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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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.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. 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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48-Hour Book Challenge! 2022 Edition – Starting Line

48-Hour Book Challenge 2

Many years ago, my friend Pam, who blogged as Mother Reader started a tradition of a 48-Hour Book Challenge.

Since then, Pam moved on to other things (including working with me at the library!), but I have periodically brought back the idea and carried out my own personal 48-Hour Book Challenge.

Last week, Ms. Yingling of msyinglingreads.blogspot.com hosted a 48-Hour Middle Grade Marathon — and I fully intended to do it when I heard about it a couple weeks before — and then totally forgot until I saw people posting about it Saturday night.

But this weekend, I don’t have my regular gaming group meeting on Sunday, and Saturday is completely clear, and I have piles and piles of new books I want to read from ALA Annual Conference, plus 11 books I want to read for the mid-year voting for Capitol Choices (a DC area group of librarians that chooses 100 best kid’s books of the year) — and that’s only counting the ones I already have checked out.

So — I am going to do a 48-Hour Book Challenge! And I started at 8:05 pm tonight!

Here’s how it works: It’s measured by time. You take a 48-Hour period of time — In my case, it will be 8:05 pm Friday to 8:05 pm Sunday — and you see how much of that time you can spend reading.

Okay, it began with bloggers, and I am also going to count blogging. The thing that was holding me back: I currently have 199 book reviews sitting as drafts waiting to be posted. If I read more, I’ll get more behind.

So — I am going to count blogging time, too, including writing this post. And in fact, after every book I read, if I’m going to review it, I’m going to review it immediately, and post that review. (The first book I’m going to finish is a YA book I’ve already decided I won’t review because although I’m enjoying it, I have too many negative comments.)

But I would also like to make headway on my blog. So with every book I finish, I also plan to post an old review only on the blog, post a non-book-review post like these ones about ALA Annual Conference, and post another book review on Sonderbooks.com.

This year, I now listen to eaudiobooks, so I can do chores like cooking, dishes, laundry and such while listening to books and count that time. I’m afraid I also have a 3000-piece puzzle up on my table, and there will be some time given to that this weekend, while listening. But my queue of audiobooks I want to listen to is piling up, too, so that will be fine.

Of course, I won’t get nearly as many books read as when I don’t have these side goals, but I’m happy about my plan.

Why do a 48-Hour Book Challenge? Well, the lovely part is that it tricks my brain into making reading my priority for 48 hours. I have to get my reading done!

I won’t lose sleep for it, and won’t set my alarm or skip my walk, and I will go to church Sunday — but otherwise my plan is to really put in some good reading time this weekend. And yay! See how I’ve tricked myself into making fun a priority?

Anyone is welcome to join me, though I’m posting this so late I doubt I’ll get any takers. But if you do decide to join me, just post in the comments when you’re starting. You could always do a 24-hour Book Challenge, right? And I’m thinking writers could do it, too — count time working on your book!

The key is it’s what you want it to be. You might think I don’t need to do it since I live alone, but it gives me permission to have a luxurious reading weekend. If you do live with someone, you can also use this to give yourself permission to do the same.

So, off I go to finish a book! (I only have about 50 pages left.) And to embark on 48 hours of happy reading and blogging.

And please forgive me, but I always watch this video and laugh and laugh when I start a 48-Hour Book Challenge:

There’s no one here to interrupt me, but I’m also not going to interrupt myself!

Happy Reading!

Review of Hooray for Lolo, by Niki Daly

Beginning Chapter Books, Children's Fiction Review, Contemporary, Cross Cultural 0

Hooray for Lolo

by Niki Daly

Catalyst Press, 2020. 86 pages.
Review written July 23, 2020, from a library book

Hooray for Lolo is a beginning chapter book set in South Africa with four stories about a little girl and her family, doing life.

There’s a story about a show-off friend and her birthday party, a really fun story about a library book that all Lolo’s friends love, a story about Lolo dealing with appendicitis, and finally a story of Lolo and her family taking care of a baby.

This is a joyful book about simple things important to a child’s world with plenty of pictures and simple sentences. I like the window into another culture, which also shows that day-to-day life is much the same.

catalystpress.org

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Childrens_Fiction/hooray_for_lolo.html

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 Fairfax County Public Library.

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 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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This review is only on the blog.

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.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. 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 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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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/good_girl_bad_blood.html

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.

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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YA Author Coffee Klatch – ALA Annual Conference Day Three

Conference Corner 0

My third day of ALA Annual Conference, on June 26, 2022, began at 9 AM with the YA Author Coffee Klatch.

Most years, the authors who participate in this event were all award winners, but this time there were some debut authors in the mix. We got about five minutes with each author before they moved to the next table, so not much time to interact, but it was fun to hear personally about their books.

At first I was shy, but after the first few, I took pictures, so I’d remember them and their books.

Here are the authors I met:

Lisa Fipps, author of Starfish. Book Two is coming!

Vincent Tirado, author of Burn Down, Rise Up. The characters go back in time to the Bronx in the 70s.

Angeline Boulley, author of Firekeeper’s Daughter. Book Two is also coming for her! It will be same setting, different characters.

Kyle Lukoff, author of Different Kinds of Fruit.

Gail Jarrow, author of American Murderer. She gave us gummy worms as swag for a book about a worm parasite!

Anath Hirsh, author of Pixels of You, soft sci-fi graphic novel about artificial intelligence and presenting as human.

Laekan Zea Kemp, author of Somewhere Between Bitter and Sweet, Heartbreak Symphony (2022), and An Appetite for Miracles (2023). The first one was about food, the new one is about music overcoming grief, and the next is about food and music and dementia.

Tim Grove, author of nonfiction The First Flight Around the World, and a new book, The World Turned Upside Down, about Yorktown, including a story about Lafayette’s spy.

Diana Peterfreund, author of the Clue trilogy. It’s great for doing library programming around. Send her pictures if you do a themed game night!

Judy Lin, author of A Magic Steeped in Poison and Venom Dark and Sweet (coming August 2022). It’s Taiwanese-Chinese-inspired fantasy about a magical tea competition.

Cory Anderson, author of Morris Finalist What Beauty There Is, crime fiction set in rural Idaho.

Francesca Padila, author of What’s Coming to Me, a debut novel, a mystery about a girl on her own in rural Long Island who discovers her boss is laundering money. (Oops! Missed her picture!)

Darcie Little Badger, author of two of my recent favorites, Elatsoe and A Snake Falls to Earth. They’re inspired by storytelling structures and themes for the Lipan Apache. She has a PhD in Oceanography and wanted to combat a sense of helplessness and environmental anxiety.

Susan Azim Boyer, author of Jasmine Amideh Nees a Win, a funny book about the Iran hostage crisis and an Iranian American student feeling shame around her identity.

Vanessa L. Torres, author of The Turning Pointe (pub 2/22/22), about a Latinx ballet dancer in the 80s in Minneapolis. She encounters police brutality and leaves her emotions on the dance floor.

Marsha Argueta Mickelson, author of Pura Belpré Honor book Where I Belong, a contemporary YA novel where politics brings out the story. Her next book is called The Weight of Everything.

Ebony LaBelle, author of Love Radio, a YA romance set in Detroit. A love letter to Detroit and to families. Black joy.

Review of Even More Lesser Spotted Animals, by Martin Brown

Children's Nonfiction Review, Science 0

Even More Lesser Spotted Animals

More Brilliant Beasts You Never Knew You Needed to Know About

by Martin Brown

Scholastic, 2019. First published in the United Kingdom in 2019. 52 pages.

Even More Lesser Spotted Animals is, not surprisingly, a sequel to Lesser Spotted Animals, which I reviewed in 2017 and booktalked in the elementary schools.

I’ve got a soft spot for Martin Brown’s illustrations. He’s the illustrator of the Horrible Histories books that my son devoured when he was in elementary school. As in Horrible Histories, he puts comical speech bubbles in the illustrations and makes them tremendously entertaining. He also knows how to pull out the most interesting information to kids.

Like its predecessor, this book focuses on species and subspecies that nobody ever talks about. Many of them have entertaining quirks. The forest musk deer, for example, is a deer that sits in trees. And the dingiso is a kangaroo that lives in trees. Then there are sengis, which are as small as a guinea pig with a nose and appetite like an anteater.

In this book, I learned about the existence of both kangaroo rats and rat kangaroos. You might think bears are too common to appear in this book, but did you know that the Syrian Brown Bear doesn’t live in Syria? It is also vulnerable to extinction. The maned wolf is not actually a wolf, but a dog that looks like a fox with long legs.

Those are some of the interesting animals this book explores, with a spread for each animal and a box of basic facts about each one. The fun parts are the cartoons that occur throughout the book. Give this book to a child who enjoys animal facts, and they’ll absorb all kinds of information. An entertaining way to learn. And as the author says in the Introduction, “But how can we help something survive if we don’t even know it exists?”

scholastic.com

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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.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. 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.

What did you think of this book?

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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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Childrens_Nonfiction/sylvie.html

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.

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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ALA Annual Conference Day Two – Authors for Freedom to Read and Newbery 100 Celebration!

Conference Corner 0

I spent most of the Saturday of ALA Annual Conference in the exhibits, having a wonderful time. I got books signed by Nancy Pearl, Christina Soontornvat, Gail Jarrow, L. M. Elliott, and I’m sure several more people. I went to a lunch hosted by Scholastic Press where they gave us a nice tote bag filled with five books and had the five authors speak — so of course now I very much want to read all five books. They also gave some swag related to the books like these lovely pink glasses!

I picked up lots more free advance reader copies in the exhibits, and had to make a trip to my car in the middle of the day so I could reload. Here’s how my pile looked after Saturday:

As you can see, restraint had gone out the window!

I went to a talk by David Levithan with some teen DC Public Library interns talking about Freedom to Read. Here are some notes from him and the teens he was interviewing:

As of 2020, David Levithan was the 8th most banned author in America. Book bannings feel different now — it’s a national movement to ban books.

Book banning always does more harm than good.

Kids will still find out about the issue. But books give a fuller picture.

Once teens get in the library, there’s always a chance they’ll pick up a book.

How do you ban someone talking about their life story?

Story isn’t a competitive thing. Movies and books don’t compete with each other.

David Levithan taps into the universality of teen experience.

He started in publishing as the editor of the Babysitter’s Club series — and he still edits the Babysitter’s Club series.

Books don’t get banned as much if you actually have to read them to know there’s LGBTQ content. His books, such as Two Boys Kissing, obviously have LGBTQ content.

They’re trying to prey upon parents who are scared, to get people to run away from public education.

Our literature has to be representative. Reading a story with emotions make LGBTQ kids feel they belong. The power of recognition.

There isn’t an ounce of truth in the mud-slinging. He’s not writing to push buttons, but being truthful will push buttons.

His new book, Answers in the Pages, is about book challenges. (I did get a copy signed by him later!)

The authors are in it together. The publishers don’t walk away, they double down.

Now there are more books about LGBTQ Joy, not just trauma.

***

After that inspiring session, I had more time in the Exhibit Hall. Besides picking up free books, I also talked with some vendor representatives our library purchases from and had the fun of mentioning that I’m the new Youth Materials Selector for my library system.

And the day ended with a celebration of 100 years of the Newbery Medal!

Besides that being very cool all by itself, I was looking for the room along with Megan Whalen Turner, one of my favorite authors, who won Newbery Honor with The Thief in 1997. We helped each other find the room (She found the right hall, and I found the right door) and sat together.

The celebration was fun stuff — a film showing titles, with quotes from authors, a presentation of trivia, and a competition of authors vs. librarians of knowing detailed facts about their award-winning books. I’d read all the books featured, but hardly knew any answers — these were *very* obscure details!

After the formal program, many Newbery authors were doing giveaways and signings. I got an ARC from Meg Medina — along with a hug! She was the winner of the Newbery Medal the year I was on the committee. She has written the third and final book about Merci Suárez, and I was delighted to get a signed copy.

I went home “early” that day (leaving DC around 6 pm), but with a full heart.

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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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Fiction/100_years_of_lenni_and_margot.html

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.

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.

What did you think of this book?