A measured, well-researched winner.
Reid and Freeman celebrate the life of tennis champion Althea Gibson.
Debut author Reid takes readers from 1940s Harlem, where “fleet-of-foot” Althea Gibson is the “quickest, tallest and most fearless athlete,” all the way to 1957, when she becomes the first black player to win the championship at Wimbledon. Readers get to see Gibson’s development from a young athlete, cocksure, assertive, and focused only on winning, to a considerate sportswoman in a league of her own, paving the way for generations of young tennis players coming after her. Framing transitional moments in Gibson’s life in medallions, Freeman’s somewhat static illustrations encourage the narrative along, keeping pace with the text. The clever placement of Gibson’s form playing tennis on top of maps or with the globe represents the reach of her influence across the U.S. and the world. Other double-page spreads emphasize the enormity of the difficulties, specifically racism, Gibson faced while pursuing her dreams. One levels a “WHITES ONLY” sign on one page ever so slightly below Gibson’s determined gaze on the other. An author’s note fills in more historical and personal context for Gibson’s early and later life, and a timeline of important dates with a short bibliography of recommended texts rounds out the exploration of Gibson’s remarkable rise to tennis stardom.
A measured, well-researched winner. (Picture book/biography. 6-12)Pub Date: Jan. 21, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-06-285109-3
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
A celebration of progressive Judaism and an inclusive primer on Jews making a difference in the world.
This wide-ranging collection of short biographies highlights 36 Jewish figures from around the globe and across centuries.
Explicitly pushing back against homogenous depictions of Jewish people, the authors demonstrate the ethnic, racial, and gender diversity of Jews. Each spread includes a brief biography paired with a stylized portrait reminiscent of those in Elena Favilli and Francesca Cavallo’s Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls (2016). A pull quote or sidebar accompanies each subject; sidebars include “Highlighting Jewish Paralympic Athletes,” “Jewish Stringed Music,” and “Ethiopian Jews in Israel.” Kleinrock and Pritchard’s roster of subjects makes a compelling case for the vastness and variety of Jewish experience—from a contemporary Ethiopian American teen to a 16th-century Portuguese philanthropist—while still allowing them to acknowledge better-known figures. The entry on Raquel Montoya-Lewis, an associate justice of the Washington Supreme Court and an enrolled member of the Pueblo Isleta Indian tribe, discusses her mission to reimagine criminal justice for Indigenous people; the sidebar name-checks Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Elena Kagan. The bios are organized around themes of Jewish principles such as Pikuach Nefesh (translated from the Hebrew as “to save a life”) and Adam Yachid (translated as the “unique value of every person”); each section includes an introduction to an organization that centers diverse Jewish experiences.
A celebration of progressive Judaism and an inclusive primer on Jews making a difference in the world. (resources) (Nonfiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 24, 2024
ISBN: 9780063285712
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Blandly inspirational fare made to evoke equally shrink-wrapped responses.
An NBA star pays tribute to the influence of his grandfather.
In the same vein as his Long Shot (2009), illustrated by Frank Morrison, this latest from Paul prioritizes values and character: “My granddad Papa Chilly had dreams that came true,” he writes, “so maybe if I listen and watch him, / mine will too.” So it is that the wide-eyed Black child in the simply drawn illustrations rises early to get to the playground hoops before anyone else, watches his elder working hard and respecting others, hears him cheering along with the rest of the family from the stands during games, and recalls in a prose afterword that his grandfather wasn’t one to lecture but taught by example. Paul mentions in both the text and the backmatter that Papa Chilly was the first African American to own a service station in North Carolina (his presumed dream) but not that he was killed in a robbery, which has the effect of keeping the overall tone positive and the instructional content one-dimensional. Figures in the pictures are mostly dark-skinned. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
Blandly inspirational fare made to evoke equally shrink-wrapped responses. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Jan. 10, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-250-81003-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
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