Inspiring and honest, this smart book offers both compassion and practical instruction.
This guide for teens provides tools for living a creative life.
Teenagers receive sympathetic inspiration and practical how-to advice on living a creative life and being productive in one’s work. The chapters, each of which is further broken down into focused sections, follow the cycle of developing and executing projects, guiding readers through five steps: “Play,” “Plan,” “Make,” “Share,” and “Play Again.” In each, the author addresses topics such as exploration, setting up your creative space, brainstorming and freewriting, and how and why to pay attention. Readers can learn challenging lessons in setting intentions and planning, dealing with failure, procrastination, self-doubt, and critical feedback. Zarr balances stories from her own life with concrete exercises to put these lessons into practice. The book combines you-can-do-it cheerleading with straight talk about sitting down and getting the work done. With her accessible, confessional tone and hands-on exercises, the author defangs many young artists’ deepest and most immobilizing fears while also giving them tools for success. Most importantly, she affirms these feelings and lets teenagers know they are not alone. Notably, Zarr directly addresses readers’ different personal circumstances when it comes to the money to fund projects or experience the arts, family encouragement, and access to private space in which to create. Black-and-white illustrations and design elements enhance the text. This inspirational and powerful work affirms readers with the underlying message: Fear not!
Inspiring and honest, this smart book offers both compassion and practical instruction. (further reading) (Nonfiction. 12-18)Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5064-5915-8
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Beaming Books
Review Posted Online: July 7, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2020
Small but mighty necessary reading.
A miniature manifesto for radical queer acceptance that weaves together the personal and political.
Eli, a cis gay white Jewish man, uses his own identities and experiences to frame and acknowledge his perspective. In the prologue, Eli compares the global Jewish community to the global queer community, noting, “We don’t always get it right, but the importance of showing up for other Jews has been carved into the DNA of what it means to be Jewish. It is my dream that queer people develop the same ideology—what I like to call a Global Queer Conscience.” He details his own isolating experiences as a queer adolescent in an Orthodox Jewish community and reflects on how he and so many others would have benefitted from a robust and supportive queer community. The rest of the book outlines 10 principles based on the belief that an expectation of mutual care and concern across various other dimensions of identity can be integrated into queer community values. Eli’s prose is clear, straightforward, and powerful. While he makes some choices that may be divisive—for example, using the initialism LGBTQIAA+ which includes “ally”—he always makes clear those are his personal choices and that the language is ever evolving.
Small but mighty necessary reading. (resources) (Nonfiction. 14-18)Pub Date: June 2, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-593-09368-9
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Review Posted Online: March 28, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2020
A fierce, penetrating, and empowering call for change.
Artist and activist Vaid-Menon demonstrates how the normativity of the gender binary represses creativity and inflicts physical and emotional violence.
The author, whose parents emigrated from India, writes about how enforcement of the gender binary begins before birth and affects people in all stages of life, with people of color being especially vulnerable due to Western conceptions of gender as binary. Gender assignments create a narrative for how a person should behave, what they are allowed to like or wear, and how they express themself. Punishment of nonconformity leads to an inseparable link between gender and shame. Vaid-Menon challenges familiar arguments against gender nonconformity, breaking them down into four categories—dismissal, inconvenience, biology, and the slippery slope (fear of the consequences of acceptance). Headers in bold font create an accessible navigation experience from one analysis to the next. The prose maintains a conversational tone that feels as intimate and vulnerable as talking with a best friend. At the same time, the author's turns of phrase in moments of deep insight ring with precision and poetry. In one reflection, they write, “the most lethal part of the human body is not the fist; it is the eye. What people see and how people see it has everything to do with power.” While this short essay speaks honestly of pain and injustice, it concludes with encouragement and an invitation into a future that celebrates transformation.
A fierce, penetrating, and empowering call for change. (writing prompt) (Nonfiction. 14-adult)Pub Date: June 2, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-593-09465-5
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Review Posted Online: March 14, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2020
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