Review of Fight the Night, by Tomie dePaola

Contemporary, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

Fight the Night

by Tomie dePaola

Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2020. First published in 1968.
Review written July 25, 2020, from a library book
Starred Review

This book is a reprint of a Tomie dePaola classic I hadn’t been familiar with, but reading it, I’m quite taken with it.

The story is simple. A little boy doesn’t want to go to bed. What’s interesting is that he decides to Fight the Night.

He fights the Night with his flashlight. First, he encounters some different things, such as his cat.

After those things, though, in the dark, the Night whispers to him. It’s deliciously spooky.

“Let’s fight,” said Ronald, and he began to swing his flashlight around.
“You will never catch me,” said the Night.

Ronald heard a squeaking noise.
“I’ll get you, Night,” said Ronald, and he swung his flashlight.
“You missed,” said the Night.

Ronald ran after the voice. Something tripped him. He swung his flashlight.
“That’s not me. You cannot catch me. I am the Night.”

The battle goes on. Ronald thinks he has won. He has chased the night away! But oh, how tired his eyes look in that picture!

And indeed the Night gets the last laugh, in a perfectly satisfying ending.

Normally I wouldn’t think a book where a kid actually stays up all night would be one I’d want to let children see. But I think they will see who ultimately wins. Perhaps this will succeed as a cautionary tale that it’s futile to fight the Night.

Either way, reading this as a parent, I was smiling all the way through. Nice try, kid!

simonandschuster.com/kids

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Review of Playing with Myself, by Randy Rainbow

Audiobooks, Nonfiction Review, Starred Review, True Stories 0

Playing with Myself

by Randy Rainbow
read by the author

Macmillan Audio, 2022. 7 hours, 2 minutes.
Review written July 21, 2022, from a library eaudiobook
Starred Review

I love Randy Rainbow! If you lean at all liberal politically, or maybe if you just enjoy show tunes, I hope you’ve seen his parody videos. They usually deal with current issues, but often include other fun content. He has a new one out, written with Alan Menken, called “Pink Glasses” about being willing to be yourself, using his trademark pink glasses as a symbol.

If there’s anyone out there who still doesn’t believe that some people are born gay, this audiobook is solid refutation of that world view. From childhood, Randy Rainbow (Yes, that’s his real name.) loved Broadway show tunes and dressing up and acting out the female parts. This is the story of his unconventional route to fame — making parody videos in his bedroom.

In the audiobook, Randy’s mother makes a special appearance as he interviews her about his childhood. I thought that chapter was especially fun.

But I found the whole thing adorable and inspiring. Yes, there’s profanity peppered throughout — at a similar level as in his videos. Also a touch of adult humor here and there. But overall, it’s a story of a kid who was bullied in school for being gay and overweight and having a funny name — going on to smashing success in part because of his exhaustive knowledge of Broadway show tunes.

It’s fun hearing about his unlikely path to stardom and his unbridled joy in getting appreciation from his idols such as Barbra Streisand and Patti LuPone. This audiobook felt like hearing a friend tell his story and just made me so happy for him as he found a true expression of his unique talents and a way straight into people’s hearts (well maybe not exactly straight), including mine.

randyrainbow.com

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Review of A Dream of Flight, by Rob Polivka and Jef Polivka, illustrations by Rob Polivka

Children's Nonfiction Review, History, Starred Review 0

A Dream of Flight

Alberto Santos-Dumont’s Race Around the Eiffel Tower

by Rob Polivka and Jef Polivka
illustrations by Rob Polivka

Farrar Straus Giroux, 2019. 40 pages.
Starred Review
Review written September 2, 2019, from a library book

Here’s a picture book about one of the pioneers of flight – and one I didn’t know anything about. Alberto Santos-Dumont, who went by Santos, dreamed of flying and worked hard to invent a machine that would fly and could be steered.

Santos made balloons, trying to make their shape facilitate steering. He added a motor to make them move even against the wind. Yes, his airships crashed. He used that as an opportunity to improve the design.

After Santos had already built five airships, a prize of 100,000 francs was announced for the first person who could pilot an airship from the Aero Club in Paris around the Eiffel Tower and back in less than 30 minutes. His first attempt failed, and Airship No. 5 was destroyed.

This book tells the dramatic story of his next attempt. He won this prize even before the Wright Brothers achieved their historic flight.

Alberto Santos-Dumont’s life and adventures make a good story. It’s dramatic and easy-to-follow – and teaches the reader that there was more to the development of flight than just the Wright Brothers or just what was happening in America. There’s a page of more facts in the back of the book.

mackids.com

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Review of You Are My Friend, by Aimee Reid, pictures by Matt Phelan

Biography, Children's Nonfiction Review, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

You Are My Friend

The Story of Mister Rogers and His Neighborhood

words by Aimee Reid
pictures by Matt Phelan

Abrams Books for Young Readers, 2019. 40 pages.
Starred Review
Review written August 15, 2019, from a library book

You Are My Friend is an appropriately simple picture book biography about Fred Rogers and why he began his classic television show.

It simply tells about his lonely childhood dealing with illness and bullying, and some of the ways he coped, such as puppets and music. It talks about his mother telling him to look for helpers and finding friends in his own neighborhood.

The book covers all the important points about his life and his show, while lingering over some key scenes. I love the scene after his grandfather let him walk on the big stone wall on his farm.

When at last Fred came back inside,
he had a skinned knee, but he was happy.
His grandpa told Fred that he liked him
just the way he was.
He said Fred was special and that,
just by being himself,
Fred made the day special, too.
Fred let those words sink deep inside him.
As he thought them, he felt braver.

The explanation of his motivation for creating his show comes from Mister Rogers’ testimony to the United States Senate on behalf of public funding for television.

One day, when Fred was grown up, he saw a television program. People were throwing pies in each other’s faces. Fred did not like the pie throwing, but he thought television could be wonderful. What if, instead of showing people fighting, TV could show people helping one another? Right then, Fred decided that was what he wanted to do.

This book explains the man behind the neighborhood on a level that small children can understand and their parents will particularly appreciate. The illustrations are a perfect accompaniment.

mattphelan.com
abramsbooks.com

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Review of Good Girl, Bad Blood, by Holly Jackson, performed by MacLeod Andrews and a full cast

Contemporary, Mystery, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Good Girl, Bad Blood

by Holly Jackson
performed by MacLeod Andrews and a full cast

Listening Library, 2021. 10 hours, 48 minutes.
Review written May 24, 2022, from a library eaudiobook
Starred Review

Big thanks again to my coworker Lisa who recommended the Good Girl’s Guide to Murder series to me! This is Book Two. Each book has a complete case, but you’ll want to read them in order so you don’t have the surprises in the earlier books spoiled.

Pip is a high school senior and spent the last book solving a cold case of murder and disappearance as her Senior Project. She told about the case in a wildly popular podcast. But now her parents want her to slow down and focus on school. Her life was in danger at the end of the first investigation, and she was obsessed with finding out more. So when one of her best friends comes to Pip about his missing brother Jamie, Pip tries to say No.

But when the police don’t consider Jamie’s disappearance to be high-risk, Pip feels she has to get involved. Jamie’s mother and brother beg Pip to use her new notoriety to spread the word about Jamie’s disappearance and get more people looking.

And so a new case begins, and a new season of Pip’s podcast. Pip herself saw Jamie at a memorial service for the victims of her last case. So now her task is to trace Jamie’s movements after that event. But getting answers brings more questions. And yes, some of the answers bring danger to Pip and others.

Being a teenage sleuth sounds like a lot of fun, but this author explores how investigating affects Pip’s life and relationships. Besides a gripping mystery, these stories make us care about Pip and her family and friends. And we think with her about what it takes for justice to be served.

listeninglibrary.com

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Review of Sylvie, by Sylvie Kantorovitz

Biography, Children's Nonfiction Review, Graphic Memoir, Starred Review 0

Sylvie

by Sylvie Kantorovitz

Walker Books, 2021. 346 pages.
Review written May 19, 2022, from a library book
Starred Review

I love graphic novel memoirs for kids – and so do kids. Graphic novelists, using pictures as well as words, are better than anyone at expressing what it was like to be a kid.

In Sylvie the author tells about what it was like growing up in a Jewish family in France. Her family moved from Morocco when she was small. Sylvie always wanted to be an artist, but her mother pushed her to study science and math and other more impressive fields.

Sylvie’s father was the principal of a “Boys’ Normal School,” a college where students earned teaching degrees, and her family had an apartment at the end of a row of classrooms. So Sylvie grew up in a school. She had three younger siblings, and when the third came along, she got to move into an attic room in the school, with more privacy and room to do art.

The stories of growing up feel universal. She touches on things like family conflict, feeling like an outsider, friendships starting and ending, and making decisions about what she wants to do. And she’s in France! It’s all told with humor, and her creative drawings bring it to life.

walkerbooksus.com

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Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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Review of The 100 Years of Lenni and Margot, by Marianne Cronin

Audiobooks, Award Winners, Contemporary, Fiction Review, Starred Review 0

The 100 Years of Lenni and Margot

by Marianne Cronin
read by Sheila Reid and Rebecca Benson

HarperAudio, 2021. 10 hours, 54 minutes.
Review written July 9, 2022, from a library eaudiobook
Starred Review
2022 Alex Award Winner (books published for adults of interest to teens)

Oh, this book touched my heart!

You’re warned right from the start. Lenni is a Swedish girl living in the terminal ward of the Princess Royal Hospital in Glasgow. She’s 17 years old, and she doesn’t want to die.

As the book begins, she can still go on adventures around the hospital. She goes to the chapel and meets Father Arthur. She asks him some uncomfortable questions about why she’s going to die, and ends up making friends with him. She helps a temp name the new room for hospital patients to do art. They call it the Rose Room — and that’s where Lenni meets Margot.

Margot is 83 years old and also dying — and Lenni notices that between the two of them, they’ve lived 100 years.

They begin a project together in the Rose Room — 100 paintings, one for each year of their lives. And along with the paintings, they started telling stories, stories from different years of their lives.

I love the two narrators for this audiobook. The narrator reading Lenni’s part sounds 17, and the narrator reading Margot’s stories sounds 83. And they both have wonderful accents, so the whole thing is a delight to read.

We know from the start that Lenni and Margot are dying. So you can simply expect some heartbreak at the end. But that’s going to come because this unlikely pair will have completely wound their way into your heart before you’re done with their stories and their enthusiasm for living.

Oh, and there’s a Swedish man in the book named Mr. Eklund, so that’s proof it’s a great book!

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Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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How To Be on the Moon, by Viviane Schwarz

Delightfully Silly, Picture Book Review, Starred Review 0

How To Be on the Moon

by Viviane Schwarz

Candlewick Press, 2019. 32 pages.
Review written April 23, 2022, from a library book
Starred Review

How To Be on the Moon is an exuberant adventure of the imagination from the author of one of my favorite picture books, Timothy and the Strong Pajamas.

We start out seeing two characters playing, with no explanation of how they got to be friends. They’re playing a game in a room and Anna looks out the window and decides she wants to go to the moon. Crocodile has some practical objections.

“Hang on,” said Crocodile. “We will need special skills to go to the moon.”

“What skills?” asked Anna.

“Math. Without math, it will go wrong.”

“I can do math,” said Anna.

“Can you count backward?” asked Crocodile.

“Five, four, three, two, one,” Anna said. “Zoom!”

After some more obstacles overcome, Anna makes a rocket while Crocodile makes sandwiches. I like the way the rocket looks like a playground rocket, complete with a slide. After they blast off and are floating, they play “Crocodiles in Space”:

The rules were: If you caught all the parts of a sandwich, you got to eat the sandwich. If you caught anything else, it didn’t taste as nice.

They both won.

They have the fun of landing on the Moon and exploring. I love the quirky details like remembering to eat a sandwich before they put on their space helmet because it’s difficult afterward. After some wonder and joyful play, they decide Earth misses them and head back home. I like this bit of insight:

“Being far away feels just the same as being very small when you’re missing someone,” said Anna.

And here’s the exuberant finish:

“Earth!” said Crocodile. “We are on Earth!”

“We went to the moon!” said Anna. “It was almost impossible!”

“But we had the skills!”

“And now we are back home! You can stop worrying. Look, the Earth is everywhere! It is huge!”

“I’m not worried. You always stayed the right size,” said Crocodile. “That’s the main thing.”

“You too,” said Anna. “We are very good at that. Let’s go and check on the rest of the world, just in case.”

And they did.

Check this one out to see the joyful pictures for yourself. This would be fun to try in a preschool storytime.

candlewick.com

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Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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Review of The Boys in the Back Row, by Mike Jung

Audiobooks, Children's Fiction Review, Contemporary, Starred Review 0

The Boys in the Back Row

by Mike Jung
read by Koong Sim

Dreamscape Media, 2020. 5 hours, 13 minutes, on 5 CDs.
Review written June 17, 2022, from a library audiobook
Starred Review

I missed this book when it came out because I was judging for the Cybils Awards in a different category, but I’m glad I finally caught up. The reader is excellent, making you believe you’re hearing the voices of middle school boys.

This is a book about deep and lasting friendship between two comic-book-and-band geeks. They’re bullied because of the friendship and because they’re geeks, but the friendship just shines.

Matt and Eric are starting another year of middle school. This time, instead of flute, where he was the only boy, Matt is playing bass drum, so he’s in the back row with his best friend, Eric. But there are some bullies in the back row, too.

Early in the year, the band learns that they’re going to compete in a band competition at World of Amazement at the end of the year. (I love the names Mike Jung invents for amusement parks and comic book characters!) But then they learn that Eric’s family is moving away after the year is done. So the final piece that sets their planning in motion is when they also learn that on the last day the band will be at World of Amazement, there’s going to be a DefenderCon where their favorite comic book creator is signing comics — just a mile away from the amusement park. Of course they have to go, in a final adventure together as best friends.

The catch is that they also realize they won’t be able to get permission. But if they can manage to keep things quiet, they might be able to pull this off. But then a back row bully finds out what they’re up to….

Naturally, I didn’t expect all to go smoothly with their plans, but I still was completely surprised by what happened. And the tenderness at the end almost brought tears to my eyes.

This all sounds serious, but the book is full of humor throughout, fun nerdy humor, the best kind.

Let’s hear it for nerdy middle school boys who care deeply about their friends!

dreamscapepublishing.com

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Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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Review of An Arrow to the Moon, by Emily X. R. Pan

Audiobooks, Paranormal, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

An Arrow to the Moon

by Emily X. R. Pan
read by Natalie Naudus, Shawn K. Jain, and David Shih

Little, Brown Young Readers, 2022. 8 hours, 24 minutes.
Review written June 29, 2022, from a library eaudiobook
Starred Review

I read and loved Emily X. R. Pan’s debut novel, The Astonishing Color of After, during my Newbery committee year, so I made sure to get my hands on this book.

This book is more lyrical writing and magical realism as Chinese mythology collides with the modern world.

The book follows two Taiwanese teenagers who were born on the same day. They both have strange magical things about them. Hunter Yee never misses a shot — whether with a bow and arrow or balled-up paper into a trash can. Luna Chang is followed around by magical fireflies that show her what to do. And when they come together – their kisses leave soft blue marks on each other’s skin.

But like Romeo and Juliet before them, their families hate each other. And Hunter’s family is living in hiding after his father stole an ancient Chinese artifact. A powerful mob boss is looking for them, and their protection is somehow wearing off.

And before the story of the teens, we hear a tale of something that happened in the sky long ago, and then in China.

Against that backdrop, Hunter and Luna’s romance blossoms. They’re drawn to each other, despite their parents. And intrigued by the magic they each contain. Hmm. My summary doesn’t convey the atmospheric resonance of this book. It was a magical listening experience.

While I was listening, it bothered me a little that, while Luna talks with girlfriends a little at the beginning, they seem to disappear as her romance with Hunter blossoms. They kiss while riding the school bus and no one notices or comments. The world seems to become just them. When they find a private place and have sex (off-stage), nobody else suspects or is at all interested in their all-absorbing relationship — and that made me wonder a bit.

But given how the story turned out — my quibbles seemed less important. This book is transcendent and beautiful. I shouldn’t have been surprised by the ending, since it was foreshadowed nicely — but I was indeed amazed by how beautifully Emily X. R. Pan pulled it off.

exrpan.com
lbyr.com
thenovl.com

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Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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