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PROTEST!

HOW PEOPLE HAVE COME TOGETHER TO CHANGE THE WORLD

How can such a passionate topic be rendered so blandly?

Discover the history of the world’s most effective protests.

Arranged in a mostly chronological format, this book documents an international history of protest and resistance. The text is quick to note that it “is not a complete history. It includes a selection of famous and less well-known movements, focusing on nonviolent protest. Rather than describe a handful of protests and their contexts in depth, [they] have chosen to present a broad range to give a sense of the many possibilities of what protest can be.” This summation captures both the strengths and the flaws of the text. The Haworth-Booths provide glimpses into myriad cultures and social groups, including movements not frequently seen in U.S. children’s books such as Chile’s early 1970s protests against food shortages and Nigeria’s Abeokuta Women’s Revolt in the 1940s. Unfortunately, though, they cover so many topics that the information has been condensed until key pieces are missing. This could be a permissible sin if there were thorough, user-friendly backmatter enabling readers to investigate more deeply elsewhere, but the cramped bibliographic essay does not comprehensively provide specific citations or documentation. Some sections are missing vital information, such as whether stories are documented or anecdotal, key facts, and cultural context. The crisp tone is more reminiscent of a textbook than enjoyable nonfiction, and the pink, gray, and black color scheme of the illustrations provides little excitement. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

How can such a passionate topic be rendered so blandly? (Nonfiction. 8-12)

Pub Date: Sept. 7, 2021

ISBN: 978-1-84365-512-1

Page Count: 168

Publisher: Pavilion Children's

Review Posted Online: July 13, 2021

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2021

Categories:
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OIL

Like oil itself, this is a book that needs to be handled with special care.

In 1977, the oil carrier Exxon Valdez spilled 11 million gallons of oil into a formerly pristine Alaskan ocean inlet, killing millions of birds, animals, and fish. Despite a cleanup, crude oil is still there.

The Winters foretold the destructive powers of the atomic bomb allusively in The Secret Project (2017), leaving the actuality to the backmatter. They make no such accommodations to young audiences in this disturbing book. From the dark front cover, on which oily blobs conceal a seabird, to the rescuer’s sad face on the back, the mother-son team emphasizes the disaster. A relatively easy-to-read and poetically heightened text introduces the situation. Oil is pumped from the Earth “all day long, all night long, / day after day, year after year” in “what had been unspoiled land, home to Native people // and thousands of caribou.” The scale of extraction is huge: There’s “a giant pipeline” leading to “enormous ships.” Then, crash. Rivers of oil gush out over three full-bleed wordless pages. Subsequent scenes show rocks, seabirds, and sea otters covered with oil. Finally, 30 years later, animals have returned to a cheerful scene. “But if you lift a rock… // oil / seeps / up.” For an adult reader, this is heartbreaking. How much more difficult might this be for an animal-loving child?

Like oil itself, this is a book that needs to be handled with special care. (author’s note, further reading) (Informational picture book. 9-12)

Pub Date: March 31, 2020

ISBN: 978-1-5344-3077-8

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Beach Lane/Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: Nov. 23, 2019

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019

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IF YOU LIVED DURING THE PLIMOTH THANKSGIVING

Essential.

A measured corrective to pervasive myths about what is often referred to as the “first Thanksgiving.”

Contextualizing them within a Native perspective, Newell (Passamaquoddy) touches on the all-too-familiar elements of the U.S. holiday of Thanksgiving and its origins and the history of English colonization in the territory now known as New England. In addition to the voyage and landfall of the Mayflower, readers learn about the Doctrine of Discovery that arrogated the lands of non-Christian peoples to European settlers; earlier encounters between the Indigenous peoples of the region and Europeans; and the Great Dying of 1616-1619, which emptied the village of Patuxet by 1620. Short, two- to six-page chapters alternate between the story of the English settlers and exploring the complex political makeup of the region and the culture, agriculture, and technology of the Wampanoag—all before covering the evolution of the holiday. Refreshingly, the lens Newell offers is a Native one, describing how the Wampanoag and other Native peoples received the English rather than the other way around. Key words ranging from estuary to discover are printed in boldface in the narrative and defined in a closing glossary. Nelson (a member of the Leech Lake Band of Minnesota Chippewa) contributes soft line-and-color illustrations of the proceedings. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

Essential. (Nonfiction. 8-12)

Pub Date: Nov. 2, 2021

ISBN: 978-1-338-72637-4

Page Count: 96

Publisher: Scholastic Nonfiction

Review Posted Online: Oct. 12, 2021

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2021

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