Cover of book shows illustration of Jimmy Carter in front of American flag and a farm.

One of my favorite questions to ask school librarians is, “What book do you wish you had for your library?” Surprisingly often the answer is, “More books about US presidents.” Hard Work But It’s Worth It: The Life of Jimmy Carter by Bethany Hegedus answers that need.

Carrying through the theme of Carter’s belief in hard work, we see him as a child working on the farm, as an adult working in politics, and as an ex-president, working toward “waging peace, fighting disease, building hope.”

The book doesn’t shy away from the difficulty of telling the story of the roots a president from Georgia had in the Jim Crow South. We see how Carter’s family wasn’t typical of their neighbors but the book acknowledges the privilege that came to Carter because of his whiteness.

The back matter has an extensive timeline as well as an author’s note that concludes, “Jimmy Carter is a hero of mine. I hope he is now one of yours.”

The digital illustrations by Kyung Eun Han use a muted, soft palette. She ably manages to capture the likeness of Carter from childhood right through old age.

This book is a great addition to any library’s US Presidents collection. My copy is going straight to my brother who, like Hegedus, is a big fan of Jimmy Carter.

Image shows a tree growing from a book and reads Nonfiction Picture Book Challenge 2020
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The cover is in for my new book, All the Way to the Top: How One Girl’s Fight for Americans with Disabilities Changed Everything, has arrived! It tells the true story of how an eight-year-old girl lobbied for the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990 when it was stalled in Congress.

Cover of book shows young Jennifer Keelan climbing the steps of the US Capitol.

What did Jennifer do? She got out of her wheelchair and climbed the steps to the US Capitol. Cameras captured her every move. She vividly demonstrated just how inaccessible community spaces were to people with disabilities. Partly because of her, Congress finally passed the Americans with Disabilities Act. And because of the ADA, things changed. Today we cross the street at cut-away sidewalk corners, to to neighborhood schools with kids with disabilities, and work alongside people with all sorts of disabilities.

This is a debut book for the illustrator, Nabi H. Ali. I am once again in awe at how nonfiction illustrators use photographs to create totally new images that are still grounded in historicity.

Both Nabi and I benefited from getting to ask our questions directly to the subject of the book, Jennifer Keelan-Chaffins. She’s a grown-up now and worked closely with us on the text and the illustrations, making sure we got it right. She also wrote the foreword to the book.

I’m so excited for this book to hit the shelves, but it’s still more than half a year away. So I will just nurse that excitement until March 1, 2020. In the meantime, here’s a video of Jennifer talking about the Capitol Crawl. You can keep an eye on upcoming ADA commemorations here.

All the Way to the Top: How One Girl’s Fight for Americans with Disabilities Changed Everything by Annette Bay Pimentel, illustrated by Nabi H. Ali. (Sourcebooks: 2020).

Picture announced "Nonfiction Picture Book Challenge 2019"