Not As Expected

Yesterday started with a plan, a plan for productivity.  The gardens in my newly purchased home are out of control; left to grow with abandon by the previous owners and frankly, not at the top my list until now.  Working in them is no easy task.  The hot summer temperatures combined with the lack of rain makes the soil (clay) like working in cement.  Just as I was about to head out the door promising myself to get, at the very least, the front area completed, torrential rains fell.

The book held in my hand to read during gardening breaks became my afternoon companion.  As life would have it, a significant place in the story is a garden.  Making Friends with Billy Wong (Scholastic Press, August 30, 2016) written by Augusta Scattergood is a slice of life into our historical past.

All it took to send my summer on the road to ruin was a fancy note and a three-cent stamp.  The minute that envelope showed up, Mama was packing my suitcase.

Eleven-year-old Azalea Ann Morgan loves her mother and father and was looking forward to sharing a trip to the Grand Canyon with them.  Gone are her plans of spending the remaining summer days with her best friend Barbara Jean.  Instead she has left Texas for Paris Junction, Arkansas to help her grandmother.  She is having a difficult time believing her mother's words that everything is going to be fine. Didn't her mother and father leave Paris Junction as fast as they could after high school?  Even now, her mama can hardly wait to get on the road back home to Texas.

As Azalea is struggling with how she will survive weeks of living with a grandmother she hardly knows, working in the large garden, cooking and cleaning for them, she is informed other garden helpers will be arriving on certain days.  Too polite to voice an opinion, this is unwelcome news for a girl who is uncomfortable meeting and speaking with new people.  Life in the small town of Paris Junction in 1952 is about to surround Azalea.

Another recent arrival in the community is Billy Wong, great-nephew to the owners of the only grocery store, Lucky Foods.  He's thrilled to be staying and working with his great-uncle and great-aunt so he can attend a quality school, one offering more opportunities.  The prejudice, the looks, taunts and remarks, and vandalism, against Chinese Americans by some community members is a daily hardship for Billy and his family.

Azalea is pleasantly surprised to discover herself considering Billy a friend.  Two people she would not wish to have for friends are fashionista Melinda Bowman and mean-spirited Willis DeLoach, two young people who come to help in her grandmother's garden.  The one is there voluntarily, the other by court order.

Individually and together, in her grandmother's garden and out in the community, Azalea's and Billy's biggest trouble is with Willis DeLoach.  What has made Willis so nasty?  Soon Azalea has more questions than answers.  She is becoming a seeker and keeper of secrets.  One thing is certain, Billy Wong, Grandmother Clark and Paris Junction did not cause Azalea's summer to travel down the road to ruin.  On the contrary, they set her on a path paved with the best things in life.


Books written by Augusta Scattergood make us feel like we've come home, regardless of our age.  Her characters could be our neighbors, best friends or family members. Their joys and concerns become our joys and concerns not only during the story but resonating long after the final word is read.

In this title she alternates between the first person, prose narrative of Azalea filled with realistic dialogue and the poetic thoughts of Billy.  These writing styles take us into the essence of both of these characters and the other people in their lives.  Through their eyes we see the forest and the trees of this very particular time and place. Here are some sample passages.

Inside Lucky Foods Grocery
...Maybe I shouldn't climb trees to daydream in the
clouds.
But high on a tree branch, stories pop wide open.

I tie the white apron around my waist and
straighten pickle jars.
Stories jumping.
Popping.
Waiting to explode.
Onto the pages of the Tiger Times. ...

My grandmother had other ideas. "Help me to my room and turn on the radio, Azalea.  Go read a magazine on the porch where it's cool."
Cool, my foot.  I could die of heatstroke sitting on the front steps.  But just in time to save me from boredom, here came a man walking the world's littlest dog, barking her head off.  Now, I love dogs more than anything.  Cats, too.  I'm a whole lot better at talking to animals I don't know than people I don't know.  But this one looked plenty mad.
In case I was attacked by a dog not much bigger than a rat, I backed up.  The man pulled on a skinny leash and waved real big, same as most everybody in Paris Junction.

Once my eyes adjusted to the dimness, I sank into a soft chair that smelled like a rainy day.  I tugged the desk lamp's chain to shine light on a book of old pictures.  After a while, even though I heard the outside noises---cars slowing down, people talking---if I shut my eyes, the bad memories vanished into the room's quietness.  I understood why Billy wanted me to see this special place.


Making Friends with Billy Wong written by Augusta Scattergood addresses the dynamics between generations, family and friendship within the setting of 1952 Arkansas.  Her research is evident but the real gift Augusta Scattergood brings to us in all her books is her ability to make the past relevant in the present.  In her author's note she discusses the importance of Chinese grocery stores in the South, the Chinese immigration to the region and segregation prior to civil rights legislation.  This book comes with my highest recommendation.

To learn more about Augusta Scattergood please follow the link to her website attached to her name.  You can read more on her blog.   Augusta Scattergood chats with Scholastic Ambassador of School Libraries John Schumacher on his blog, Watch. Connect. Read. when the book cover is revealed. You can read wonderful interviews about this title with Augusta Scattergood at Reflections On The Teche, Twenty by Jenny, and Friend Friday hosted by author Kirby Larson.  A little more than a year ago August Scattergood wrote a blog post at Nerdy Book Club, Top Ten Things I've Learned From Kids About Writing A Book, you will enjoy reading.

UPDATE:  Augusta Scattergood has designed a discussion guide for educators.

To The North

Every single person living then was affected.  (The effects have lasted for generations.)  By 1935 it caused untimely deaths, loss of businesses and employment, and large-scale fear.  The Great Depression exacted a cost of unparalleled economic scale taking decades for recovery.

The loss of income meant people were unable to keep their homes, clothe themselves or their children and maintain a healthy diet.  In 1935 as part of a New Deal program initiated by President Franklin D. Roosevelt more than two hundred families on relief from the states of Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin were selected to participate in The Matanuska Colony in Palmer, Alaska.  Sweet Home Alaska (Nancy Paulsen Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House L.L.C., February 2, 2016) written by Carole Estby Dagg captivates reader at every page turn with the struggles and triumphs of the Johnson family through the voice of eleven-year-old Terpsichore.

Chapter 1
Terpsichore Johnson Cooks Dinner
November, 1934---Little Bear Lake, Wisconsin

It was because Terpsichore was the only unmusical Johnson that she dragged a hatchet across the yard toward a pumpkin as big as a pickle barrel.  She stumbled over an icy hillock of mud where her mother's roses had been uprooted to make way for potatoes.

After an exclamation and a promise during a frustrating piano lesson Terpsichore finds herself cooking dinner day after day for her two sisters, baby Matthew and her parents.  All they have left to eat is pumpkin and this creative young woman whips up more delicious meals than you would think possible.  Their father has lost his job at the sawmill as an accountant and their mother has few piano students left.  Mr. Johnson refuses to apply for assistance or move to Madison to live with Mrs. Johnson's mother.

When word of The Matanuska Colony plan is announced Mr. Johnson goes to apply only to discover you have to be on relief to qualify.  As the winter gets harder and harder for the family, Mrs. Johnson decides to trade her piano for food credit at the grocery store.  When Terpsichore's best friend Eileen's family is sure to leave for Alaska, she hatches a daring plan.  To her dismay it completely backfires!

With only two days to plan and pack, the Johnson family is destined to leave for Palmer, Alaska. Each family receives a loan of three thousand dollars, forty acres of land and is allowed to take only a ton of possessions.  Mrs. Johnson is not happy making Mr. Johnson promise to return to Wisconsin if in sixteen months they have not succeeded.  

Traveling on land by train and on sea aboard a ship over the turbulent waters of the Gulf of Alaska, the Johnsons arrive in Palmer only to discover the promised tents, their residences until homes can be built, are not available.  This is only the beginning of the troubles experienced by Terpsichore, her family and the other pioneers.  Swarms of mosquitoes have them hurrying from place to place and wearing specially designed headgear,  shared two-holer outhouses, wood and coal burning stoves for heat and cooking, a mess hall for eating for those without tents, the lack of enough hammers for the CCC employees, and overcrowded classrooms are some of the problems they endure.

Terpsichore and her new friends, Gloria and Mendel, forge a companionship much as the adults in the community, individual successes happen with the support of others.  The Library Action Committee, a telegram to Mrs. Roosevelt, Will Rogers, Wiley Post, winter snow and howling winds, the appearance of a kindly old-timer with a secret, the first upcoming autumn fair and Terpsichore's final big plan will keep readers flipping pages as fast as they can. Hardships can be handled with hope and the can-do attitude of one gal who won't give up.


One of the first things you notice about this title is the personalities of the characters.  Carole Estby Dagg creates characters, Terpsichore (Trip and Tipper), her twin sisters, Polly (Polyhymnia) and Cally (Calliope), little brother Matthew, Mother and Father, Grandmother, Gloria, and Mendel and their parents, Mr. Crawford and other community members who are as compelling as the people you might meet in everyday life.  Placing them within this historical context through Terpsichore's thoughts and the dialogue between the real (Dagg effortlessly weaves historic figures into the narrative.) and imagined people is like stepping back in time, experiencing what they do as if it's happening right before your eyes.

Through her painstaking research Dagg paints vivid pictures of the landscape as well as detailed accounts of daily life.  We see the grandeur of the mountain ranges, the flora and fauna, and the opportunities for farming.  We are exposed to the sickness and fright endured during the sea crossing, the lack of privacy in the cramped living conditions, the act of caring for a child still in diapers, a community without a hospital, doctors and nurses, a library or churches.  We come to understand these people begin equally with nothing, building a community in the wilderness.

One other high point is the mention of current news (some of it listened to on a radio), music and literature during this time period.  Terpsichore takes to heart one of President Roosevelt's Fireside Chats using it to boost her spirits.  She also uses what she has read in The Little House on the Prairie and Farmer Boy to assist her in accomplishing her goals.  I should also mention the pets, a cat named Tigger and a dog named Togo, who accompany Terpsichore and Mendel to Palmer.   Here are some sample passages.


Cutting library hours again?  Whose crazy idea was that?  The library was one of the most popular places in town, especially after the mill closed.  People couldn't afford the movies or the roller-skating barn, but they could come to story hour and check out books for free.  Even folks who didn't read much huddled around the heat registers at the library.  Terpsichore returned her books through the slot.  The hollow clunk they made as they hit the bin inside was as hollow as her heart.

"Mendel Theodore Peterson," he said, holding out a hand.  
Terpsichore didn't let go of the windowsill to shake his hand. "Terpsichore Elizabeth Johnson."  That would be one advantage of the move.  In Alaska she could reinvent herself and finally escape her horrible nickname. "Terpsichore," she said. "As in---"
"I know, I know, the Muse of Dance," he said.
Terpsichore narrowed her eyes.  "How did you know that?"
Mendel smirked, "You're not the only kid on this ship who knows Greek mythology.  And my name, Mendel, is for---"
"The composer Mendelssohn?" Terpsichore wanted to show he wasn't the only one who knew his composers.
"No," he said. "Gregor Mendel, the guy with the twenty-nine thousand pea plants.  The guy who figured out how two parents with brown eyes could have a blue-eyed baby."
"I knew that," Terpsichore said.  "The reason I guessed Mendelssohn first is that my mother used to teach piano."
And my mother used to teach botany, so I got stuck with 'Mendel.' Anyway, since I read up on sea travel in the library before I left, I've been able to minimize seasickness.  At least I didn't toss my cookies."
"Toss your cookies?"
"Puke, vomit, upchuck, retch, heave, spit up, spew up, disgorge, be sick to one's stomach, be nauseated, return your breakfast, or blow your lunch."
"Stop!" Terpsichore said. "Just the words..." Who ever knew there were so many ways to say throwing up?  All the same, she couldn't quite control the grin that quivered at the corners of her mouth.

Later that week, as the wind shrieked through spruce trees and bare limbs of cottonwoods, Terpsichore huddled in her cot and pulled the blankets up over her ears, trying to muffle the sound.  Moments later, Tigger led her two new kittens under Terpsichore's blankets.  Terpsichore wished she had ten more cats to keep her warm.
The tent canvas whipped in the howling wind that threatened to fly them all away to Oz, like Dorothy and Toto.  Outside, the washtub clanged and rattled across the plowed field.  Wind thrust itself under the narrow space between the wood platform and canvas walls and whipped Matthew's drying diapers off the clothesline. 
At a crack like a gunshot, Matthew stood in his crib and howled.
"What's that?" Cally and Polly whimpered.
"Probably a tree that couldn't stand up to the wind," Pop said.
Terpsichore coughed and pulled the blankets over her head.  She flinched each time a tree snapped.  She didn't think any trees were close enough to hit the tent and crush them, but she wasn't sure.


Sweet Home Alaska written by Carole Estby Dagg is an engaging portrait of the settling of the Matanuska Colony in Palmer, Alaska, an event rarely depicted in American history classrooms.  This is one of the reasons readers will enjoy this book.  It acquaints them with something they might not know through the eyes of people like them.  It's inspirational and hopeful; two things as important today as they were then.  Short chapters with compelling closing sentences will keep them venturing to the next episode until the heartwarming conclusion.  Author notes, resources, recipes, and the lyrics for When It's Springtime in Alaska are placed at the close of the book.

Please visit Carole Estby Dagg's website to learn more about her and her other books.  She includes fascinating pages about this title as well as a discussion guide.  If you would like to know how to pronounce her name and the history about it, go to TeachingBooks.net.  More information about this portion of history can be found at the Alaska Rural Rehabilitation Corporation site, the National Association of Rural Rehabilitation Corporations, Explore North, and Alaska's Digital Archives.

Update:  February 3, 2016 Carole Estby Dagg wrote a post about this title at the Nerdy Book Club.

Update:  February 5, 2016 Carole Estby Dagg is interviewed at Margie's Must Reads.

The Soul Of A City

The last week in August 2005 a nation, admittedly persons around the world, watched with growing alarm as a force of nature spun toward the southern edge of the United States.  On the 29th it reached landfall along the Gulf Coast.  Hurricane Katrina stretched some four hundred miles with sustained winds reaching between one hundred and one hundred forty miles per hour. The loss of life, the loss of a way of living and personal property was catastrophic.

One man, Cornelius Washington, in the wake of devastating destruction dug deep into his heart doing what he had done daily.  Marvelous Cornelius: Hurricane Katrina and the Spirit of New Orleans (Chronicle Books, August 4, 2015) written by Phil Bildner with illustrations by John Parra is an inspirational tribute to an extraordinary human being.  His strength in the face of events beyond his control was a spark that fueled flames in others.

In the Quarter,
there worked a man
known in New Orleans as Marvelous Cornelius.

Cornelius was known for his cheerful salutations to all he saw each morning, afternoon and evening on his route.  Men, women and children raised their hands and voices in returned greetings.  Cornelius was a sanitation worker spreading joy throughout the city riding on the back of the big truck.

This man took tremendous pride in his work; realizing we all have jobs to do, so we need to do them in the best possible way.  His calls rang out like trumpets.  His beats on the side of the truck and clashing of lids were like the matching percussion in a big brass band.

He moved from curb to truck with the skills of an acrobat and the smoothness of a dance king, bags sailing through the air.  People happily paused to watch or join Cornelius, marveling at the magic he dispersed.  This all stopped when the storm struck.

The mighty wind and water stirred the city into a stew of destruction.  When they finally receded Cornelius felt the weight of the world on his shoulders as he saw the piles of rubble farther than his eyes could see.  He sobbed.  He then got to work from the back of his truck.  So did others in his city, the state, and the nation.  One man's spirit rallied others then and still does today.


One person can make a difference.  Once man's presence can brighten a day and lighten a load.  Phil Bildner gives respectful recognition to such an individual with words lifting off the page like the notes in a song, sung in a storyteller's voice.  Bildner has Cornelius acknowledge three distinct people as the story begins.  They play an essential role toward the end of the tale.  Alliteration describes the worker's day.  The rhythms in the Crescent City ring out in this man's every action.  Here is a passage.

BANG!
He clapped the covers like cymbals and
twirled the tins like tops.  Whizzing and
spinning back and forth across the street.


Rendered in paint the two separate illustrations seen on the front and back of the matching dust jacket and book case speak to the spirit of the man and the work ethic he presented to all who encountered him.  The perspective on the front depicts Cornelius as a larger than life figure in the city he loved.  The rays of the sun are akin to the rays of cheer and go-to attitude of this man.  He was a sunrise to the people before and after Katrina.  To the left on a background of burnished orange Cornelius is waving as he rides on the back of the truck.  On the opening and closing endpapers forty-eight different symbols of the city are patterned in small rectangles.  A city street, a row of houses, spans from left to right as the truck passes on the verso and title pages.

Single page and double-page images display a full range of color with a nod to the architecture of the vibrant city of New Orleans.  Greens, blues and the blush of dawn provide the background colors.  Readers will note the bluebird, a symbol of happiness, seen in the first picture is visible repeatedly throughout the book.  When Cornelius makes a decision to begin his work after the storm even though the odds against him are huge, the bluebird returns with a sprig of green.  This is most definitely a nod to the receding of the waters and sadness being replaced with determination and hope.  The tiny details, ants in the street, logos on the discarded items Cornelius picks up, the clothing worn by the residents, the vines growing on railings, a bee on a string of lights, street musicians, an umbrella caught in the wind, the type of boats on the water, and the NY 2 NO on the side of a bus tell us about the care John Parra takes when creating his visuals.

One of my favorite illustrations is the first one of Cornelius kneeling in the center of a street, a can held in one hand, a bag in the other.  He is smiling as he looks at a bluebird perched on a curved handle poking from the can.  Rays are radiating behind him.  On either side are rows of homes people out and about enjoying the day.  At the top two ribbons arc from a star on the left is New, on the right is Orleans.  

Readers, this reader, can't help but feel gratitude toward author Phil Bildner and illustrator John Parra for bringing our attention to this man in Marvelous Cornelius: Hurricane Katrina and the Spirit of New Orleans.  The text and images raise it to the status of tall tale as intended but the truth of this life well-lived glows on every page.  Phil Bildner explains further in an Author's Note.  

To learn more about Phil Bildner and John Parra and their other work please visit their respective websites by following the links attached to their names.  If you go to the publisher's website there are several interior images and a teacher's guide.  Two years earlier John Parra was a guest at author, reviewer and blogger Julie Danielson's Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast.  Two years ago Phil Bildner stopped by Scholastic's Ambassador for School Libraries John Schumacher's blog Watch. Connect. Read. Stop by Latin@s in Kid Lit to read In the Studio with Illustrator John Parra.  A series of blog posts at Color Me a Kidlit Writer showcase this title.  Phil Bildner talks about A Modern Day Folktale: MARVELOUS CORNELIUS Blog Post.  CELEBRATING THE SPIRIT OF NEW ORLEANS 10 YEARS AFTER KATRINA is an essay by Phil Bildner revealing the story behind this book.  Teacher librarian Matthew C. Winner talks with Phil Bildner and John Parra in Let's Get Busy, Episode #175 podcast.  John Parra reads this title aloud on KidLit TV.  You are going to enjoy this.




Update:  March 2, 2016 John Parra is interviewed at GROG.

Listen And Learn

It's hard not to think about what-ifs sometimes.  What if I was not on social media?  What if I was not a friend with a particular person?  What if I had not checked posts on a specific day?  The facts are I am on social media, friends with a special author and I did read my feed on August 10, 2014.  Based on three sentences written and shared, I went to my bookshelves remembering a title I had purchased.  As soon as I opened the book, my known world slipped away.

Newbery Honor winning author, Margarita Engle presents readers with a remarkable piece of historical fiction in one of her 2014 titles.  Silver People: Voices from the Panama Canal (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) spans the years 1906 to 1914 in the country of Panama.  The past is speaking to us and we need to listen.

MATEO from the island of Cuba

JOB HUNT
Fear is a fierce wind

that sends me reeling

down to the seashore,

where I beg for work,

any work at all,

any escape 

to carry me far

from my father's

furious fists.

Fourteen years old, strong for his size, willing to tell a number of lies to leave, Mateo, believing the propaganda about working conditions and wages paid to diggers of the Panama Canal, finds himself on a steamship bound to that very place.  Plagued by hunger, the humiliation of segregation by skin color, travel by railroad flatcars and living in boxcars, he realizes he is trapped by a mistaken decision.  The only brightness shining in what is and will become a bleak existence is Anita, a local girl, a seller of native herbs and plants. 

As Mateo moves tracks daily, deeper and deeper into the Serpent Cut, another voice is heard.  Henry, from the island of Jamaica is a digger.  Instead of twelve to a boxcar, eighty of his comrades live together in one room.  At lunch break each day he sees how the Americans eat in comfort under a tent, the medium-dark workers sit on the train tracks and he and other diggers must stand with no place to rest.  

Pay days come; restless workers wander around in Silver Town made of mud, loneliness, anger and not much else.  Draw to a boxing ring by the ghosts of his past, Mateo find himself the loser in a fight with Henry.  The two now know one another.  They meet in the ring on a regular basis, strangers battling with fists for no apparent reason.

A landslide, an arrest, and a visit from President Roosevelt, define shifted loyalties.  The agony is lessened by another speaker, the voice of Augusto from the island of Puerto Rico, educated in the United States, working as a geologist on this mammoth endeavor.  Augusto sees Mateo's special gift, giving him at least one day a week to hope. 

Official visitors, official changes, jungle living, the suffering brought by fever and freedom found alter all their lives.  Chapter after chapter we readers are drawn further into this huge undertaking filled with choices and consequences.  Nothing remains the same then or now; especially for us having read these pages.

As a novel in verse, Margarita Engle is able to create intimate portraits of Mateo, Anita, Henry, Augusto and even Old Maria.  Usually one or two pages long, their voices, thoughts, are realistic portrayals based upon her research.  We build in our minds an understanding of their physical and emotional statuses throughout the narrative.  

Interspersed among their chapters are placed real persons, John Stevens, Theodore Roosevelt, George Goethals, Jackson Smith, Gertrude Becks and Harry Franck creating a more intense authenticity.  Margarita Engle sets aside pages, in eight different sections, for flora and fauna from the rain forest, the howler monkeys, glass frogs, a Blue Morpho butterfly, the trees and many others. They each reflect upon (or shout out) the impact of the Canal on their habitat. This technique of adding historical figures and allowing those with no voice to speak gives readers a more complete picture of all the aspects of the building of the Panama Canal during these eight years.

Very early in my reading of this book, I began marking passages until my copy soon had what I call the "porcupine look" from so many added sticky notes.  Here are a few of those many marked words.

Hunger at sea for three days

feels like a knife in the flesh---

twisted blade, rusty metal,

the piercing tip of a long

sharp-edged

dagger

called regret.  ...

...My hands feel like scorpion claws,

clamped on to a hard hard shovel all day,

then curled into fists at night.

At dawn, the steaming labor trains

deliver us by the thousands, down into

that snake pit where we dig

until my muscles feel

as weak as water

and my backbone

is like shattered glass. ...

THE TREES

WILDERNESS

We are fewer

than before,

but each of us

is just as alive

as ever,

our leaves

hungry for sunlight,

our roots thirsty

for rain,

our fruit and seeds carried far

by flying birds and roaming animals

so that young trees can spout and grow,

our shared forest once again spreading

like music.

Highly recommended for upper middle school on up, Silver People: Voices from the Panama Canal written by Margarita Engle is beautiful in its sadness, truth and hope.  Your understanding of the impact of this cut through a country on the place and people there, and those brought from afar, will be long remembered.  Margarita Engle gives depth and breadth to these events changing every reader.  

To learn more about Margarita Engle please visit her website by following the link embedded in her name.  This link takes you to a recent interview at Watch. Connect. Read., a blog hosted by the talented teacher librarian, John Schumacher.  UPDATE:  Here is a link to an amazing guide at the Poetry for Children website. 

Silver People Excerpt by Margarita Engle

Hearing Art

There is an art to discovering, creating and enhancing art...at least for me.  I have found that in slowing down, in stillness, I have been able to develop a more sensory appreciation for nearly everything.  I think you have to step away from, step outside, the normal hustle and bustle around you.

When you stand on the shore of Lake Michigan all alone and close your eyes, the sound of the waves becomes a string of notes reaching into your soul.  When you block out all sound and gaze at the star-studded sky, it lifts you up.  Have you ever reached out and touched a milkweed pod broken open with the seeds spilling out, feeling the different textures?  When cooking and then eating a favorite recipe, sometimes it's difficult to determine where taste ends and smell starts; the two are nearly blended together.

What I have never been able to do is to see color when hearing sounds or to hear sounds when seeing color.  Artist Vasily Kandinsky could.  The Noisy Paint Box: The Colors and Sounds of Kandinsky's Abstract Art (Alfred A. Knopf) written by Barb Rosenstock with illustrations by Mary GrandPre traces his creative life from his youth into adulthood.

Vasya Kandinsky spent his days learning to be a proper Russian boy.
He studied bookfuls of math, science, and history.

Everything was going along rather dully according to his parents' plan until his aunt gave him

a small wooden paint box.

It was a subject necessary for a good and decent upbringing; an appreciation for art was integral to him becoming well-rounded.  After a lesson in mixing the colors from his aunt, he tried it on his own.

He heard hissing!  Did his aunt hear it?  Did his papa hear it?  Did his mama hear it?  No, they did not.  Only Vasya could.  He mixed and painted and listened to the noise filling the air.

The results of his efforts puzzled everyone.  They failed to understand what his work represented.  Vasya was asked to attend classes so he could paint exactly as everyone else did.  When he grew older he attended law school, setting aside his box of paints.

Even though his box was closed, colors still rang out to him wherever he went.  One evening the most astonishing thing happened; at the opera Vasya saw colors as the orchestra played.  His career in law no longer held any importance but becoming a painter did.

He studied and painted conforming to the instructions of his mentors.  These pictures were not a reflection of the sounds he heard.  Vasya could no longer ignore the music coming from his noisy paint box.  He mixed and painted and people began to listen.


When you look at a Vasily Kandinsky painting, a unique energy emanates.  That same type of vitality calls out from the narrative with Barb Rosenstock's use of language.  Details reflect her meticulous research but her depiction of them is completely captivating for readers.  When she describes Kandinsky's abilities the air around you will resonate in joyful colors.  Here is a sample passage.

As the orchestra's music crashed around him, the colors of the noisy paint box twirled wildly in his mind.  Stomping lines of vermilion and coral.  Caroling triangles in pistachio and garnet. Thundering arches of aqua and ebony, with shrill points of cobalt and saffron.


You can almost reach out and touch the magic in the air from looking at the matching dust jacket and book case illustration extending over the front and back.  Mary GrandPre uses acrylic paint and collage to make this and the other pictures in this title; most spanning two pages.  A thin white line frames those and the eight single-page visuals.  The opening and closing endpapers are done in a collage of creams and a paler shade of one of the brush strokes of color pattered on them; the red, blue, green and yellow.  The final set of endpapers includes a quote of Vasily Kandinsky done in script.

The title page is a close-up view of the interior of the paint box; the text cleverly positioned as if it's supposed to be there.  With a page turn the story begins with a scene of Vasya in his room studying.  Displayed items mirror the words (with the exception of his stuffed toy rabbit).  There is an authenticity to the architecture, decor, furniture and clothing of the era in every scene.

Mary GrandPre chooses a color palette that brings the hues from Kandinsky's artwork into her illustrations with an overtone of shades of blue (almost like a base).  Her lively paintings move with a vibrancy perhaps due to her lighting, lines and layout.  My favorites, by far, are the close-ups of Vasya's face over the years as he senses colors in sounds and hears sounds in color; as a boy mixing his paints for the first time or as a young man walking down a city street or sitting at the opera house during a performance.


This picture book presentation, The Noisy Paint Box: The Colors and Sounds of Kandinsky's Abstract Art written by Barb Rosenstock with illustrations by Mary GrandPre, of Vasily Kandinsky's life is exuberant, informative and engaging.  It shines a light on one man's individuality, on his desire and determination to follow his heart.  You might want to have several paint box sets on hand after you read this book.  I know it will inspire others to do the same.  The outstanding illustrations of Mary GrandPre make this title a candidate for the Mock Caldecott 2015 list.

At the conclusion of the book are an author's note, four of Kandinsky's paintings, and a list of sources. The links embedded in Barb Rosenstock's and Mary GrandPre's names will lead to their official websites.  I urge you to visit them.  Please follow this link to an interview of Barb Rosenstock by John Schumacher at Watch. Connect. Read.  This is a link to The Noisy Paint Box Educator's Guide.

In The Year 1812

Until we all have the ability to move back and forth in space and time, we rely on primary sources of fact to give us insights into the events which comprise history.  From these records authors and illustrators provide readers with nonfiction and fiction enlarging our understanding based upon their interpretations.  If not for these books our perceptions of the past would be greatly diminished.  

During the course of my reading life, historical fiction has continually provided the impetus for me to dig deeper into the truths presented in those titles.  In December of 2013 a book, a novel in verse, appeared on the nominations list for the 2013 Nerdy Award Finalists.  Recently I completed my reading of this book, Salt:  A Story of Friendship in a Time of War (Frances Foster Books, Farrar Straus Giroux) written by Helen Frost.  Presented through the voices of two twelve-year-old boys, we are given a possible, personal perspective of two life-changing months in the autumn of 1812.

A shallow sea

moves over the earth,

salty, sun-warmed.

Water rises

as mist,

fog, clouds,

leaving a thin coat

of salt on the ground.

Anikwa lives with Old Raccoon, his father's younger brother who he calls Father, Mink, his wife, Wiinicia, Old Raccoon's mother who Anikwa calls Grandma, fourteen-year-old Rain Bird and six-year-old Toontwa, children of Old Raccoon and Mink.  They make their home in the community of Kekionga at the juncture of three rivers.   James Gray lives with his parents and younger sister, Molly, within the stockade surrounding the fort in a house next to the trading post run by his father.

There is a bond, generations' old, between the two families; James' great-grandfather traded with the Miami (Myaamia).  For the first six one-page chapters we become acquainted with the relationship between Anikwa and James, the sharing of adventures in the surrounding woods and fields, food and fun between the two young men.  They each know a few words of the other's language.  It is in the seventh chapter speaking in James' voice, the conflict, the tragedy to come, is introduced. 

Isaac, an eleven-year-old boy, the son of soldier lives at the fort.  Unfortunately, he joins James one morning as he walks to catch some fish at the river.  Isaac's conversation is constant describing the conflict predicted to come and his distrust of the Native Americans.  An incident at the river highlights the disparity in beliefs of people like Isaac and James and Anikwa.  

In another series of chapters we are given a picture of the daily lives of both families.  We realize the ethical standards which guide the actions of both groups.  Woven among the conversations and thoughts of Anikwa and James are several additional incidents portraying the increasing tensions in the area.

Adult discussions are overheard and decisions are made, some confusing to the boys.  Due to restrictions placed on their lives by the upcoming arrival of the American and British soldiers, the confidence and trust grown over their shared lifetimes is threatened.  Literal and figurative fires are set destroying decades of growth.  Will those things which brought them together before be strong enough to do so again?

During the moments it took me to read the opening quote by Mihsihkinaahkwa, Miami Chief (Little Turtle) to William H. Harrison, Governor of the Indiana Territory, look over the Miami Homeland map, study the two page introduction by Helen Frost and the explanation of character names, I knew I was going to be taken back in time by an author who had done extensive research in support of her passion for this project.  This was further confirmed on my completion of the story by the author notes, glossary of Miami (Myaamia) words and acknowledgments. The opening poem I included above is the first of ten depicting the area containing the salt deposits necessary to the lives of many.  Frost uses them to delineate certain aspects of her story.

Within the confines of her poetic prose Helen Frost breathes beautiful life into the two boys' voices. Anikwa's pages are in the shape of traditional Miami ribbon work.  James's pages began in the shape of stripes on the American flag.  Frost says:

As I discovered the two voices, the pulse-like shape of Anikwa's poems wove through the horizontal lines of James's poems, and the two voices created something new that held the story as it opened out.

 Readers cannot help but be drawn into the circumstances surrounding the lives of both.  I remarked to a colleague as I was nearing the end of the story, how I was afraid to finish.  I could feel the tension increasing as I was filled with an overwhelming sadness.  Here are a couple passages of many I marked as exemplary. 

Two fish arc out of the water near

the eddy, showing us exactly where they are.

Then, over by that sycamore that fell last year, a big

bullfrog starts up talking like a drum.  I answer, and he

answers back.  And then we hear something else---

James's quiet voice, Isaac's scratchy loud one.

It sounds like they're arguing.  Everything

except the river and the frog stops

talking.  The bluebirds fly

away, the ducks dive

underwater.

Anikwa plays a tune on a willow whistle.  Could I make one?  I point to the whistle

and take out my knife.  We go find a willow tree, and Anikwa shows me how

to cut a stick at an angle, make a notch through the bark, and tap the stick all over

so the bark comes loose and slips right off.  After I slice off a piece of wood

to make a mouthpiece, he helps me cut another notch and slide the bark back on.

I put the whistle to my mouth and blow---it works!  The sound it makes is lower

than Anikwa's.  He plays fast, and I play slow; soft, loud, then soft again.

We sound so good, two yellow birds stop to listen and sing along with us.

I believe Salt:  A Story of Friendship in a Time of War written by Helen Frost is a significant work of historical fiction for the audience in which it is intended.  It is not only valuable for the story it tells but for the discussions I know it will generate.  What each individual takes away from the reading of this book depends on what they bring to it originally.  Personally, I am deeply moved by the accounting created by the impressive research and lovely writing of Helen Frost.

For more information about the title with multiple resources please follow the link embedded in Helen Frost's name to her website. Anita Silvey author of the print and online Anita Silvey's Children's Book-A-Day Almanac wrote a review linked here.  For a review of the book from a Native American perspective along with the continuing conversation in the comments, please follow this link to Debbie Reese's blog, American Indians In Children's Literature.  Please follow this link to the publisher's website to read further excerpts from the book.

Taken

There's something particularly unsettling about having to go somewhere you don't want to go, even when you have a choice.  When in the course of events all you imagined comes true, it's almost overwhelmingly wonderful to return home; to be among those things familiar and comforting. A house, your house, no matter the size, and the natural landscape surrounding it provide sanctuary.

Take away choice.  Take away the knowledge of where you are going.  Take away the only land you have ever known.  Africa Is My Home:  A Child of the Amistad (Candlewick Press) written by Monica Edinger with illustrations by Robert Byrd follows a nine-year-old girl captured and placed on this slave ship.  Her accounting will linger in your mind and heart.

No one comes home.
That is what they told me.
No one.

I was born in Mendeland, West Africa, one of the greenest places on earth.

At a very young age, a child is pawned by her father to work for another family in exchange for food.  Soon thereafter, she finds herself part of a human chain, tied together by iron, marching for days toward something frightening. She has never seen an ocean.

For seven harrowing weeks, she and others live below deck in darkness.  Brought to shore in the middle of the night, in silence, she and three children are purchased the following day in Cuba.  They have never seen people wear layers of clothing.  They have never seen a horse.  It must have been terrifying for her, for all of them, to comprehend all this newness.

The four children are placed on a ship with other adult males, a ship called the Amistad. Lead by a man called Cinque the captives escape from their chains to overthrow the white men in charge of the ship.  They demand the ship set sail back to Africa.

Deceived the slaves aboard the Amistad are again captured and placed in custody.  For more than eighteen months trial after trail does not settle the fate of the Africans until it finally reaches the Supreme Court of the United States.  Freedom is finally granted to all but still they cannot go home.

Surviving the cultural differences, the changes in seasons, living with more than one family and the uncertainty of your future, this girl, the other children and men waited another eight months to sail home to Africa with a group of missionaries.  By the time she is sixteen the course of her life will alter again, taking her on another ocean voyage.  Will she ever return to her beloved homeland?

In an author's note Monica Edinger addresses her years of painstaking research and the decision to write this true story as a first person fictionalized account.  There is an intimacy in her word choices, bringing readers into the strong emotional experiences of Margru.  Vivid descriptions of place and people, good and bad, transport Margru's life from the past into the present; readers will feel her presence, hear her voice.  Placed among the narrative three times are poetic pieces of her dreams; of her mother, father and the elders.  Each ends with

I dreamed of home.

Here are a couple of passages from the book.

We walked for days and days, passing people going about their lives as we had only days before: girls with calabashes full of water on their heads, women washing in rivers, men working in fields, and boys climbing trees.  Everyone and everything made me think of home.  Of my mother, my sisters and brothers, even my father.  I cried myself to sleep thinking of them. 

Our lawyers felt Kagne, Teme, and I should not be prosecuted as we had nothing to do with the rebellion, and so, on the first day of the trial, we were brought to the courtroom without the men. 
"Are they hanging Cinque and the others while we are here?" I whispered to Teme.  All three of us cried and cried.  Mr. Tappan tried to comfort us, but it was to no avail.


Rendered in ink and watercolor the illustrations of Robert Byrd give readers a genuine sense of the life of Margru beginning with the matching jacket and cover.  He features her memories and dreams of home with her voyage and the challenges and changes it wrought in her world.  The blue of ocean on the front is a solid background on the opening and closing endpapers.  Travel across the Atlantic alters this person's life more than most of us can understand.

Full color pictures accentuate the narrative, beginning with a map of Africa on the first page framed in a pattern native to the area.  The text on the opposite page is framed with the lush green landscape of Mendeland; three children walking among the bushes and trees.  At times Byrd chooses to use an illustration spreading across two pages, above or below the text.

Many of the full page visuals extend to the page edge.  Single page illustrations edged in a thin black line usually have a single element breaking that frame, giving it motion and emotion.  Throughout the book, smaller pictures are inserted for emphasis.  It is this variety in size and perspective which elevates and compliments the text.  Reproductions of primary documents act as excellent bridges between the past and present.

One of the most poignant scenes is of Margru standing alone on the deck of the ship taking her home to Africa.  The small figure looking across the water, sun shining its path on the surface, is uplifting and hopeful.  Your heart will soar, cheering at her return to her homeland.


Africa is My Home:  A Child of the Amistad written by Monica Edinger with illustrations by Robert Byrd is captivating from cover to cover.  The character of Margru, her fears, her courage and the fulfillment of her dreams, is a story that needed to be told.  I encourage you to read this title and add it to your bookshelves.  In addition to the author's note a page of selected sources is included.  Update: Monica Edinger has several posts on her blog with additional resources.  The links are here, here and here.  Follow this link to an interview of Monica Edinger at Book Q & As with Deborah Kalb.

All In A Summer

While it's true the Internet provides users with untold amounts of resources, the ability to converse with people on the other side of the world and endless networking possibilities, exchanges of information, I still hold the belief that inside the pages of a book, the same is true.  Sometimes the most wondrous happenings then or now are closer than you think.  When these secrets are revealed to you, it's like opening a geode.

I was born and have lived in the state of Michigan for my entire life.  Walking through the botanical gardens at Michigan State University, spending days at the Henry Ford Museum, Greenfield Village, Mackinac Island and other parks, zoos, lakeshores, woodland trails and museums have enriched my sense of history and appreciation for our natural world.  In all those adventures, though, I have yet to do more than pass through Muskegon, Michigan.  Little did I know what happened in the nearby neighborhood of Bluffton in the summers of 1908, 1909 and 1910?  Illustrator and author Matt Phelan knows.  His newest title, Bluffton: My Summers With Buster (Candlewick Press), opens up possibilities, blending history and fiction in a pictorial journey back in time.


It's not every day a train rolls into the town of Muskegon, Michigan filled with vaudeville entertainers, an elephant and a zebra, but on a summer day in 1908, that's exactly what Henry Harrison saw.  The troupe has come to vacation in the cottages at Bluffton; the heat having caused the closure of all the theaters.  Henry decides to explore the next morning along the western shore of Lake Muskegon.  Crashes and flying bodies introduce him to Jingles, Louise and Buster Keaton.

Leaving for home with the promise of a baseball game the next day, Henry (and readers) get the inside scoop on vaudeville and the people at The Actors' Colony from a man on the porch.  For the next three months Henry and Buster play baseball, fish, swim, pull pranks and talk, reveling in all the peaceful bliss of summer.  Each can't help but hopefully wish for what the other has; Buster, a normal boy's life, Henry, a life on the stage.

Henry attends school, helps out in his father's hardware store and juggles away the months, longing for the companionship of his summer pal. Another boy who is part of the traveling group, Lex, keeps him informed with the latest news through letters, including problems the Keaton family have had with authorities about their knockabout act.  When they return Henry is more determined than ever to learn an act, to be on stage.

During the second summer more of the two boys' personalities and lives are revealed in their continued conversations and in the events experienced by both; boarding house fires, train wrecks, elaborately rigged contraptions, Harry Houdini, baseball and the presence of Sally, a neighborhood friend of Henry.  Regardless of an initial failed attempt and caution urged by Buster and Lex, an incident teaches Henry more than one lesson during their absence before the third summer in 1910.  Only three sentences are spoken throughout the pages of the last summer shared by Henry Harrison and Buster Keaton.  But the visuals speak loudly and clearly of glorious memories made.


In an Author's Note at the book's conclusion Matt Phelan writes about his admiration and love of all things Buster Keaton.  Keaton's autobiography, My Wonderful World of Slapstick, is the source of his inspiration for this title.  Phelan's knowledge is evident in every word.

His use of text is minimal but deliberate, providing contrasts and tidbits of information.  It acts as a main thread upon which all the conversations written and pictured are tied and woven together. Every verbal exchange provides insight into what it might have been like to experience those three summers.


Using watercolor Phelan illuminates the past for his readers.  It's as if we are peering through a looking glass watching the days of those three summers, the months in between for Henry, unfold before our very eyes, panel by panel.  We are given clues as to the time and its passage with details in the inside and outside surroundings.

There is a delicate intricacy to Phelan's work.  He might be giving us a panoramic view of a particular scene or a close-up of a facial expression, conveying much through his deft skills as a graphic artist.  One example early in the story is Henry, apple in hand, casually leaning outside against the train station building.  In the next panel from behind we watch him as the train arrives at the station.  He lifts the apple to his mouth for a bite.  The view shifts to the train, a ramp being put to the open door of a car. Henry looks startled, apple still in hand.  In the final panel we see the apple falling, bouncing up as it hits the ground.  Without a word Matt Phelan has told us that something extraordinary has been seen by Henry.

I feel fortunate that Matt was able to answer some questions I recently asked him about his work on this book.  My questions are in black, his replies are in gray.  Thank you so much Matt for making the time to do this and for including some artwork, the completed watercolor of Buster and a thumbnail of their first game of baseball.

When you were working on Bluffton, did the script (narrative) come first or did you visualize the story first?

I always write a complete script first and that goes through the usual editorial process. I don't start drawing until everyone feels the story is as tight as it can be. That said, the writing process for me is basically describing what I see in my head, panel by panel.

I am no artist at all (pitiful is the word that comes to mind) so I am wondering when you work on your illustrations is the entire book mapped out like a storyboard first in pencil?  Thumbnails?  What comes next after the first step is done?  Is it done again in pencil or is ink used? Are more details added this time?  Is the watercolor the final step? Was watercolor all that was used in the final work of Bluffton?  Do you enlarge the illustrations or is that done in the publishing process? 

Thumbnails always come first. Very small, very loose. Those are scanned in to the computer and the words are added. From those, I make a second round of layout sketches which are in some ways even looser, but clearly place the dialogue and composition elements. Then I draw the final art on a new sheet of watercolor paper in pencil and paint it with watercolor. The final art is 100% larger than the size in the book.

I am also wondering if you have ever visited Muskegon or Bluffton?  After reading your book, I sure hope to visit myself. J  When you consider I’ve lived in Michigan my entire life, it’s sad I have never done anything but pass through there before now.

I spent a week in Bluffton in 2010 before I wrote the script. It was well worth it. I really gained the necessary feeling that I needed to do the book.

Were the characters of Henry and Sally based upon anyone real in or near Bluffton during that time period or are they entirely fictional? (I know you said they are fictional in your author’s note but where did Henry and Sally come from?)  I love how you created this story around those three summers. 

Henry and Sally are entirely fictional. For Henry, I basically just imagined how I would react if I met Buster as a kid. Three years is quite a lot of time for that age, and part of the challenge in writing the book was to age the kids physically and emotionally from summer to summer.

I remember reading in your author’s note how you and your brother watched the Buster Keaton movies projected on the bedroom wall.  What sparked the interest in those movies?  Did your study of film and theater in college increase your passion for this master actor?

As a kid, I just responded to how hilarious those movies are. They really haven't dated. Growing up in my family, we never had a stigma against black and white movies. Some kids do (or think they do) today but I'm pretty certain that a few minutes of a Keaton film could change that. As I got older and learned more about film and acting, my admiration for him grew exponentially. I believe he was the finest filmmaker of the silent era and certainly one of the greatest film actors. There isn't a single moment of overacting in any of his films.

Bluffton:  My Summers With Buster written and illustrated by Matt Phelan is an outstanding tribute to some of the best times in the life of Buster Keaton as a youth.  It is also a story about finding your niche in life; discovering how to best use your gifts.  Even after reading it three times, I continue to find enjoyment in the illustrations, noticing a detail missed previously, and in the conversations between the characters.  This book is a historical fiction treasure.

To access Matt Phelan's website follow the link embedded in his name.  Here are two links to articles on his blog, The Road to BLUFFTON, Part One: Buster Keaton and The Road to Bluffton, Part Two: Vaudeville.  For a peek inside the book, more visuals, this link takes you to the publisher website.  Here is the link to a post Matt Phelan did recently at the Nerdy Book Club about a researcher's dream come true.

This link will take you to an introduction to the title and a Q & A with Matt Phelan.  This link is to an interview with Matt Phelan at Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast with Julie Danielson.
Here is a video interview which was conducted during the American Library Association Annual Conference & Exhibition in Chicago this summer




Here is a trailer for the book.




Here are three videos Matt Phelan recommends watching to learn more about Buster Keaton.

Strong Enough To...

Growing up my life was a reflection of my parents having been children during the Great Depression.  There were no credit cards or checkbooks in our home.  Everything was paid for with cash, saving until the full cost of a car or home could be paid in full.  Staples in our pantry were always well-stocked; the fear of running out having made a life-long impression on both of them.  The stories of going without, the struggles of barely getting by, in turn and in time have directed how I live.

Despite hearing firsthand accounts from my parents, immersion by way of well-crafted historical fiction can and does give new insights into the hardships felt by others during this time period.  Writing her debut novel, Every Day After (Delacorte Press), Laura Golden returns readers to a world where wanting gets pushed aside by needing, where too much change reveals the depth of a person's character.  It's a time when some truths remain the same while others alter for the sake of survival.


I learned a lot from my daddy, but the number one most important thing is this:  never, ever, under any circumstances, let something get the best of you.  To do this, you gotta work with what you got, play the cards you been dealt, turn lemons into lemonade.  Too bad he wasn't around to see me doing just that, because one thing's for sure:  when it rains in the South, it pours.

With that opening paragraph larger-than-life, gutsy, Lizzie Hawkins has become each reader's new best friend.  We share her ups, which are too few and far between, and downs, one right after the other, over and over again.  Before we know it the walls in our reality have slid away, replaced by her town of Bittersweet, Alabama.

Losing his job at the steel mill sapped the vim and vigor right out of Lizzie's Daddy until one morning without so much as a goodbye, he left home, leaving her Mama a small note and Lizzie her grandmother's locket.  With his leaving her Mama became more and more withdrawn until she sat in the rocker on the porch or the wingback chair in the parlor all day, every day.  Eleven-(soon to be twelve)-year-old Lizzie has taken up all the household and gardening chores as well as mending from townsfolk.  The frightening part was it was a well-guarded secret, except from her best friend in the whole world, Ben.

Ben was as kind as Lizzie was feisty, seeing the goodness, however small, in everything and everyone. He had problems of his own, his father having passed away a short time ago.  The one slight crack in an otherwise long-standing, solid friendship was a new girl in their class, Erin.  Ben being Ben was more neighborly to her than Lizzie thought right.  After all, Erin had done nothing since her arrival last summer, except to bully and badger Lizzie.

Not only does Erin want to make sure she gets the attention due for best grades instead of Lizzie, she wants to make sure Lizzie never has the honor again.  Erin wants Lizzie gone from Bittersweet...permanently.  Fear of discovery feeds Lizzie's fervor to maintain appearances at all costs.

Eccentric Mr. Reed, the elderly town recluse, the large amiable Sheriff Dawson, banker Mr. Cooper, snooty, meddling Mrs. Sawyer, Erin's mother, wise Dr. Heimler, storekeepers, Mr. and Mrs. Hinkle, their teacher, Miss Jones and Mrs. Butler, Ben's mom, all figure prominently in the twists and turns of the escalating troubles confronting Lizzie.  A trap is laid.  Dogged and desperate, Lizzie knows escape to, not from, is her only hope.


Laura Golden breaths life into her characters through dialogue rich in local flavor.  Lizzie's conversations with each of the characters illuminates their personalities and hers, brilliant and blemished. Her journal entries, documenting events and her perceptions, help readers to see her growth, however slow it may seem at times.

Through Lizzie's voice we become acutely aware of the financial challenges facing people not only in Bittersweet, Alabama but in most of the United States during the Great Depression.  Vivid descriptions of place paint a picture of the town in our minds. Chapter headings, proverbs taken from Lizzie's Mama's favorite book, provide a closer look at the atmosphere within Lizzie's own home, especially before her Daddy left.  Here are several passages taken from the book displaying the attraction of Golden's writing.

Myra, along with about ten other nosy bystanders, trailed us into town.  We turned off Main onto Oak Street, then onto Mr. Reed's rutted dirt drive, which led directly to his house up on the hill behind town.  I didn't know about Ben, but I was as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs.  We tiptoed over the junk in the front yard---cracked mirrors, broken chairs, rusty pitchforks and hoes---and onto the sagging front porch.

"Those church ladies probably think Mama's crazy for not coming to church lately.  A few of 'em came by to visit after Daddy left, to drop off a jar of jam or a batch of biscuits, but they never saw Mama.  I always told 'em she was scrubbing floors or gone into town.  They never seemed to doubt me.  But still, when they stopped showing, their mouths likely started moving.  Do you figure that's where Erin heard it?"
Ben shrugged and cleared his throat like he was gonna say something.  He didn't.
"Benjamin Butler!" I yelled.  "Did you hear me?"
It was times like these I'd have traded Ben for a girl in a blink.  Girls live to get riled up over stuff.  Boys would shake hands with the man who'd shot their dog.
He snatched up a rock and shot it into a sweet gum.  A single leaf floated to the ground.  "I just got a lot on my mind."


Beautifully conceived and executed, Every Day After, a labor of love, written by Laura Golden is a completely captivating work of historical fiction.  Nearly consumed in a single reading, I was compelled to discover answers about the characters' questionable futures and filled with admiration for Lizzie Hawkins.  This outstanding narrative will resonate with readers, the characters lives lingering and mingling with ours.

As is my custom a link to Laura Golden's website is embedded in her name above.  Here are links to four interviews where Laura talks about this book and the writing process, here, here, here and here.  Laura is the guest blogger at the Nerdy Book Club today.

To Their Last Breath

Everyone fortunate to have a dog choose them knows about their keen sense of smell.  When they catch a whiff of something, it's not just a scent but an entire story.  If Xena sticks her nose in the air, looks around and does not seem to want to continue, we turn around.  The nose knows.

Another of their innate abilities is their sense of love, loyalty, to the leader of the pack--you.  If I become fearful, Xena is alert.  This was never more apparent than when we were attacked by a German Shepherd loose in a park; her change into wolf mode was uncanny. It is because of characteristics unique only to them, canines were used extensively during World War I along the Front; many as messenger dogs.  Debut author, Sam Angus, recreates a year during the war through the story of a fourteen-year-old boy in Soldier Dog (Feiwel and Friends).


Twelve hours had passed.  He'd last seen her at eight that morning.  Faint with exhaustion and hunger, Stanley sank down.  How on earth could he find a creature lighter and quieter than the wind?

Stanley did not find the purebred, prize female greyhound, Rocket.  She returns home the next morning. His father, Da, prone to violent rages since the death of his wife and the enlistment of his older son, Tom, in the Great War, vows to not allow half-breed pups on the premises.  Six weeks after their birth, when the one most attached to Stanley, Soldier, is not taken by the tinkers, Da states he will drown him.  Awakened by Rocket's howling the next morning, to Stanley's dismay and rage, Soldier is missing.

Unable to bear a life that has become intolerable, Stanley leaves to look for Tom in France.  From Lancashire to Liverpool, he travels to enlist.  Lying about his age, he survives basic training, moving through Signal School, a division of the Royal Engineers.  When a new section of the Signals Service is formed, Messenger Dog Service, Stanley signs up, becoming a Keeper, Keeper Ryder.

Unlike the other men who are given three dogs to train, Stanley receives only one, Bones, a Great Dane.  He's told only men with three dogs go to the front, only men with dogs who bond with their master working perfectly without question.  Week after week Stanley prepares Bones, gunfire, heavy guns, bombs, and homing runs, until Colonel Richardson has no choice but to send them to France.

When communication lines (wires) are broken by gunfire and shelling, when men, runners, and pigeons can no longer be used the messenger dogs are sent.  Warfare in the trenches along the Western Front is brutal but a dog trained to come back through the worst of it, out of loyalty, will do so.  Key people in his home life, Da, Tom, and his teacher, Lana Bird, who Tom loves, merge with the soldiers who are Stanley's new family. Letters from those he cares about most play as important a role as the messages sent from one company to another on the field by the dogs.

The month of April 1918 will change everything Stanley believes to be true; unbelievable horror, suffering, pain, loss and heroism will pass in and out of his world.  Key battles, lost or won, will depend on the messenger dog who loves Stanley and who Stanley loves.  Readers will be unable to turn the pages fast enough to discover the fate of all involved.


In a word, this story, written by Sam Angus, is intense.  Meticulous research, providing details, is woven into dialogue and descriptions of place and time in England and France.  A sensory writing style binds the reader intimately to the events and action within the narrative; it's as if we one and the same with Stanley.  Broken into three parts; before enlistment, during service and after the Battle of Villers-Bretonneux, chapter headings, sometimes only hours apart, contribute to the profound impact.  Here are several passages taken from an Advanced Reader's Edition (my only copy available).

The vast and bleak parade ground was surrounded by barracks, offices, and the entrance gates.  Fear kept drawing Stanley's eyes, like the needle of a compass, toward the gates.  Da might stomp through them at any minute, shouting for all to hear, "Fourteen! The daft twerp's only fourteen!"  Da would see the ill-fitting uniform, see the pants which billowed around his son's buttocks, see the puttee---the bandage-type stocking---that was in danger of unwinding at his right ankle, already unraveling at his knee.  Da would mock him and haul him home.

"The shelling's cut the lines, sir...There's no point, sir, they're blown to bits as soon as they're laid."
"Oh, God," breathed Hunter to the linesman, aghast and haggard.  "No signals and we can't lay new lines till nightfall.  We've only the runners and they haven't a chance---the Hun's taken the tunnel under the canal---they'd have to swim across."
Hunter raced back down to the Signal Station.  There were more shouts from below, unintelligible.  Fidget was shouting to Stanley that the front line had pulled back again, that it wasn't holding.  A man came up the stairs, white-faced, eyes full of fear, a fresh runner, with Hunter behind.  Hunter looked toward the canal and the sickle of flame that grew hourly closer.
Stanley looked at the face of the runner.  And he looked down at Bones, willing and ready.  Would he be wanted now? his round eyes seemed to ask.  Stanley saw, with a rush of love, the large square skull and wing-like ears, and he felt a lump rising in his throat.  Bones must go, a man should not be sent---the dog was faster, lower, had the better chance.
"No, sir.  Don't send a man. S-send my dog, sir."


Soldier Dog the debut work of author Sam Angus vividly brings to life the place of messenger dogs in service during World War I.  It is a story of incredible courage, both human and canine; heartbreaking and heartwarming, captivating and compelling, memorable to the final sentence.  For middle grade and up, this book has my highest recommendation. A historical note, author's note, photograph gallery and bibliography are found at the book's end.

Follow the link embedded in Sam Angus's name above to her official website.  The link embedded in the title contains more information about the book, the research, reviews and the first chapter.  Bobbie Pyron, author of The Ring, A Dog's Way Home and The Dogs of Winter, interviews Sam Angus here.

Always...

The lines shaping who we become, are colored in by the people who enter and leave the days of our lives as well as our response to them.  For readers those numbers increase by leaps and bounds being introduced to real people in works of nonfiction and truly memorable characters in all forms of fiction. Probably more than we understand, these additional people, rarely met outside the pages of a book, influence and inform our personalities in varying degrees.

To connect with a real or imagined person, who has faced and conquered obstacles whether similar or different than ours, is to make their story part of our story.  In 2006 author Kirby Larson, introduced readers to Hattie Inez Brooks, a sixteen-year-old orphan.  Hattie left Iowa in December, 1917, never having felt welcome in the home of her Uncle Holt and Aunt Ivy, to live on her late Uncle Chester's homestead near Vida, Montana.  Hattie Big Sky, winner of a 2007 Newbery Honor award, is the story of her successes, failures, happinesses and heartbreaks as she set forth to "prove up the claim".  We were immersed in those, meeting a cast of characters who helped and hindered her attempts, as the history of the time swirled around them all.

On February 12, 2013 Hattie Ever After celebrated a book birthday.  Kirby Larson brings us back to Montana in June of 1919.  She opens the door; we gladly step through into a past we have come to know and love.

As she did in the previous title a letter begins chapter one.

June 4, 1919
Great Falls, Montana
Brown's Boardinghouse

Dear Perilee,
      You will never guess what I am posting in the mail besides this letter to you: my last check to Mr. Nefzger!  After these long months, Uncle Chester's IOU is paid in full. ...

Hattie finds it ironic she is making money doing the very thing which she left Iowa to avoid; cleaning and cooking in a boardinghouse.  She harbors a secret dream though; being a newspaper reporter after her articles, Honyocker's Homily, sent back to Iowa were published in The Arlington News.  Fate decides to intercede in the form of love.

Long-time friend Charlie Hawley, back home from his service during World War I, questions Hattie about their relationship when he makes a surprise visit.  The wardrobe mistress of a group of performers staying at Brown's has unexpectedly run off with a member of the cast.  A letter for Hattie's deceased Uncle Chester from a mysterious Ruby Danvers is forwarded to her.

These three seemingly unconnected occurrences chart a course for Hattie's new future.  Still unsure but determined to pursue her dream she finds herself in San Francisco as Charlie begins his new career in Seattle.   From Big Sky Country to big city living, we shadow Hattie as she makes her way.

People and moments connect in a chain of events leading to Hattie's employment at the San Francisco Chronicle as...yes...a night crew cleaning woman.  Her curiosity to uncover the truth about her uncle's past, her instinctive nose for news, her beliefs about human nature and her baseball pitching skills, learned from Charlie, all contribute to her being at the right place at the right time.  Plenty of excitement from the good and not-so-good people who cross her path lead Hattie to the best possible outcome.


With precise and painstaking research, Kirby Larson places her vivid, true-to-life characters within a historical setting so real, readers feel as though they've willingly ridden on a time machine.  Through dialogue, letter writing and musings by Hattie we are privy to the distinguishing personality traits of each person in Hattie's world.  With adept skill in her use of words and language Larson conveys a depth of emotion completely captivating her readers.  Here are a couple of passage from Hattie Ever After. (It was hard to narrow it down to only three.)

First impressions might lead one to think that a newspaper morgue was as quiet as...well, as a morgue.  Not that I knew about that firsthand.  But I did not think of "my" morgue as quiet.  Even in the wee hours, a symphony of sounds reverberated throughout this place.  First heard was the thump as one weighty volume was slid from its shelf, followed by the satisfying thump as it was placed on the library table. Then the whisk-whisk refrain of pages being turned enhanced the concerto.  One last set of sounds rounded out the music of a city's memories; each time I delved into those huge leather books, each time I traced my finger over the yellowed columns of newsprint, each time I studied a worn and faded photograph, papery whispers spoke to me of things that had happened long ago, and in so many places it would take an entire atlas to contain them all.  These stories were as irresistible to me as the Italian nougats one of Maude's suitors had brought her.

At the door, he took my hand.  When his palm slid next to mine, it was like a key slipping into my heart.  

Lacy clouds frothed around the seaplane like spun sugar.  We continued to push through to the clear sky above, and I pushed myself up in my seat, worries dissolving like the clouds.  There was no room for fear when faced with such a vista.  From my ever-ascending perch, I could take the city in all at once:  the Palace of Fine Arts, the wharves, Nob Hill.



In an interview Kirby Larson said, of Hattie Big Sky,  the story caught my heart when explaining her purpose in writing about Hattie.  She then goes on to say readers will know if a story is from your heart.  When continuing to tell the tale of Hattie's life after leaving Montana, the fullness in Larson's heart for this character has filled the pages of this remarkable new title, Hattie Ever After.  I have read it twice; receiving an ARC earlier, again after it's release and many of the treasured marked spots repeatedly.  This is historical fiction at its very finest.  Hattie Inez Brooks will become part of your story.

To listen to Kirby Larson's earlier podcasts follow this link to the Hattie Big Sky home page.  Here is a link to some resources at the publisher page for Hattie Big Sky. This link will take you to the Educator's Guide for Hattie Ever After.  A link to Kirby Larson's website is embedded in her name above.