Review: Yang Warriors

Title: Yang Warriors

Author: Kao Kalia Yang

Illustrator: Billy Thao

Publisher: University of Minnesota Press

Pages: 40

Review copy: Digital ARC via Netgalley

Availability: April 13, 2021

Summary: In this inspiring picture book, fierce and determined children confront the hardships of Ban Vinai refugee camp, where Kao Kalia Yang lived as a child. Accompanied by the evocative and rich cultural imagery of debut illustrator Billy Thao, the warriors’ secret mission shows what feats of compassion and courage children can perform, bringing more than foraged greens back to the younger children and to their elders. In this unforgiving place, with little to call their own, these children are the heroes, offering gifts of hope and belonging in a truly unforgettable way.

My review: Kao Kalia Yang has put the perfect words together to whisk readers back in time right into her memories. She shares about her young cousins training together each day so they would be ready when needed. They had both physical and mental exercises and their chosen leader was one of the smaller children. He was chosen because he was the most passionate about their training and believed in them the most. He had a heart for everyone and for the work they were doing. One of my favorite illustrations is this tiny boy standing with his hands on his hips. The shadow that he casts is a large one and it is also shaped like the heart motif that is often found in Hmong textiles and jewelry. It's just one of the many wonderful ways Billy Thao's artwork supports the story. 

The Yang Warriors had many reasons to train. There were Thai guards, other children who wanted space in the camp, and there were lonely ghosts. They knew there was danger around them, but they also knew they wanted to be prepared for anything. Young readers will likely connect with these creative and empathic children who did more than simply survive in this challenging situation. They taught each other and challenged each other in many ways. 

As with many of Kao Kalia Yang's stories, readers will also feel the boundless familial love within the words. Several of her adult and children's books are love letters to her grandmother and parents, but with this book, we get to see love for her sister and cousins. 

Yang and Thao each provide wonderful notes at the end of the book that include a little more information about the refugee camp experience and Hmong culture. 

Recommendation: This is truly a book for anyone. It should find a place in any library and I am excited to have it available for my students in the near future.

Review: Sisters of the Neversea

Title: Sisters of the Neversea

Author: Cynthia Leitich Smith

Publisher: Heartdrum 

Pages: 320

Review copy: Digital ARC via Edelweiss

Availability: June 1, 2021

Summary: Lily and Wendy have been best friends since they became stepsisters. But with their feuding parents planning to spend the summer apart, what will become of their family—and their friendship?

 Little do they know that a mysterious boy has been watching them from the oak tree outside their window. A boy who intends to take them away from home for good, to an island of wild animals, Merfolk, Fairies, and kidnapped children. 

A boy who calls himself Peter Pan.

My Review: Cynthia Leitich Smith reimagined Neverland and the adventures of Peter Pan. The original story has been problematic since it was created, but there was much about it to love. Smith has found a way to address some of the racist depictions of Indigenous folks along with a few of the gender role issues too. 

In this retelling, the children are from a blended family with a British father and a mother who is part of the Muscogee Creek Nation. The children are feeling unsettled because of conflict between their parents and in the midst of this, Peter Pan arrives on the scene. He and Tinkerbell are very charming and appealing to Michael and Wendy, but Lily is not convinced that he is trustworthy. He uses words like Injuns which offends them all and calls them useless girls since they can't sew properly. Lily informs his that her mother is brilliant at math and managing money. I love it when Wendy informs Peter that their dad also didn't teach them how to sew. 

Of course the children do end up in Neverland, but it is not as carefree and lovely as Peter made it out to be. As in the original, Peter is pretty focused on himself and does not take advice or instruction well. Though he delivers on adventure, he is not concerned with the needs of the children and he has a lot of "wrongheaded" ideas about Native children. 

There are other children already on the island including Daniel who is Leech Lake Ojibwe from St. Paul. Through Daniel and others, readers see that Native people are still alive and that there is a great deal of variety among them. Lily and the others also appreciate their cultural identity and their family members more as time passes. 

Recommendation: Sisters of the Neversea is a fantastic way to visit the world of Neverland again without having to see the damaging stereotypical Natives. It is a great adventure story even for those who are unfamiliar with Peter Pan. Siblings fall out and feelings are hurt, but love is still there and of course there are fairies and merpeople along with pirates so it's going to be a crowd pleaser. This story is a lot of fun and has great representation. I plan to purchase it for my elementary school library and I believe it will be a great addition to any library serving young people. 

It's Monday! What are you reading?

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It's a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now...you just might discover your next “must-read” book!

Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and Jen Vincent, of Teach Mentor Texts decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children's literature - picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit - join us! We love this meme and think you will, too. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kidlit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

If you go to my Storygraph account, you can see what I have read recently & click on the books to learn more.

Last Week on the Blog

Review of A Taste for Love over at Rich in Color

Review of Jo Jo Makoons

Last Week in Books:

Snapdragon is an amazingly cute middle grade graphic novel with magical realism. The Meet Cute Project is a YA rom-com that was fairly predictable, but of course, it was also cute.

Adult:

Accidentally Engaged and Take a Hint Dani Brown are both adult rom-coms with the fake relationship trope. They are both super cute. Accidentally Engaged involves food and there were two recipes at the end--Egg Curry and Parathas. We had a yummy dinner when I tried out the recipes. Dani Brown is one of the sisters from the first Brown Sisters series and was just as fun as that one. I have the third and final book on deck. 

The Coming Week: 

I just started reading a nonfiction adult book called The Loneliest Polar Bear. It was written by the son of a good friend. It's a really great book and it's fun to know the proud mom. :) He wrote the book after creating a five part series about Nora for The Oregonian. You can learn more about that here. Have a great week!

Review: JoJo Makoons

Title: Jo Jo Makoons: The Used-to-Be Best Friend

Author: Dawn Quigley 

Illustrator: Tara Audibert

Publisher: Heartdrum 

Pages: 80

Review copy: Digital ARC 

Availability: May 11, 2021

Summary: Jo Jo Makoons Azure is a spirited seven-year-old who moves through the world a little differently than anyone else on her Ojibwe reservation. It always seems like her mom, her kokum (grandma),and her teacher have a lot to learn—about how good Jo Jo is at cleaning up, what makes a good rhyme, and what it means to be friendly. 

Even though Jo Jo loves her #1 best friend Mimi (who is a cat), she’s worried that she needs to figure out how to make more friends. Because Fern, her best friend at school, may not want to be friends anymore…

My Review: The first thing to see inside this delight of a book is a yearbook style page with each of the characters in a square like a photo, but several of them are bigger than life and don't quite fit inside the squares. Ears or hair poke out. Everyone is smiling and the mood is lighthearted from the start. Jo Jo tells the reader about her cat and a lot about her name. I love that she informs the reader that if you can say Tyrannosaurus Rex, you can certainly say her Ojibwe name nindizhinikaaz. She even shows the way to pronounce it - nin-Dezh-in-i-kauz. No excuses. Jo Jo is proud of her heritage and is happy to share about how awesome it is to be learning the Ojibwe and Michif languages. Jo Jo also gives a few language lessons along the way and there is a glossary in the back.

Jo Jo is clever, curious, and a bit mischievous which makes her a ton of fun. She gets herself into tricky situations, but she is also quick to find creative solutions. One thing I loved was that she enjoys math. So many adults and children have negative feelings about math, but she gets a kick out of it. She also takes a very literal view of the world and this creates some hilarious situations much like with Amelia Bedelia. 

Recommendation: This is the beginning of a great early chapter book series that is sure to be a hit with young readers. There are friendship and family situations that most readers could likely relate to regardless of culture and then there are also some situations that come about that are specifically related to being Ojibwe. It's also simply hilarious. I'm looking forward to sharing this one with students and hope that it finds many, many readers. 

It's Monday! What are you reading?

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It's a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now...you just might discover your next “must-read” book!

Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and Jen Vincent, of Teach Mentor Texts decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children's literature - picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit - join us! We love this meme and think you will, too. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kidlit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

If you go to my Storygraph account, you can see what I have read recently & click on the books to learn more.

Last Week on the Blog

Group Discussion - Fat Chance, Charlie Vega

Interview with Author of Fat Chance, Charlie Vega - Crystal Maldonado

Last Week in Books:

Picture Books:

Talking is Not My Thing - this is a sweet story featuring animals with a main character who is nonverbal or shy. 

Sometimes I Feel Like a Fox features a child wearing various masks and accessories that portray many animals along with characteristics that the child shares with that animal. This is written by an Indigenous author. 

The First Fire: A Cherokee Story - in this story, many different animals attempt to retrieve fire, but only one is successful and it is not who you might expect. 

Sugar in Milk is a lovely retelling of how Persian Zoroastrian's came to be in India. I feel like I have just read this story or a similar one somewhere else, but maybe I saw an ARC and just forgot to record that I read it. Who knows.

Middle Grade:

Sisters of the Neversea is a great Peter Pan retelling by Cynthia Leitich Smith. It makes some headway into righting some of the wrongs perpetuated again Native characters in the original. 

Young Adult:

Be Not Far From Me is a great survival story that I read for the adult YA book group I attend. It was pretty riveting. 

Long Way Down: The Graphic Novel was excellent. I'm not sure which version I prefer because I think the emotional impact is pretty intense on a first read and I read the other book first.

A Taste for Love is a fun Pride & Prejudice retelling that features baking and lots and lots of boba. I'll be doing a formal review at the end of the week over at Rich in Color. 

Adult:

Serena Singh Flips the Script - I've read one other book by this author and then I heard an author chat with her on Books and Boba so I had to find this one. It was an enjoyable rom-com and also had a character on the cover wearing glasses - yay! I really loved the friendship storyline here too. 

Cultivating Genius: An Equity Framework for Culturally and Historically Responsive Literacy is for anyone who teaches and wants to do better. Teachers - especially white teachers - too often look at students with deficit thinking. Here Muhammad reminds us that teaching is more about seeing and cultivating the genius or the strengths that students already have within them. She encourages teachers to look to the history of Black literacy in the U.S. as a model for what we could be doing across grades and across content areas. I know I'll be reading and re-reading and sharing this book many times over. 

The Coming Week: 

I'm still listening to Dahlia Adler's new anthology That Way Madness Lies via Librofm. I have a huge pile of books from the library and don't know exactly which ones I will pick up next. Have a great week!

It's Monday! What are you reading?

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It's a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now...you just might discover your next “must-read” book!

Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and Jen Vincent, of Teach Mentor Texts decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children's literature - picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit - join us! We love this meme and think you will, too. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kidlit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

If you go to my Storygraph account, you can see what I have read recently & click on the books to learn more.

Last Week in Books:

One Summer Up North is an almost wordless book about a family spending time in the Boundary Waters. It's lovely and is especially nice for those who live in Minnesota, Canada, or the Midwest.

It was funny that I found the picture book Listening with My Heart: A Story of Kindness & Self-Compassion since I had recently watched a TedTalk about this subject. It's a great book that reminds us to treat ourselves with gentleness and offer the compassion to ourselves that we would offer to a loved one. 

The All-Together Quilt shares the story of an intergenerational community group bonding over the creation of quilts. 

You're Invited to a Moth Ball is a nonfiction picture book that gives step-by-step instructions for having an  evening party featuring moths. It's a way to be scientists in a really fun way. 

Starfish is a middle grade novel in verse that features a fat girl who doesn't see being fat as a problem, but rather sees how people treat her because she's fat as a much larger problem. She's really trying to maintain a positive relationship with her body, but outside forces seem to want to keep her small in more ways than one. 

Chlorine Sky is a young adult novel in verse that is also about a young girl who has people in her life who seem to be trying to keep her from taking up space. She has to find out how to be herself and take up the space she deserves. 

We Are Not Free is a young adult novel about the Japanese incarceration during WWII. It's told through many different perspectives and is quite moving. 

When the Emperor Was Divine is an adult novel that is also about the Japanese incarceration. It is much shorter than the young adult novel, but also packs an emotional punch. 

Straight from the Horse's Mouth is an adult novel that takes place in Morocco and is the story of a sex worker there. It is a translated novel and was definitely very interesting. 

The Coming Week: 

I'm listening to Dahlia Adler's new anthology That Way Madness Lies via Librofm. I'm still reading an ARC of Cynthia Leitich Smith's Sisters of the Neversea and I'm also still working on Cultivating Genius. Have a great week!

It's Monday! What are you reading?

It's Monday! What are you Reading? is a meme hosted by Kathryn at Book Date. It's a great way to recap what you read and/or reviewed the previous week and to plan out your reading and reviews for the upcoming week. It's also a great chance to see what others are reading right now...you just might discover your next “must-read” book!

Kellee Moye, of Unleashing Readers, and Jen Vincent, of Teach Mentor Texts decided to give It's Monday! What Are You Reading? a kidlit focus. If you read and review books in children's literature - picture books, chapter books, middle grade novels, young adult novels, anything in the world of kidlit - join us! We love this meme and think you will, too. We encourage everyone who participates to visit at least three of the other kidlit book bloggers that link up and leave comments for them.

If you go to my Storygraph account, you can see what I have read recently & click on the books to learn more.

Last Week in Books:

I read quite a few picture books this week, but these are the four that were most interesting. You Might Find Yourself is done with collage and shows the different places and situations that one might find themself. School Days is a photographic collection of the daily activities of children at a school. I liked it because it seems like a great mentor text for a class to share about their day. Dads is another photo collection and this one shows the many ways dads interact with their families and how they may move through their days. There is a wide variety of cultures and ethnicities represented. I Sang You Down from the Stars is a gorgeous and loving book about what an Indigenous mother does to prepare for her new child. The author and illustrator are both Indigenous. 

I read and enjoyed the middle grade fantasy The Time of Green Magic for a book club I am in. Again for escape reading, I also read an adult romance - How to Fail at Flirting.  

The Coming Week: 

I'm still listening to Chlorine Sky and I am still reading the four books above Straight from the Horse's Mouth, Sisters of the Neversea, The Collected Works of Audre Lorde, and Cultivating Genius.  Have a great week!