Happy Halloween! Books in the Scientist in the Field series look and feel like a picture book (albeit hefty ones at 80 pages). They get shelved with nonfiction picture books. But inside, they’re middle grade material, complete with chapters. They’re also totally engaging. Every chapter in this book features a different scientist working on some […]
How do you summarize a life like Ralph Waldo Emerson’s for a picture book biography? Barbara Kerley did it by choosing one theme–Emerson’s desire for a home–and follows it throughout his life. We see him longing for a home as a child, building a home and community with his wife, losing his home to a […]
[booknet booknumber= “9780823430451”] Despite the title, this book doesn’t have anything to do with school or classes (check out Snow School if you’re looking for an animals-school comparison). Instead, it’s a clever rhyming picture book outlining the different characteristics of vertebrate classes: amphibians, birds, fish, mammals, and reptiles. Lord uses rhyming couplets, each with 7 or 8 […]
In honor of the World Series, here are some great recent nonfiction picture books about baseball: [booknet booknumber=9780375868443] You Never Heard of Willie Mays? Jonah Winter also wrote You Never Heard of Sandy Koufax? [booknet booknumber=9781419705212] Barbed Wire Baseball by Marissa Moss. Haunting and inspirational story of a semi-pro player in a Japanese American internment camp in World […]
[booknet booknumber=”9780547875071″] This moving autobiography tells the story, in first person present tense, of a boy who stutters but can speak fluently to animals. We live with him through the despair and loneliness of school and then find, with him, the joy of researching jaguars in the wild. We see his passion to protect the […]
[booknet booknumber=”9781580894302″] “Birds and feathers go together, like trees and leaves, like stars and the sky.” Melissa Stewart’s lyrical voice makes this information-packed book a great read aloud. The layered text structure is elegantly simple. Each spread compares a function of feathers to something in a child’s frame of reference–“Feathers can shade out sun like […]
This is not your everyday counting book! No 1-2-3 or babyish illustrations here. Instead, Lola Schaefer attacks the idea of averages for middle grade readers. The mathematics are sophisticated but she keeps the text simple and clear. Brevity and consistency are the heart of the book. Every spread has a sentence in exactly the […]
“Crash!” This book plunges us into the action with its first word. We follow Toughie Brasuhn and Gerry Murray’s roller derby rivalry as we read about one day’s match. We also get a glimpse of the way sports came to television. Sue Macy’s narrative voice is fast and engaging; her present tense third person narration […]
Sometimes brilliant book design elevates a good story into something extraordinary. In the main text of this biography of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Peter Sís uses language infused with the same tone as Saint-Exupéry’s masterpiece, The Little Prince: Long ago in France, at the turn of the last century, a little boy was born to be an adventurer. The […]
The Nonfiction Detectives highlight a new Lee & Low title about a female trombonist. It’s on my to-read list! This mash-up of Press Here and a Gail Gibbons book plays with the definition of nonfiction. Betsy Bird’s Fuse #8 blog is my first stop for book recommendations. She has a cover reveal of the newest in the […]
Joe DiMaggio’s hitting streak is an amazing story in itself, but Rosenstock puts the streak in its historical context. We see how DiMaggio struggled to achieve the record and how his brilliant success gave hope to a nation facing a world war. Rosenstock sets the stage deftly on the first page where she talks about […]
[booknet booknumber= “9780439930505”] “There was a time when jolly old England was not so jolly. Children worked in factories. Queen Victoria frowned. Everything was grim. Everything was dark—except…in the make-believe kingdom of Topsy-Turvydom.” Gilbert and Sullivan’s hilarious operas can just seem strange if you don’t understand the class-bound, rule-conscious Victorian world they came from. In The […]
Author’s Note Afterword A Note about This Story The titles vary, but what belongs in that bit of text that comes at the end of a nonfiction picture book, next to the timelines and glossaries, the bibliographies and source attributions? Why have an Author’s Note? In my reading of nonfiction picture books, I’ve found six […]
Illustrator Maira Kalman follows up her 2012 book about Lincoln (Looking at Lincoln) with a look at another president, Thomas Jefferson. Once again, the narrator’s voice is memorable and spunky, but while the Lincoln book had a childlike narrator, this book sounds like your quirky Aunt Edna telling you stuff: But wait. We have not spoken of […]