It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

It's Monday! What Are You Reading? is a meme hosted by Sheila at Book Journey as a way to share what you have read and/or reviewed in the past week. It's also a terrific way to find out what other people are reading.

Jen Vincent, of Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee Moye of Unleashing Readers have given this meme a children's literature focus: picture books, middle grade novels, etc. They "encourage everyone who participates to support the blogging community by visiting the other bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

I've been having a terrific time visiting with my parents in Keokuk, Iowa. It's awesome to relax with family and friends. It's also been a great time to read. I love to sit on their deck, with a book in my hand, and a beautiful view of the Mississippi River. To all of my friends that are attending NerdCampMI this week, hope you're havng an awesome time. I'm enjoying everyone's Tweets and pictures!

Here's what I've been reading this week: 

Middle Grade Fiction  

Midnight Without A Moon by Linda Williams Jackson

 

 

The Girl Who Drank the Moon by Kelly Barnhill

 

Picture Books

Steamboat School by Deborah Hopkinson, Ron Husband (Illustrations)

It's hard not to gaze out at the Mississippi River and not think about this awesome story!
Based a true events, this awesome picture book tells the story of Reverend John Berry Meachum and his tireless work educating African Americans in St. Louis in 1847. When the state of Missouri passed a law banning schools for African Americans, he moved his school to a steamboat on the Mississippi River. The book includes more information at the end of the story about this man and this time in history. I would love to share this book with my students during the first week of school.

  How to Eat an Airplane by Peter Pearson, Mircea Catusanu (Illustrations) 

This picture book uses very colorful digital illustrations and humorous text that give detailed instructions on how to eat an airplane. It's all pretty silly, with directions about dismantling a plane and eating the parts at a dinner party. An author's note at the end explains that the story was inspired by the fellow who's in the Guinness World Records for Strangest Diet. There are also interesting facts about airplanes. This might be a good mentor text if students were writing a How To essay or Step By Step Instructions.

Excellent Ed by Stacy McAnulty, Julia Sarcone-Roach (Illustrations)  

This is a really cute story about a dog, Ed, who just wants to fit in with his family. Everybody in the family is very talented, but Ed doesn't feel like he's good at anything. Young children will have a great time reading to see if Ed figures out what his special talents are.

The Bell in the Bridge by Ted Kooser, Barry Root (Illustrations)  

This is a beautiful picture book that tells a charming story. Charles is spending a few weeks on his grandparents' farm. He's bored in the house, so he hangs around by a stream playing with tadpoles and turtles. He discovers that when he throws rocks at an old metal bridge, it rings loudly and deeply, like a church bell. He gets a kick out of the echo, but then he hears another BONG like someone is answering him. This becomes quite a mystery that makes time go faster as he tries to figure out what's happening. The illustrations, rendered in watercolor and gouache, are wonderful and heartwarming. Young readers will enjoy reading to see if he finds out whether or not someone is answering him.

One More Dino on the Floor by Kelly Starling Lyons, Luke Flowers (Illustrations)  

Young readers will have a terrific time dancing along with these fun dinosaurs. Rhyming text and beautiful illustrations that capture the joy of these dancing dinosaurs will make this a fun read aloud.

The Perfect Dog by Kevin O'Malley  

This is a cute picture book in which a little girl is trying to pick the perfect dog. There are adorable illustrations as she is looking at all of the possibilities. There are loads of good descriptive words and comparison words: big, bigger, biggest. Young readers will enjoy trying to find out which dog she winds up choosing.

Running the Road to ABC by Denize Lauture  

This is a gorgeous picture book that uses beautiful poetic language to tell about three boys and three girls on their way to school in Haiti. They are up before the sun and they journey through the lush landscape to get to school on time. I love the vibrant acrylic paintings that bring this story to life. I would love to share this book at the beginning of the school year.

  

 

  

Book Review: The Girl Who Drank The Moon by Kelly Barnhill

 

The Girl Who Drank the Moon by Kelly Barnhill

 

 

 

I had the opportunity to read a digital ARC of this novel by Kelly Barnhill and I have to say that this book is just awesome! To be honest, I usually wouldn't be attracted to this type of book. However, so many of my students love fantasy books with dragons, witches, and magic that I love the idea of finding a new book for them to devour. I've also heard a lot of great things about this book from my friends on Twitter.

 

 

From the very beginning of the book, I was hooked on this story. When the story opens, it is the Day of Sacrifice in the Protectorate. Each year, the parents of the youngest child in the village are required to surrender their baby as an offering to the witch who lives in the forest. They must do this in order to keep her from destroying the Protectorate. It is heart wrenching to witness this scene: the Council of Elders have arrived at the home of the sacrificial child, the desperate mother has climbed to the rafters of the house clinging to her baby girl, the soldiers capture the mother and have her sent to the Tower, and the Grand Elder Gherland carries the baby away. They carry the baby into the forest and leave her, lying on the ground to be taken by the witch.

 

The people of the Protectorate don't realize that the witch in the forest, Xan, is a kind old woman. She lives with Glerk, the wise swamp monster, and Fyrian, a Tiny Dragon. Every year, Xan rescues these abandoned babies and takes them to kind and welcoming families on the other side of the forest. She feeds the babies starlight, to strengthen them during this journey.

 

 

This year, Xan takes the child that we've just seen ripped from the arms of her mother on this annual journey. Along the way, she accidently feeds the girl moonlight, which immediately fills her with extraordinary magic. Xan decides to take the girl, whom she has named Luna, home with her, instead of to a family on the other side of the forest. For the safety of everyone, Xan has locked up the magic inside Luna. On her thirteenth birthday, her magic will emerge, with powerful consequences.

 

 

This book is filled with magic, suspense and adventure. A young man from the Protectorate, Antain, is determined to find the deadly witch that is responsible for so much unhappiness in his village and kill her. Once I was swept into this story, it was hard to put it down until I was finished with it.

 

 

This is a book that I have to get for my classroom library. Not only does it have the action and adventure that so many of my students love, it has some excellent messages and themes for them to take away from it. My favorite theme is the power of hope in the face of darkness and sorrow. There is so much in this book and in our world that threaten to make people want to throw up their hands and give in to fear and despair. When we watch the evening news and see all of the violence in places like Orlando, Baton Rouge, Minneapolis, and Dallas, it's easy to feel like there's nothing that can be done to make things better. The characters in this book, realize that they can't give up or sorrow will win.

 

I know that this book has lifted my spirits, after several days and weeks of heartbreaking news of violence. It has made me want to continue to find ways to show kids that kindness and hope are still better ways to settle conflicts than fighting. Glerk, the wise swamp monster, is a terrific role model for this. One of my favorite quotes from the book:

 

 

Calling a truce was "preferable for Glerk, who felt that violence, while sometimes necessary, was uncouth and uncivilized. Reason, beauty, poetry, and excellent conversation were his preferred tools for settling disputes."

 

 

Hardback, 400 pages

Available August 9, 2016 from Algonquin Books

 

 



 

 

 



Book Review: Midnight Without A Moon by Linda Williams Jackson

Midnight Without A Moon by Linda Williams Jackson

I am participating in a group of Twitter friends that are reading, sharing and responding to recent middle grade novels. Hopefully, we will be able to find books that will excite the young readers in our classrooms and help us to teach important literacy skills and concepts in the coming year. Our group's handle is #BookRelays if you would like to see what we're reading and how we respond to these books.

It truly is an awesome experience to be able to read and share with other enthusiastic teachers these books that I know will be able to help us help kids. Up until now, I would read books by myself during the summer and then by the time I got back to school in August, I would forget to talk to others about them.


As a result of my participation in this group, I had the opportunity to read an ARC of this awesome novel by Linda Williams Jackson. This is a very powerful book with an important story that needs to be shared with young people. More than any other book I've ever read on the civil rights movement, this book pulled me right into the world of African American sharecroppers living in Mississippi in 1955. Told from the point of view of thirteen-year-old Rose Lee Carter, who lives with her grandparents, her younger brother, and her cousin in a small house on a cotton plantation, Jackson helped me understand and experience the pain, fear, anger, and emotional turmoil of African American families living during this time of change.


At the beginning of the book, Rose's mother leaves with her new husband and their children for Chicago, while Rose and her brother Fred have to stay behind with Ma Pearl and Papa. Rose has to work very hard in the cotton fields instead of attending school, while dramatic changes are starting to swirl around her.


As more and more African Americans attempt to become registered voters, they are becoming the victims of violence and brutality at the hands of groups like the Klan and the White Citizens' Council. The murder of a fourteen-year-old boy from Chicago, Emmett Till, for allegedly whistling at a white woman, brought publicity, the NAACP, and a famous trial into the lives of these humble, hard-working people.

But as much as the South needed to change, I was struck by the resistance to that change that came from within the African American Community. This fierce rigidity comes to life in the large, opinionated, and imposing character of Ma Pearl.  Ma Pearl is the force that holds this family together. And while she is severe and unpleasant, her religion and values weave their way through the tapestry of their lives.

One dark and ominous morning, when it was apparent that something horrible had happened, her work was mixed with the singing of hymns:


"While her fingers shaped the sticky batter into dough, her made-up lyrics morphed into the humming of a real song. 'Why should I feel discouraged,' she sang quietly, 'and why should the shadows come? Why should my heart be lonely, and long for heav'n and home?

I pulled back the curtain and stared into the early morning darkness again. As the sun peeked over the horizon, promising another blazing hot day, Slick Charlie finally got his lazy self up and crowed. I dropped the curtain and stared down at a crack in the floorboards as I listened to Ma Pearl's chanting, 'Jesus is my portion. A constant friend is he. His eye is on the sparrow, and I know he watches me.'"

 "His Eye Is On The Sparrow" - Mahalia Jackson

 

And as the violence and racist acts escalated to the murder of Emmett Till, fear and poverty kept people like Ma Pearl from tolerating activism in her family. As those in her family and community pressed the case for fighting back, Ma Pearl fought them:

 

"'Preeeeacher,' she addressed Reverend Jenkins sarcastically, 'you sit here in my kitchen telling me how things got to change. But the man who own this house says I best leave things the way they is. Tell me I gots to leave if I let these northern Negroes tell me how I oughta live in Mississippi. Now you tell me this: Where we go'n go if we git tho'd off this place? You got a house for me? You go'n let me and Paul and all these chir'ren of mines live in town with you and yo' boy? I 'spect y'all got 'nuff room for all us with all that money you makin' taintin' the chir'ren through the week and fleecin' the flock on Sunday.'"

 

I love how Rose's character changes and becomes more self-confident and mature through the course of this important summer. At the beginning of the story, her mother abandons her and her grandmother isn't nearly as nice to her as she is to her lighter skinned cousin, Queen. The title of the book comes from a put-down from Ma Pearl upon Rose's birth:

 

"Folks said that when I first came out of Mama, my skin was as pink as a flower. Mama said she took one look at me and declared, 'I'm go'n call you Rose, 'cause you so pretty like one.' But Ma Pearl said, 'Don't set yo' hopes high for that child, Anna Mae. Look at them ears. They as black as tar. By this time next year that lil' gal go'n be blacker than midnight without a moon, just like her daddy.'"

 

But later in the story, she remembers something a relative once said, "Stars shine brighter in the darkness." And as she considered the meaning of that phrase as it applied to her, she had to know if she "could shine in the darkness. Imagine how bright a star would shine at midnight without a moon!"   

 

This story is told so well, so descriptively, so emotionally. It is engaging and compelling and many important discussions about race relations and the civil rights movement will be sparked from this novel. This book does contain a lot of strong language, violent imagery, and mature themes. It might work for very mature elementary school readers, but is probably better suited for middle school students. The ARC I read is labeled for readers Ages 10-12.

 

Hardcover, 320 pages

Expected publication: January 3rd 2017 by HMH Books for Young Readers

 

 

 

 

 

 

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

It's Monday! What Are You Reading? is a meme hosted by Sheila at Book Journey as a way to share what you have read and/or reviewed in the past week. It's also a terrific way to find out what other people are reading.

Jen Vincent, of Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee Moye of Unleashing Readers have given this meme a children's literature focus: picture books, middle grade novels, etc. They "encourage everyone who participates to support the blogging community by visiting the other bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

 

 

I hope everyone is having a fun and safe 4th of July holiday weekend!  And just in case you find yourself waiting between the hot dogs and the fireworks after dark, hopefully you've got a great book handy to read!

Here are some of the awesome books I've been reading this past week:

Middle Grade Novels

Be Light Like A Bird by Monika Schroeder  

 

Nine, Ten: A September 11 Story by Nora Raleigh Baskin 

Sticks and Stones by Abby Cooper

   Summerlost by Ally Condie 

 

I borrowed a copy of this book from one of my #BookRelays friends and I really enjoyed reading this middle-grade novel. There's quite a bit of emotion in this one - Cedar Lee's family is having a difficult time coming to terms with the devastating loss of her father and younger brother, Ben, in a car accident the previous year. Cedar's mother buys a house in the town of Iron Creek, so she can have a place that's closer to her family. She plans to live in the house during the summer and rent it out to college students during the rest of the year.

Cedar becomes good friends with Leo Bishop, who helps her get a job working concessions for the Summerlost Shakespeare Festival. Leo is trying to earn enough money for a planned trip to London with his father. Leo and Cedar begin giving unauthorized tours of the important places in Lisette Chamberlain's life. Chamberlain was a famous movie star who grew up in the town and had performed in the festival many years ago. She died under mysterious circumstances at the local hotel twenty years ago.

As the story develops, Cedar becomes more self-confident and more willing to have hope for her future. Her work at the theater and giving the tours with Leo gives her something to think about besides her family's grief. There's also a nice bit of mystery as she and Leo learn more and more about Chamberlain's life.

I like the story development as the summer progresses. I also like the story's themes of friendship, especially the message that friends don't always have to do and like the same things. I also like that these adolescent kids can have a friendship that doesn't necessarily become a romance:
"I thought he was cute and he thought I was cute but it was different than it was when people have crushes. With Leo I'd fallen into another kind of like. I couldn't wait to tell him stuff and I loved hearing him laugh at my jokes. He made me feel like I had a spot in the world. It felt as if Leo and I could like each other all our lives." p. 237

Picture Books

It Came in the Mail by Ben Clanton 

When I was a kid I used to love to get mail, too. I wrote lots of letters to my cousin, and it was so much fun to get letters back! This was before e-mail & text messages changed all that. Anyway, one of my daily activities in the summer was waiting for the mail truck to come past our house! It still is, only now I'm excited to see if any new books are coming my way. So, I can totally relate to the boy in this book. He wants mail, too. And so he writes to his mailbox and tons of crazy stuff starts arriving. Young readers will have a great time to see what comes in the mail and if it gets too far out of hand!  

 Louise and Andie: The Art of Friendship by Kelly Light  

This is a terrific book to share with young readers, because it has a wonderful message about making new friends. We see the situation through the lens of Louise, whom we grew to love in Louise Loves Art. Louise has a new neighbor and she's anxious to meet her. She goes next door with her little brother and shares her drawings with Andi. When they start drawing together it becomes clear they don't see eye to eye on everything. Kids will enjoy reading to see how these two are going to reconcile these differences and become good friends.  

Secret Agent Man Goes Shopping for Shoes by Tim Wynne-Jones, Brian Won (Illustrations)  

The young man in this fun picture book has quite an imagination! He pretends to be Secret Agent Man (S.A.M.) as he and his mom go shopping for shoes. After the shopping trip and a nap, he gets the opportunity to come to his mom's rescue! It will be fun to share with students!

Woodpecker Wants a Waffle by Steve Breen  

This is a fun, clever picture book about a persistent woodpecker named Benny, who will do just about anything to get some waffles. A new waffle diner has opened near the woods, and he decides that he just has to try some waffles because they look and smell so good. He makes several attempts to get into the restaurant and get them, but the waitress kicks him out each time. Young readers will have fun reading to find out how Benny is going to get this breakfast treat.

The Great White Shark Scientist (Scientists in the Field) by Sy Montgomery, Keith Ellenbogen (Photographs)  

One of the "Scientists In The Field" series, this nonfiction picture book has fascinating information and photographs detailing the authors' journeys with renowned shark scientists. The first half of the book tells of the work that Greg Skomal, a great white shark biologist with the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries, does studying these animals off the coast of New England. The second half of the book tells of the work being done to study sharks in Mexico by Erick Higuera. There is lots of very detailed information and a list of resources for further study. This would be a great book to have in the classroom as source material for research!

Rory the Dinosaur Wants a Pet by Liz Climo  

Anyone that's ever wanted a pet of their very own will be able to relate to this book. Rory's friend has a new pet, and they all have a terrific time playing with him. Rory decides he really wants to find a pet, too. This is easier said than done. Young readers will enjoy finding out if Rory is ever going to have his own perfect pet. The digital illustrations are very sweet and help make this a fun book for younger children.

Wild Animals of the North by Dieter Braun (Illustrator)  

 This nonfiction picture book is somewhat of an index of many of the animals of the northern hemisphere. Beautiful illustrations along with descriptions for most of these animals would make it a nice addition to my classroom library. This book could serve as a good starting point for further research. 

"Oh, No," Said Elephant by A.H. Benjamin, Alireza Goldouzian (Illustrations)  

This is a cute picture book that shares a great message with young readers, no one is good at everything, but everyone is good at something. Poor elephant has a tough time playing with his friends: they always find him when they play hide-and-seek, he's too big to play leap frog, hopscotch or tag, and he gets all tangled up when he tries to jump rope. But, even though he's terrible at these games he tries his best anyway. The double spread illustrations are very detailed and humorous. Little kids will get a kick out of reading to see what elephant's favorite game is.  

The Blobfish Book by Jessica Olien  

I bought this book for my classroom library because it looked like a fun, nonfiction picture book. I'm glad I did, because it's got awesome close up photographs of deep sea fish, which is always popular with my students. The book is also funny because it appears to have been taken over by a very chatty blowfish. There's interesting information and a list of resources at the back, so this would be a good book to start research on ocean animals.

Lady Liberty's Holiday by Jen Arena, Matt Hunt (Illustrations)  

Just in time for the Fourth of July comes a fun and imaginative picture book that takes a good look at all of the awesome places in America. The Statue of Liberty has gotten bored standing around in New York Harbor staring at the same stuff all of the time. She decides to take a vacation and see The rest of the country. She visits the St. Louis arch, the Grand Canyon, the Golden Gate Bridge, and many other places. The illustrations are hilarious! My favorite is Lady Liberty photo bombing at Mount Rushmore. Kids will enjoy reading to find out if she's going to make it back in time for the Fourth of July. There is factual information at the back of the book for kids who want to find out more about the Statue of Liberty. 

Scuba Dog by Ann Marie Stephens, Jess Golden (Illustrations)  

I'm a sucker for any cute dog book! I love everything about this one, including the cover with the title dog in scuba gear. Young readers will appreciate the friendship that develops between Scuba Dog and a whale. He wants to hang around with his new friend, but he can't hold his breath for very long. Little kids will love reading to find out the steps this dog takes to be able to spend time with and show appreciation for his friend.

This Is Not a Picture Book! by Sergio Ruzzier  

With the adorable, whimsical illustrations that makes Sergio Ruzzier's books so sweet, the little guy in this book is very reluctant to pick up a book that doesn't have pictures in it. This is so like many of my students! They lack confidence to plunge into text without the support of illustrations. With some encouragement from a friend, he gives it a try and discovers that not only is he able to read it, he's enjoying it. I would love to share this with my students at the beginning of the school year!