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The Fantastic Jungles of Henri Rousseau
By Michelle Markel
Illustrated by Amanda Hall
Eerdmans Books for Young Readers
$17.00
ISBN: 978-0-8028-5264-6
Ages 4-8
On shelves now

I’m not ashamed to say it, though perhaps I should be. Still, it’s true. Though I grew up in the middle class with a good education and a stint at a liberal arts college there are huge gaping gaps in my knowledge that have consistently been filled in over the years by children’s books. I know that I am not alone in this. When I worked in NYPL’s Central Children’s Room we had any number of regular adult patrons that would come in seeking children’s books on a variety of different topics so that they could learn about them in a non-threatening fashion. At its best a children’s book takes a complex subject and synthesizes it down to its most essential parts. Simple enough. But if you’re dealing with a picture book biography, it then has to turn a human life in a cohesive (child friendly) story. No mean feat. So when I saw this picture book bio of the artist Henri Rousseau I was immediately arrested by its art. Then I sort of came to realize that when it came to the man himself, I knew nothing. Next to nothing. I may never win a Jeopardy round or a game of Trivial Pursuit but thanks to great books like this one I may someday attain the education of a seven-year-old. There are worse fates in the world. These days, seven-year-olds get all the good stuff.

Your everyday average forty-year-old toll collector doesn’t usually drop everything to become a painter, yet that’s exactly what one did back in the 19th century. His name was Henri Rousseau and though he never took an art course in his life (art lessons aren’t exactly available on a toll collector’s budget) he does his research, looks at art, sits himself down, and begins to paint. He’s incredibly excited after his first big exhibition but his reviews say mostly “mean things” about his art. Still, he clips them, saves them, and continues to paint. Over the years he meets with very little success but is inspired by greenhouses and the lush topiary found inside. He can’t afford to ever see a jungle of his own so he makes them up. Finally, after decades and decades, the new young crop of artists takes note of his work. At last, he is celebrated and appreciated and his naïf style is seen for what it truly is; Simultaneously ahead of its time, and timeless.

As far as I can tell the picture book biography can go in a certain number of directions when it comes to its interior art. It can seek to emulate the original artist, mimicking their style with mixed results. Or it can eschew the original artist altogether and only show their paintings as images on walls or in the notes at the book’s end. Artist Amanda Hall takes a slightly different take with her art, inserting Mr. Rousseau into his own works. As she says at the end “Instead of my usual pencil crayon and watercolor technique, I used both watercolor and acrylics for the illustrations, as I wanted to get close to the feel of Rousseau’s own paintings. I decided to break the rules of scale and perspective to reflect his unusual way of seeing the world. For some of the illustrations I drew directly on his actual paintings, altering them playfully to help tell the story.” That right there might be the book’s difference. I think that for many of us, the joy of an Henri Rousseau painting lies not in the composition necessarily (though that is a plus) but the sheer feel of the piece. Rousseau’s jungle scenes do not look or feel like anyone else’s and Hall has done a stellar job capturing, if not the exact feel, then a winning replica of it for kids. The endpapers of this book are particularly telling. Open the cover and there you find all the usual suspects in a Rousseau landscape, each one creeping and peeking out at you from behind the ferns and oversized blossoms.

A poorly made picture book bio will lay out its pictures in a straightforward dull-as-dishwater manner never deviating or even attempting to inject so much as an artistic whim. The interesting thing about Hall’s take on Rousseau is that while, yes, she plays around with scale and perspective willy-nilly, she also injects a fair amount of whimsy. Not just the usual artist-flying-through-the-air-to-represent-his-mental-journey type of stuff either. There is a moment early on when a tiny Rousseau pulling a handcart approaches gargantuan figures that look down upon him with a mixture of pop-eyed surprise and, in some cases, anger. Amongst them, wearing the coat and tails of gentlemen, are two dogs and one gorilla. Later Hall indicates the passing of the years by featuring three portraits of Rousseau, hair growing grey, beard cut down to a jaunty mustache. On the opposite page three critics perch on mountains, smirking behind their hands or just gaping in general. It’s the weirdness that sets this book apart and makes it better than much of its ilk. It’s refreshing to encounter a bio that isn’t afraid to make things odd if it has to. And for some reason that I just can’t define . . . it definitely has to.

But to get back a bit to the types of bios out there for kids, as I mentioned before Hall inserts Rousseau directly into his own painting when we look at his life. Done poorly this would give the impression that he actually did live in jungles or traipse about with lions, and I’m sure there will be the occasional young reader who will need some clarification on that point. But in terms of teaching the book, Hall has handed teachers a marvelous tool. You could spend quite a lot of time flipping between the paintings here and the ones Rousseau actually created. Kids could spot the differences, the similarities, and get a good sense of how one inspired the other. Near the end of the book Hall also slips in a number of cameos from contemporary artists, and even goes so far as to include a key identifying those individuals on the last few pages. Imagine how rich an artistic unit would be if a teacher were to take that key and pair it with the author bios of THOSE people as well. For Gertrude Stein just pull out Gertrude is Gertrude is Gertrude is Gertrude by Jonah Winter. Pablo Picasso? A quick look at The Boy Who Bit Picasso by Antony Penrose. Lucky kids.

Just as the art of a picture book biography can go any number of directions, the storytelling is in the same boat. You want to tell the life of a man. Fair enough. Do you encompass everything from birth to death, marking dates and important places along the way? Do you synthesize that life down to a single moment and then use your Author’s Note at the end to tell why that person is important at all (many is the Author’s Note forced to do the heavy lifting). Or do you just zero in on what it is that made that person famous in the first place and look at how they struggled with their gift? Author Michelle Markel opts for the latter. A former journalist, Markel first cut her teeth on the author bio with her lovely Dreamer from the Village: The Story of Marc Chagall. Finding that these stories of outsider artists appealed to her, the move to Rousseau was a natural one. One that focuses on the man’s attempts to become an artist in the face of constant, near unending critical distaste. Markel’s gift here is that she is telling the story of someone overcoming the odds (to a certain extent . . . I mean he still died a pauper an all) in the face of folks telling him what he could or couldn’t do. It’s inspirational but on a very gentle scale. You’re not being forced to hear a sermon on the joys of stick-to-itativeness. She lands the ending too, effortlessly transitioning from his first successful debut at an exhibition to how he is remembered today.

I remember having to learn about artists and composers in elementary school and how strange and dull they all seemed. Just a list of dead white men that didn’t have anything to do with my life or me. The best picture book bios seek to correct that old method of teaching. To make their subjects not merely “come alive” as the saying goes but turn into flesh and blood people. You learn best about a person when that person isn’t perfect, has troubles, and yet has some spark, some inescapable something about them that attracts notice. A combination of smart writing and smarter art is ideal, particularly when you’re dealing with picture book biographies. And The Fantastic Jungles of Henri Rousseau is nothing if not smart. It typifies the kind of bios I hope we see more of in the future. And, with any luck, it will help to create the kinds of people I’d like to see more of in the future. People like Henri Rousseau. Whatta fella. Whatta book.

On shelves now.

Source: Final copy sent from publisher for review.

Like This? Then Try:

• It Jes’ Happened: When Bill Traylor Started to Draw by Don Tate

• I Am Marc Chagall by Bimba Landmann

• A Weekend with Rousseau by Gilles Plazy

Other Blog Reviews:

• Jean Little Library
• Books Together
• The Nonfiction Detectives
• Shelf-employed
• Waking Brain Cells
• Bookshelf: What We’re Reading

Professional Reviews: Kirkus

Interviews: With Michelle Markel at I.N.K. (Interesting Nonfiction for Kids)

Misc: Read what Ms. Markel has to say about the book herself when she writes the guest post at Cynsations.

Videos:

A nice little book trailer exists as well.

There’s even a director’s cut.

When asked to cite the most popular up-and-coming trend in books for children and teens my answer for 2012 is always the same: Keep an eye on the twins and clones.  Walk into any children’s room this year, throw a dart, and you’ll hit about twenty new books for kids that feature boy/girl twins, girl/girl twins, boy/boy twins, you name it.  Walk into any teen room and it’s all about the cloning.  Clearly kids today are being shown that two is always way more fun than one.  Such an attitude also applies quite well to the picture book biographies I’ve seen this year.  The duplication between disparate publishers happens from time to time, but 2012 has turned out to be a particularly clone heavy year.  Observe the following:

Queen of the Track: Alice Coachman Olympic High-Jump Champion by Heather Lang, ill. Floyd Cooper

Touch the Sky: Alice Coachman Olympic High Jumper by Ann Malaspina, ill. Eric Velasquez

An interesting choice all around.  There’s no doubt in my mind that the simultaneous release of these two bios caught Boyds Mills Press and Albert Whitman completely by surprise.  They’re both smaller independent publishers.  Considering that 2012 was the year of the Olympics, it makes sense that these two authors would have looked about for a too little lauded admirable figure from the past.  It’s just their own bad luck (or good, considering how you market them) that they hit on the same idea.

Bon Appetit! The Delicious Life of Julia Child by Jesse Hartland

Minette’s Feast: The Delicious Story of Julia Child and Her Cat by Susanna Reich, ill. Amy Bates

With 2012 being Julia Child’s 100th birthday, it’s more surprising that we ONLY see two biographies of her this year rather than it is only seeing just one.  Two bios that are significantly different, I might add.  While Harland takes an innovative stand, portraying the sheer detritus of the great woman’s life, Reich chose to follow in the footsteps of bios like Bambino and Mr. Twain by P.I. Maltbie and Daniel Miyares and concentrate on the woman via her feline.  Approaching great figures through their pets isn’t unheard of, but it can pose problems unless there’s a story.  Fortunately, Reich figured it out.

Baby Flo by Alan Schroeder, ill. Cornelius Van Wright and Ying-Hwa Hu

Harlem’s Little Blackbird: The Story of Florence Mills by Renee Watson, ill. by Christian Robinson

Alice Coachman came out because of the Olympics and Julia Child because of her birthday.  That I understand.  What I can’t quite figure is why there were two Florence Mills books this year.  Whence the impetus?  While Schroeder concentrates squarely on Mills as a kid, Watson takes a more encompassing (and less cheery but more realistic) view in her title.  These two bios look as different as different can be too.

Annie and Helen by Deborah Hopkinson, ill. Raul Colon

Helen’s Big World: The Life of Helen Keller by Doreen Rappaport

Of course there’s never any reason to wonder why two bios of Helen Keller are out in a given year.  Talk about a popular subject!  Helen, I dare say, was (aside from Anne Frank) the number one request I would get from kids when it came to biographies.  They just could NOT get enough of Helen.  Kids would read bios about her for pleasure.  These two are also particularly strong, differing in terms of how much of her life they show.

That’s it for the duplicate bios I’ve seen (though you are free to tell me what I missed, if you like).  There are dupes in the picture book and fiction world as well, but I’ll just leave you with the strangest of all of them.  Here are two books so similar that you know their dual appearance could only be chalked up to bad luck.  Bad, really really odd, luck.

Z is for Moose by Kelly Bingham, ill. Paul O. Zelinsky

A Is for Musk Ox by Erin Cabatingan and Matthew Myers

Zombie Makers: True Stories of Nature’s Undead
By Rebecca L. Johnson
Millbrook Press (an imprint of Lerner)
$30.60
ISBN: 978-0761386339
Ages 9 and up
On shelves now

There’s this podcast I like to listen to called RadioLab, which is essentially just a show for people who like kooky science but are still a little foggy on what exactly Einstein’s Theory of Relativity actually means or why the sun is hot. Science for the English majors, let’s call it. Often the show will come up with really original stories, like the guy who purposefully gave himself tapeworms to cure his asthma (it worked). That story came from a show about parasites and it was accompanied by these strange unnerving stories about insects and viruses and worms that could turn their hosts into . . . well . . . zombies, basically. And though I am a children’s librarian, the thought never occurred to me that these stories could, combined with others of the same ilk, create the world’s most awesome work of nonfiction. Fortunately for all of us, Rebecca L. Johnson has not my shortsightedness. In Zombie Makers: True Stories of Nature’s Undead you will meet a whole range of horrifying creatures. It is, without a doubt, probably the grossest book for kids I’ve ever read. And boy howdy let me tell you I have read a LOT Of gross books in my day.

What do you think of when you think of zombies? Do you think of lurching undead ready to feast on your braaaaaains? Or do you think of something a little more insidious like the REASON those zombies don’t seem to have a lot of will of their own? As it happens, zombies are real. Not in the corpse-walker sense, necessarily, but in nature there are plenty of creatures willing to make others into their mindless slaves. Meet the hairworm Paragordius Triscuspidatus, which can convince a perfectly healthy cricket to drown itself. Or Toxoplasma Gondii which, aside from being the reason you’re not supposed to let pregnant women near cat poop, turns rats into suicidal kitty lovers. Page by page author Rebecca Johnson presents us with examples of evolution gone amuck. Zombie makers exist, it’s true, and as their hosts we’d better learn as much as we can about them before they get to us next!

Zombies actually get a lot of play in children’s literature these days. Insofar as I can tell there are two ways to play them. They can’t be romantic like vampires or other members of the monster family so they must either be funny or horrifying. Funny is the route that I’d say 85% of kids’ books about zombies go. Whether you’re talking about Zombiekins or The Zombie Chasers or Undead Ed or any of the other books out there, funny is usually the way to go. I say that, but a lot of what kids want when they enter a library is to be scared. And if you can scare them with real stuff, and maybe even gross them out a little, you are gold, my friend. That’s why this book works as well as it does.

Johnson cleverly sets up the book so that readers can compare and contrast what they know about zombies, zombie talking points let’s say, with these zombie-esque diseases, parasites, and insects. I’d never really thought about Old Yeller as a zombie story, but that’s what it is, isn’t it? A beloved member of the family is bitten by something evil and suddenly the boy who loves it most must put it down before something worse happens. That’s a zombie plot, but it’s Johnson who makes you realize that rabies is just another form of zombie fun. By couching her nonfiction tale within popular zombie fiction tropes, she has an easy in with the child readership.

The writing is superb in and of itself, no doubt, but I wonder if interest in this book would be quite so high if it were not for the accompanying disquieting photographs. The book as an object is beautifully designed from start to finish, which only helps to highlight the photographs found inside.  What I really liked about the photos was that they had two different ways of freaking the average reader out. On the one hand you have the photos that go for the immediate ARGGGG! reaction. I am thinking specifically of the worm. The worm that infects human beings. That makes them want to plunge themselves into the water where it breaks out of the skin and leaves the body. Alien much? The image of someone slowly and painfully removing the worm without water is enough to make you lose your lunch. But even better are the photos that elicit a slow dawning sense of horror. The fungus O. unilateralis is a clever beastie, and its greatest trick is in forcing ants to clamp onto leafs and die (but only where the temperature is just right). There’s a shot of a dead ant with a long horrible reproductive stalk emerging out of its head, spreading its spores to other innocent ants. It’s a quiet photo and lacks the urgency and pain of the leg worm shot, but it’s worse somehow. It has this brooding malice to it. You actually do not want to touch the page in the book for fear of somehow touching the fungus. That’s how effective it is.

Children’s librarians often try to lure kids into reading nonfiction by doing what we call booktalks. If you’re a good booktalker you can get your audience to fight over even the dullest looking book. Some books, however, sell themselves. Hold up this book and there’s not a child alive who won’t be instantly fascinated. Describe even one of the stories inside and you might have at last found the book they want even more than the latest edition of Guinness World Records. Informative even as it makes you want to go hide in a clean, sanitized hole somewhere, Johnson has created a clever little book that is bound to keep adult and child readers who find it, enthralled. Ick. Bleach. Awesome.

On shelves now.

Source: Galley borrowed from fellow librarian for review.

Like This? Then Try:

• Scary by Joaquin Ramon Herrera

• Phineas Gage: A Gruesome But True Story of Brain Science by John Fleischman

• Killer Ants by Nicholas Nirgiotis

Wisdom the Midway Albatross: Surviving the Japanese Tsunami and Other Disasters for Over 60 Years
By Darcy Pattison
Illustrated by Kitty Harvill
Mims House
$11.99
ISBN: 978-0-9798621-7-5
Ages 4-8
On shelves now

If I had a better knowledge of my nonfiction children’s history then I might be able to tell you the exact moment that biographies of individual animals took off. Technically we’ve seen them for years, in books like the Newbery Honor winning Rascal (which is considered nonfiction in spite of some creative liberties) from 1963. The picture book animal biography feels comparatively new to me. I think they may have existed in spurts here and there but in the last ten years there’s been a veritable explosion of them on the scene. This is a very good thing. When done well a good animal bio can provide insight into an otherwise unapproachable species, foster concern beyond our own human lives, and give a glimpse into the wider natural world. True to life incredible journeys of wild animals are difficult to tell, though. If the animal is truly wild then how do you extrapolate its life without relying on fantasy and conjecture? Wisdom: The Midway Albatross offers at least one solution to that question. Add history to facts to the glorious innovation of banding wild animals and you have yourself a bird bio that’s easy to distinguish from the flock.

The life of your average everyday laysan albatross is not often a happy one. Particularly if you have had the monumentally bad luck to have been born around 1950. Having survived the trials of growing up, avoiding sharks, and even a 1952 tsunami, one little albatross lived and was banded by research scientists in the year 1956. After that time she had to survive tropical storms, delicious looking floating plastic and fishing lines until she was caught again (by the same scientist, no less) in 2002. Having survived all that, was she capable of living past the Japanese tsunami of 2011? Pattison follows the bird’s life closely, ending her book with facts about Wisdom (calling her “The Oldest Bird in the World”, which would have been my choice of title) as well as info on your average laysan albatross, and useful websites for further reading.

It’s more than just the story of one small bird and more than just some informational text about the life cycle of an albatross. Under Pattison’s hand Wisdom’s tale takes on an almost epic cycle. You start out thinking that this is just your average animal adventure and by the end you’re wondering how much we even understand about the natural world. If a lucky albatross, avoiding every seaborne calamity on record, can live at least to the age of sixty-one and continue to breed and brood, what other animals are blessed with such longevity? If there’s any problem at all it might be that Pattison repeats the refrain of “Somehow Gooney survived” almost too often. The temptation to do so is understandable but I worried that the momentous weight of that survival didn’t feel quite as powerful when heard so often.

While Pattison is known for her other books in the children’s literary sphere, artist Kitty Harvill’s work remains largely unknown. A wildlife artist and conservationist, Harvill’s watercolors in this book serve the words more than the other way around. They leave a good amount of space for the text, avoiding the pitfalls of some artists unfamiliar with the picture book world that slap white space and text on one page and an image on the other. One point that made me curious was how Harvill chose to deal with Pattison’s suppositions. We can extrapolate Wisdom’s life by knowing both our history of the region as well as the perils facing the bird’s kind. And while the author utilizes the word “somehow” very cleverly in the phrases that explain that she survived, Harvill accompanies these with images of pairs of birds. In many cases one albatross will fall prey to fishing lines or plastic treats while the other abstains. But since we are not specifically pointing to one of those birds and calling her “Wisdom”, the book gets away with it (and, I should note, never really shows any birds dying of sharks or storms, etc.).

It’s a book with a very small press, one going by the name of Mims House. When independent publishers create children’s literature the results are invariably mixed. In this particular case I was encouraged by the writing (and my familiarity with the author), the art to a certain extent, and the design. Though paperback, the paper quality is not bad. However I was a little disappointed in the font and layout. Though the text is expertly laid onto the images, weaving in and out of the pictures with ease, the font itself looks like something you might find in a child’s school report. I’m not entirely certain whether it’s the style or the size or a combination of the two, but whatever the case it’s a misleadingly poor element in what stands as a rather cool informational text.

I don’t usually go so far as to praise the blurbs of a book, but in this case. I’ll make an exception. Some clever soul not only thought to get the wise words of Newbery Honor author Kirby Larson (who penned her own nonfiction picture book Two Bobbies: A True Story of Hurricane Katrina Friendship and Survival) but also retired Senior Scientist Chandler S. Robbins. Now it sometimes doesn’t take much to get a scientist to blurb a picture book and normally my eyes glaze over about the time we see a degree appear, but in this particular case Robbins is an exceptional get since he’s the very guy who banded the bird back in 1956 in the first place. His words have an almost philosophical ring to them as well. He says at one point, “While I have grown old and gray and get around with the use of a cane, Wisdom still looks and acts just the same as the day I banded her.” Truth. Stranger than fiction.

As I mentioned before, had I been in charge of this book I would have gone whole hog and named it “Wisdom: The Oldest Bird in the World” or something along those lines. As it stands, Pattison has uncovered one heckuva story. I can say with certainty that no child has ever walked up to my library’s children’s reference desk asking for nonfiction albatross books for pleasure reading, but for those kids assigned animal bios (it happens), easy nonfiction reads, or just books on birds in general, I now know exactly what it is I’m going to want to hand them. A keeper, you bet.

On shelves now.

Source: Galley sent for review.

Like This? Then Try:

• City Hawk: The Story of Pale Male by Meghan McCarthy

• Mama by Jeanette Winter

• Tsunami! by Kimiko Kajikawa illustrated by Ed Young

Other Blog Reviews:

• Archimedes Notebook
• Simply Science Blog
• NC Teacher Stuff
• Practically Paradise
• Laurie Thompson

Misc:

• Be sure to check out Ms. Pattison’s blog for this book.  Lots of great environmental info is to be found there as well as Common Core Comprehension Questions for CCSS or AR.

• Happy Nonfiction Monday! Jean Little Library has today’s round-up. Head on over to see what’s hot.

Video:

Finally, here’s a video where you can see Wisdom herself feeding her chick.

Chuck Close: Face Book
By Chuck Close & Glue and Paper Workshop
Abrams Books for Young Readers
$18.95
ISBN: 978-1-4197-0163-4
Ages 9-12
On shelves now

The autobiography assignment. Oh, it exists. It exists and children’s librarians know to fear it. At a certain time of year a child will approach the reference desk and utter the dreaded words, “I have to read an autobiography of somebody famous”. Never mind that while biographies are plentiful, good autobiographies come out once in a blue moon and, when they are written for kids, tend to be about children’s authors anyway (See: Jack Gantos, Beverly Cleary, Jerry Spinelli, Walter Dean Myers, Jean Fritz, etc.). If a kid wants somebody famous in a field other than writing, the pickings are slim. You might find a good Ruby Bridges book or To Dance by Siena Siegel or that children’s autobiography Rosa Parks wrote. Beyond that, you’re on your own. It is therefore with great relief that we come across Chuck Close: Face Book. Sure, I’m relieved that at long last there’s an autobiography for kids by someone outside the children’s literary sphere, but what really thrills me is the sheer splendor of the thing. Chock full of gorgeous full-color reproductions of Close’s work and biographical info, the real treat is at the center of the book. It’s a game, it’s informative, it’s what we all needed but didn’t know it yet.

Culled from interview questions lobbed at the artist Chuck Close by P.S. 8’s 5th grade students, the book is is part Q&A, part explanation of artistic techniques, and part flip book. From his earliest days Chuck had the makings of an artist. Which is to say, he was a bedridden kid whose poor health enabled him to draw. His parents encouraged Chuck’s desire and though he was not a particularly good student in other areas, in art he thrived. Eventually he was able to cultivate a style entirely of his own, until “The Event” when he was paralyzed. Yet even after that trauma he was able to continue his art. The children’s questions go through Close’s life and even allow him to explain his artistic techniques. Backmatter includes a Timeline, Resources, a Glossary, a List of Illustrations and an Index. Curiously the only other children’s book about Chuck Close (Chuck Close, Up Close by Jan Greenberg) is not one of the eight books listed in the Resources section at the back of the book.

We talk all the time about role models and how to find them. Chuck Close is probably as close as you can get to a perfect role model in terms of difficulties he has faced. First and foremost there was the nephritis that rendered him bedridden at the age of 11 and gave him plenty of drawing time (he and Andy Warhol have this much in common). Then there was his prosopagnosia or “face blindness” which kept h

It Jes’ Happened
By Don Tate
Illustrated by R. Gregory Christie
Lee & Low Books
ISBN: 978-1-60060-260-3
Ages 5-9
On shelves April 1st

Teaching kids about outsider art feels like a no-brainer to me. Which is to say, why doesn’t it happen more often? Perhaps there’s a feeling that educating kids on the self-taught is ultimately self-defeating. Can’t say as I agree, of course. Seems to me that learning about the great outsider artists could give a kid a kind of hope. This is particularly true in the case of Bill Traylor. Here you have a guy who lived a whole life, discovered an artistic calling near the end, and remains remembered where before he might have been forgotten. It makes for an interesting lesson and, to my relief, and even more interesting book. In It Jes’ Happened Don Tate and R. Gregory Christie pair up for the first time ever to present the life and art of an ordinary man who lived through extraordinary times.

He was born a slave, Bill Traylor was. Around 1854 or so Bill was born on a cotton plantation in Alabama. After the Civil War his parents stayed on as sharecroppers. After he grew up Bill ran a farm of his own with his wife and kids, but when Bill turned eighty-one he was alone on the farm by himself. With cane in hand he headed for Montgomery. It was there that he started drawing, for no immediately apparent reason. He’d draw on cardboard or discarded paper. After a time, a young artist took an interest in Bill, ultimately showing off his work in a gallery show. Bill enjoyed it but for him the drawing was the most important thing. An Afterword discusses Bill’s life and shows a photograph of him and a piece of his art.

When you’re writing a picture book biography of any artist the first problem you need to address is how to portray that person’s art in the book. If you’re the illustrator do you try to replicate the original artist’s work? Do you draw or paint in your own style and include small images of the artist’s original work? Or do you show absolutely none of the original art, trusting your readership to do that homework on their own? There is a fourth option, but I don’t know that I was aware of it before I read this book. You can hire an illustrator whose style is similar enough to the original artist that when the time comes to reference the original art they make their own version and then show the artist’s work at the end.

Now I’ll go out on a limb here and admit that I’ve never really been a huge fan of R. Gregory Christie’s style before. It’s one of those things I can appreciate on an aesthetic level but never really personally enjoy. Yet in this book I felt that Christie was really the only person who could do Traylor’s tale justice. I had initially wondered why he had been chosen (before reading the book, I might add) since author Don Tate

The Great Molasses Flood: Boston, 1919
By Deborah Kops
Charlesbridge
$18.95
ISBN: 978-1-58089-348-0
Ages 9-12
On shelves now

I was hosting a party the other night and amongst my guests was a former editor of children’s literature. In the course of the evening she happened to notice that I had a copy of The Great Molasses Flood by Deborah Kops sitting on my shelf. She saw it and instantly gave a groan. Apparently there was a time there when it felt like every other children’s chapter book manuscript she received took place during that Boston tragedy. I admit I was surprised since before this book I hadn’t seen ANY that covered this event thoroughly, fictional or nonfictional. Indeed, until I read Kops’s book I wasn’t even sure about the logistics. How exactly does molasses go about flooding anyway? Maybe if I’d lived in Boston I’d have had an idea, but I’ve never set so much as a toe in that town. So it is that once again I rely on the good authors of informational books for kids to fill in my spotty knowledge with their wise words. The Great Molasses Flood answers every question a person might have about that infamous moment in history, and does so with compassion and accuracy (two qualities all authors, adult, children, teen, what have you, should strive to achieve).

January 15, 1919 was an unseasonably warm day. Forty-three degrees if you can believe it. And folks were just going about their workday as usual. Then, at 12:40 in the afternoon, the strangest thing occurred. The molasses tank, located next to Boston Harbor and the train yard, burst wide open. Instantly 2,319,525 gallons of molasses spilled onto the streets, lifting homes, destroying elevated train tracks, and ultimately killing 21 people and wounding countless others. A 40-foot wave of molasses makes a mark, and when all was said and done folks had to figure out who was to blame. Was it an act of terrorism (anarchists were in full swing so this wasn’t a crazy theory) or the fault of the tank? Whatever it was, it was an event that lasted long in the memories of those involved, even after the sticky sweet smell had faded.

Because I am a children’s librarian and I had a somewhat spotty education when it came to American history I tend to get most of my historical information from works intended for kids. Actually, I’m not alone in this. We used to have an old man in my children’s room that would come regularly to sit and read our history books because he liked how they laid out the facts. The same goes for me. So if I’m going to be honest with you, the first time I heard about The Great Molasses Flood was in Jennifer Armstrong’s The American Story: 100 True Tales from American History. That book’s a great collection of well-known and somewhat obscure tales from this nation’s past. All the stories are true but I had a hard time swallowing (forgive the pun) this molasses blarney. I mean, really? A big old WAVE of molasses came down the street? People died?!? Of molasses? I mean . . . what? It all makes slightly more sense when you hear that molasses was useful for making weapons and in a WWI era American that was why you’d have a tank of the stuff. Still . . .

6 Comments on Review of the Day: The Great Molasses Flood by Deborah Kops, last added: 2/29/2012