Guest Post by Padma Venkatraman In Forest World, Young People’s Poet Laureate, Margarita Engle, once again demonstrates her mastery over the verse novel form, wielding it to speak eloquently of the need to protect our environment. Told through the eyes of…
Category: People & Places
What a Wonderful Word Written by Nicola Edwards Illustrated by Luisa Uribe
What A Wonderful Word Written by Nicola Edwards Illustrated by Luisa Uribe This book celebrates unusual words from many languages around the globe. Have you ever looked out of a window to see a perfectly beautiful day, but…
Historical Fiction for Tweens: A Review of Cloud and Wallfish
Recent years have seen a resurgence of historical fiction for middle grade readers, many of the stories set outside the United States. Among them is Anne Nesbit’s Cloud and Wallfish, a mystery set at the end of the Cold War.…
Three Generations That Fled: A Review of Refugee
The news today is filled with the plight of refugees from Syria and elsewhere trying to find new homes while it seems that the rest of the world – including the United States – is trying to keep them out.…
Moral Choices in a Dangerous World: A Review of Francisco Stork’s Disappeared
Sara Zapata’s good friend Linda has disappeared, and Sara, a fledgling reporter at a struggling newspaper in Juárez, Mexico, wants to find her and the “only” 62 other young women who have disappeared in the same city that year. Her…
An Unusual Wedding and More: A Review of The Wedding Portrait
In the past few years, Indonesian-born author/illustrator Innosanto Nagara has distinguished himself with multiple picture books on youth and activism for ever-older readers, all published by progressive small press Triangle Square, the children’s imprint of Seven Stories Press. His first…
Ahimsa: An Own Voices Family Story
During and immediately after the Second World War, India fought its own war for independence against Great Britain. Led by Mahatma Gandhi, this independence movement embraced civil disobedience and other forms of nonviolent resistance according to the principle of ahimsa.…
Bronze and Sunflower, a Tale from China’s Cultural Revolution
Seven-year-old Sunflower is the daughter of an artist forcibly relocated from the city to the countryside during China’s cultural revolution. By day, he works in the “Cadre School,” leaving the young child to explore the river and nearby village of…
Traveling Through Time, Facing the Past: A Review of The Girl with the Red Balloon
In this debut YA novel from Katherine Locke, Ellie Baum has traveled to Germany with her high school German II class in defiance of her beloved grandfather’s wishes. Her grandfather, Benno Hirsch, miraculously survived the Chelmno concentration camp, but now…
Shadow Warrior by Tanya Lloyd Kyi
What’s cooler than girl ninjas? An actual historical female ninja and her cohort of female spies…. Shadow Warrior by Tanya Lloyd Kyi and illustrated by Celia Krampien (Annick Press) covers the historical (and possibly mythical) basis for stories about a…