winners, Children's Nonfiction Review, History, Stand-outs, Starred Review 0

Claudette Colvin

Twice Toward Justice

by Philip Hoose

Melanie Kroupa Books (Farrar Straus Giroux), New York, 2009. 133 pages.
2009 National Book Award Winner
2010 Newbery Honor Book
2010 Sibert Honor Book
2010 YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction Honor Book
Starred Review
Sonderbooks Stand-out 2010: #1 Children’s Nonfiction

I always thought that Rosa Parks was the first black woman to refuse to give up her seat on segregated buses in Montgomery, Alabama. However, nine months earlier, a high school junior named Claudette Colvin “had been arrested, dragged backwards off the bus by police, handcuffed, and jailed for refusing to surrender her bus seat to a white passenger.”

Philip Hoose did extensive research, and had many interviews with Claudette Colvin herself. Here she describes what it was like:

“One of them said to the driver in a very angry tone, ‘Who is it?’ The motorman pointed at me. I heard him say, ‘That’s nothing new . . . I’ve had trouble with that “thing” before.’ He called me a ‘thing.’ They came to me and stood over me and one said, ‘Aren’t you going to get up?’ I said, ‘No, sir.’ He shouted ‘Get up’ again. I started crying, but I felt even more defiant. I kept saying over and over, in my high-pitched voice, ‘It’s my constitutional right to sit here as much as that lady. I paid my fare, it’s my constitutional right!’ I knew I was talking back to a white policeman, but I had had enough.

“One cop grabbed one of my hands and his partner grabbed the other and they pulled me straight up out of my seat. My books went flying everywhere. I went limp as a baby — I was too smart to fight back. They started dragging me backwards off the bus. One of them kicked me. I might have scratched one of them because I had long nails, but I sure didn’t fight back. I kept screaming over and over, ‘It’s my constitutional right!’ I wasn’t shouting anything profance — I never swore, not then, not ever. I was shouting out my rights.

“It just killed me to leave the bus. I hated to give that white woman my seat when so many black people were standing. I was crying hard. The cops put me in the back of a police car and shut the door. They stood outside and talked to each other for a minute, and then one came back and told me to stick my hands out the open window. He handcuffed me and then pulled the door open and jumped in the backseat with me. I put my knees together and crossed my hands over my lap and started praying.”

After the incident, reactions were mixed:
“Opinion at Booker T. Washington was sharply divided between those who admired Claudette’s courage and those who thought she got what she deserved for making things harder for everyone. Some said it was about time someone stood up. Others told her that if she didn’t like the way things were in the South, she should go up North. Still others couldn’t make up their minds: no one they knew had ever done anything like this before.

“‘A few of the teachers like Miss Nesbitt embraced me,’ Claudette recalls. ‘They kept saying, “You were so brave.” But other teachers seemed uncomfortable. Some parents seemed uncomfortable, too. I think they knew they should have done what I did long before. They were embarrassed that it took a teenager to do it.'”

After Claudette was convicted of violating the segregation law, disturbing the peace, and ‘assaulting’ the policemen, things got even worse. She says,

“Now I was a criminal. Now I would have a police record whenever I went to get a job, or when I tried to go to college. Yes, I was free on probation, but I would have to watch my step everywhere I went for at least a year. Anyone who didn’t like me could get me in trouble. On top of that I hadn’t done anything wrong. Not everyone knew the bus rule that said they couldn’t make you get up and stand if there was no seat available for you to go to — but I did. When the driver told me to go back, there was no other seat. I hadn’t broken the law. And assaulting a police officer? I probably wouldn’t have lived for very long if I had assaulted those officers.

“When I got back to school, more and more students seemed to turn against me. Everywhere I went people pointed at me and whispered. Some kids would snicker when they saw me coming down the hall. ‘It’s my constitutional right! It’s my constitutional right!’ I had taken a stand for my people. I had stood up for our rights. I hadn’t expected to become a hero, but I sure didn’t expect this.

“I cried a lot, and people saw me cry. They kept saying I was ’emotional.’ Well, who wouldn’t be emotional after something like that? Tell me, who wouldn’t cry?”

Not long after, Claudette met an older man who seemed to be a friend, but took advantage of her vulnerability. She got pregnant out of wedlock. So she wasn’t seen as a suitable role model for the movement to stop segregation. Seven months later, another teenager, Mary Louise Smith was also arrested for refusing to give up her seat, but she, too, was not seen as someone who could serve as the public face of a mass bus protest.

Eventually, they did find a suitable person in Rosa Parks. The bus boycott started. The boycott did not end until the case Browder vs. Gale, where four black women sued the city of Montgomery and the state of Alabama, saying that bus segregation was unconstitutional. One of those plaintiffs in the suit was Claudette Colvin, and her testimony was key in getting a positive verdict. Not until the verdict was upheld in the Supreme Court did the segregation on the buses end.

This book was especially good to read after reading The Help, by Kathryn Stockett, since it also dealt with race relations in the South at that time. Philip Hoose researched the events so well, and presents clearly all the drama of the situation, along with the emotions of the people involved. How wonderful that people can finally hear the story of a teenage girl who stood up — no, sat down — for what’s right.

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Review of The Lincolns, by Candace Fleming

Biography, Children's Nonfiction Review, History, Stand-outs, Starred Review 0

lincolnsThe Lincolns

A Scrapbook Look at Abraham and Mary

by Candace Fleming

Schwartz & Wade Books (Random House), New York, 2008. 181 pages.
Starred Review
Sonderbooks Stand-out 2010: #2 Children’s Nonfiction

Candace Fleming’s scrapbook biographies are truly amazing. I reviewed her similar book Ben Franklin’s Almanac back in 2004. This newer book, The Lincolns is equally complete and enlightening.

Instead of just telling us about Abraham and Mary Lincoln, Candace Fleming has brought together photographs, letters, news articles, and things written about them by their contemporaries. It does take time and attention to get through this book, but it is never boring, and you will feel like you have special insight into the great man and his volatile but much-loved wife by the time you are done.

Clearly Candace Fleming put in tremendous amounts of time and research to produce this exceptional book. She has produced a wonderful resource, not merely for children doing reports, but for anyone wanting to know more about the Lincolns and the Civil War.

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Review of Sandy’s Circus, by Tanya Lee Stone

Biography, Children's Nonfiction Review, History, Picture Book Review, True Stories 0

sandys_circus.jpg

Sandy’s Circus

A Story About Alexander Calder

by Tanya Lee Stone

illustrated by Boris Kulikov

Viking, 2008.  36 pages.

Here’s another delightful picture book biography.  It gives you a feel for what the artist has done and makes you want to know more.  The story is told on a level that will intrigue both children and adults.  I especially enjoy the playful illustrations.

“There once was an artist named Alexander Calder.  Only he didn’t call himself Alexander.  And he didn’t call the things he made art.”

Tanya Lee Stone and Boris Kulikov beautifully capture the inventive, experimental quality of Sandy Calder’s art.  They show how he playfully created a moving, working circus out of wire.  His art was more than a static display to look at.  It was a show where things happened.

The author tells us that “even the mobiles that hang over baby cribs would not exist without Calder.”  This is the story of a man who brought a sense of play into his life’s work.

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Review of Pale Male, by Janet Schulman

Children's Nonfiction Review, History, Picture Book Review, True Stories 0

pale_male.jpg

Pale Male

Citizen Hawk of New York City

by Janet Schulman

illustrated by Meilo So

Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 2008.  36 pages.

Here’s a beautiful picture book true story of a red-tailed hawk that flew into New York City in 1991 and made his home on a building across from Central Park.

The building occupants weren’t too happy with a nest on their building, though the citizens of New York were thrilled.  The hawk’s pale coloring made him distinctive and easy to spot, so bird watchers avidly watched his efforts to settle in and start a family.

Lovely watercolors illustrate this gentle story of a wild creature learning to live alongside humans.  It also tells how important the efforts of humans were for him to be able to keep his home.

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www.sonderbooks.com/Childrens_Nonfiction/pale_male.html