Maddie's LIS 721 Book Blog

  Turnage, S. (2012). Three Times lucky . Dial Books for Young Readers.  Mysteries abound in Sheila Turnage’s Three Times Lucky, the start of the Mo and Dale’s Mystery Series. With a hurricane on the way, Moses “Mo” Lobeau, and her best friend, Dale race to solve mysteries that are popping up like a game of whack-a-mole. Prior to the start of the story, Mo questions who and where her biological parents are, and how it came to be that they lost her. Then, a murder takes place shortly after a detective arrives in town, and her parental figures go missing quickly after. It’s a race against time and a mystery who to trust, and Mo spends the majority of the story with more questions than answers.  The themes of this story include community, family, and one’s sense of self. Like many mystery book protagonists, Mo has a mystery all her own that she’s looking to solve, creating tension in the plot even before the murder of a local man comes to light. It’s the question of who he...

  Applegate, K. (1996). Animorphs: The invasion . Scholastic. Animorphs: The Invasion is the start of a fifty four book series that encompasses the adventures of a group of children who meet an alien on a shortcut home, and subsequently gain incredible abilities. The reader spends very little time in the status quo before the rising action begins. We have enough time to meet our cast of characters, who we only learn the first names for, and who live in a town that remains unnamed and undisclosed for the sake of the reader’s “safety”. While not particularly the focus of the story nor particularly inspired, this concept of the setting being just about anywhere (including your town) is sure to appeal to children who long for a sense of adventure. The plot as a whole is cohesive, though not necessarily well built, it’s sure to be entertaining.  The narrator of this story, Jake, introduces himself and goes on to explain that his friends had taken a shortcut home through a constru...

  Williams-Garcia, R. (2019). One crazy summer . Thorndike Press, a part of Gale, a Cengage Company.  One Crazy Summer, by Rita Williams-Garcia takes place in 1968. When three girls are sent to live with their mother for the summer, hoping to go to Disneyland and get to know the mother they barely know. Instead, they end up rebuffed by their mother and sent to a Black Panther  day camp, where they begin attending protests and learning about a movement for black liberation. Themes of One Crazy Summer include race, family bonds (especially those between sisters), and identity. In many ways, this novel is a bildungsroman, or coming of age novel for Delphine in particular, though all three of the girls go through major change throughout. The main occurrence in One Crazy Summer is the three sisters going to visit their mother, Cecile, who they knew only when they were quite young. Cecile abandoned Delphine, Vonetta, and Fern just days after Cecile’s birth, and while Delphine s...

  Sumner, J. (2020).   Roll with it . Atheneum Books for Young Readers.   Roll With It, by Jamie Sumner, centers on a young girl named Ellie, who has Cerebral Palsy and uses a wheelchair. After an incident of her grandfather’s Alzheimer's putting him in danger, Ellie moves from Tennessee with her mother to live with her grandmother and grandfather in Oklahoma. The themes of this book are friendship, disability, classism, differences, and family. Ellie’s story takes place in the modern day, as reflected by the fact that the characters have cell phones, watch the great british baking show, and live in a world in which Ellie and her mother reasonably expect a level of equity of access that isn’t always delivered by her new school. The plot and action, which involve Ellie’s effort to win a baking competition, fit in at school, and help her grandfather as his Alzheimer's progresses.  As a significant portion of this story involves moving a decent distance away from home...

  Butler, D. H., & Meyers, N. (2018). King & Kayla. king & kayla and the case of the lost tooth . Peachtree.  King and Kayla and the Case of the Lost Tooth , written by Dori Hillestad Butler and illustrated by Nancy Meyers is an adorable Level Three Easy Reader about a girl who loses her first tooth, and then loses it again! Using a typeface that appears to be approximately a size 18, this adventure in the stories of King and Kayla is playful and unique. The use of narration by King, Kayla’s dog, is an engaging way to tell the story. This story uses more complicated sentences than would be expected in a level one or two, and has about seven words per line on average. The majority of the sentences are broken up into brief ones, rather than being compound or complex.  There are no more than nine lines per page, with some pages that are filled with pictures instead of lines of text.  While the typical guidelines for a Level Three book states that there will ...

  Faruqi, S., & Aly, H. (2019). Yasmin in charge . Picture Window Books, a Capstone imprint.  Yasmin in Charge , Saadia Faruqi, illustrated by Hatem Aly, was much more complicated to place into a specific category. While I was torn between the book being Level Two, Level Three, or a Transitional Book, I ultimately decided it was a Level Three. It bears some of the hallmarks of being Level Two, such as the fact that, unlike a Level Three, the illustrations are integrated with the text. It also has some similarities to a Transitional Book, such as episodic, compelling chapters and direct sentences, and more complex words. However, it is clearly a Level Three upon thorough examination. Another thing that tripped me up when trying to categorize this book was the fact that the library I got it from places it among the chapter books, with a J Fiction Label, rather than in the easy reader section with a label reading JF Faruqi, which indicated to me it might be a Transitional Boo...

  Tabor, C. R. (2019). Fox the Tiger . Scholastic Inc.      Fox the Tiger, by Corey R. Tabor, is a simplistic book that fits neatly into Level One. The font appears to be 20 point, with a rough average of five words per line and a maximum of eight words per sentence. While some words that appear in the book, such as “Tiger”, “Turtle”, “Rabbit” and “Sneaky” fall outside the realm of sight words or one syllable words, no word that appears in the book is longer than eight letters, with the word “Squirrel” appearing on page 27. While some of these words may be challenging to early readers, they provide the opportunity for children to feel a sense of pride at having successfully read such a complicated book. Finally, the page with the fewest lines of text has one line, while the page with the most lines has three lines of text. Also, there are a handful of pages where the story truly relies on the pictures to move the story forward, such as when Fox and Rabbit wait for ...

Kibuishi, K. (2008). Amulet. the stonekeeper . Graphix.   Amulet: The Stonekeeper by Kazu Kibushi is an intriguing first step into the world of the Amulet series, which contains eight published books and a ninth upcoming one to finish off the series. In Amulet, siblings Emily and Navin pursue a creature that has kidnapped their mother from their new home with the aid and guidance of a mysterious amulet.  The book uses an intentional color palette, largely using drab grays, browns, and blues for the surroundings, especially in the dangerous new world Emily and Navin find themselves in. Even the main characters' colors are dampened, more noticeably so once they leave their new house for the danger of the world beyond it. While drab, the color palette is not unappealing. Kibushi’s art style is cartoon-like and appealing to the eye, creating engaging characters. However, where the art work really excels is in the monsters and creatures that inhabit the world beyond Emily and Navi...

          Wang, J., & Pien, L. (2019). Stargazing . First Second.  Jen Wang and Lark Pien’s Stargazing is a beautiful middle grade graphic novel about friendship, imagination, and overcoming differences to show care for each other. When Moon moves into the house next door, Christine isn’t sure they’ll ever get along, much less become friends. Yet as the book goes on, that is exactly what occurs, and Christine ultimately learns an important lesson about overcoming differences and friendship.  This powerful tale is told through colorful, effective artwork created by Jen Wang with a mechanical #2 pencil and a Uni Jetstream Ballpoint Pen, and colored by Lark Pien using photoshop. The text is also written by Jen Wang, and the art and text go well together, as reflected by the fact that they were created by the same person. The text appears to be size 12, and its font is a playful yet readable one that is reminiscent of comic sans, and that compl...

Holm, J. L., & Holm, M. (2006). Babymouse: Queen of the world! HarperCollins Children's Books.  Babymouse: Queen of the World is the work of a brother and sister pair, Jennifer L. Holm, who writes the text of the story, and Matthew Holm, who illustrates the work. The illustrations are naive in style, appearing somewhat shaky and untrained to the eye, yet the text and illustrations work well together, as the naive style and simple plot and easy word choices are well matched. However, the art style may be unappealing to some young readers, as the lines are frequently shaky and the pictures can be a touch too busy. Matthew Holm draws the illustrations digitally, and uses a limited color palette of black, white, and pink, and adds minimal to no depth to the drawings with shading or color.   The plot is based on social problems that children may experience, including bullying, exclusion, and gossip. The plot is therefore easily understandable and relatable to children. T...

Weatherford, C. B., & Cooper, F. (2021). Unspeakable: The Tulsa Race Massacre . Carolrhoda Books.  Unspeakable: The Tulsa Race Massacre, by Carole Boston Weatherford and illustrated by Floyd Cooper, is a compelling nonfiction book about the Tulsa Race Massacre – a deeply sad and heavy subject that is immensely well handled by this children’s book. The author has written numerous books about black culture and history, including a book about Harriet Tubman and another about Fannie Lou Hamer. In the author’s note, she says that racism is an issue that has deeply affected her and her family. She goes on to explain more of the history of the Tulsa Race Massacre. Meanwhile, the illustrator’s grandfather grew up in Tulsa, and told him about the Tulsa Race Massacre at a time when very few were talking or teaching about it. Both of the creators of this book are highly qualified to write on such a subject. The book covers just one event: the massacre in Tulsa, Oklahoma, that destroyed a ...

Robeson, T., & Huang, R. (2019). Queen of physics: How Wu Chien Shiung helped unlock the secrets of the Atom . Sterling Children's Books.      This biographical account of Wu Chien Shuing’s life is told by Teresa Robeson, who is an award winning children’s nonfiction book author. There is little in the book to indicate any qualifications on Robeson’s part for writing this book. The dedication mentions the guidance the author had, and there is a bibliography at the end, but nothing to indicate what qualifies her to understand these sources. There are no acknowledgements in the book at all. Though the book’s whole title is “Queen of Physics: How Wu Chien Shiung Helped Unlock the Secrets of the Atom”, the book is mostly a biography of Wu Chien Shiung’s life, rather than exploring her scientific achievements. The focus is narrow in terms of its subject matter: Wu Chien Shiung’s life, but doesn’t focus on what the title makes it seem that it will focus on: the specific p...

Tonatiuh, D. (2014). Separate is never equal: Sylvia Mendez & her family's fight for desegregation . Abrams Books for Young Readers.  When I think of the fight for desegregation in America, my mind goes to what I learned in history class, such as the Little Rock Nine and Ruby Bridges. The book, Separate is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez & Her Family’s Fight for Desegregation proves that this fight was much more diverse than I had ever realized. Duncan Tonaituh tells the story in a narrative format with illustrations throughout, creating an effective and informative book that reads more like a picture book than a work of nonfiction. The author is Mexican himself, and has written and illustrated several other books for children. However, it appears these are his only qualifications for writing such a book. The information on the front flap indicates that Tonatiuh did extensive research for this book, including research through court documents and an interview with Syliva Mendez h...

  Camp Panda: Helping Cubs Return to the Wild, by Catherine Thimmesh Thimmesh, C. (2022). Camp Panda: Helping cubs return to the wild . Clarion Books.  Camp Panda: Helping Cubs Return to the Wild, by Catherine Thimmesh, is a joyful, humorous children’s non-fiction book that explores the process of returning young pandas to the wild in order to repopulate an endangered species. Thimmesh has written a number of non-fiction books aimed at children, including a book about what dinosaurs actually looked like and how we know. However, there is no indication, either on her website or in the book, that she has any further qualifications to talk about the subjects of her non-fiction works. She does, however, provide acknowledgements and a list of sources at the end of the book, indicating she consulted conservation centers and organizations and many scientists who were experts in this field. This book narrows its focus as it goes into something very well suited for children of the age ...