The Right Word: Roget and His Thesaurus by Jen Bryant with pictures by Melissa Sweet is a biography (written for children) of the creator of the Thesaurus, Peter Roget. Some of the most beautiful mixed media art has been used to enhance a subject which I imagine many adults (not to mention kids) would consider quite dry. While the art is gorgeous, I have to be honest and say that Roget didn’t lead the most exciting life so the story itself isn't exactly edge of the seat content. From childhood, he spent much of his time making categorized lists (sounds like the life of the party) which didn't help his shyness but did help him to graduate early from school. It also helped him in his preparations to become a doctor where an ability to stay focused while learning a vast amount of information came in handy. This book tracks his life and accomplishments in an easy to digest manner for kids aged 9 and up (although younger kids could understand the content with help from an adult). If nothing else, this is an absolutely beautiful piece of art and for that alone should be celebrated. 6/10 because it didn't knock my socks off or supply me with any particularly new information.

 

What I'm Currently Reading: So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo

Up til this point, I could most likely count the number of biographies written for children that I've read. Actually I could probably count how many biographies in total I've ever read because I have to admit biographies in general not my favorite genre. However, there are always exceptions and every now and again there are people who I find intriguing enough to seek out more information about them. Last year I read My Ears Are Bent which included different excerpts from The New Yorker along with background on the magazine itself. I discovered from this book just how much of the writing was done by E.B. White. (You might recognize him from such things as Stuart Little and Charlotte's Web.) This piqued my interest in White but I had so many other things on my TRL that I somewhat forgot about him until I saw Some Writer!: The Story of E.B. White by Melissa Sweet pop up as a recommended read. I think E.B. White would have heartily approved of this biography even though he was an intensely private, low-key individual. This book delivered not only on giving me the biography that I was looking for but also offering up beautiful mixed media layouts which make it more accessible to children.  His approach to writing and his proliferation of works is fascinating and astonishing. Sweet manages to educate the reader about his works but she also manages to paint a portrait of a writer that was passionate about his craft, his family, and his farm. She does this almost from the start. This book is great if you want to learn more about E.B. White yourself or if you want to introduce your kids to biographies. It's easily accessible and the layout is beautiful. Quick, fun read that I'd recommend for reluctant biography readers (like myself). 10/10

 

To give you a taste of what I mean about the mixed media approach:

 

Source: NPR

Source: NPR

 

What's Up Next: Brian Selznick Masterpost including The Invention of Hugo Cabret, The Marvels, and Wonderstruck

 

What I'm Currently Reading: Alice by Christina Henry

My spouse and I went off in search of a new dehumidifier, but first, we stopped at the library to replenish her stock of cheesy mysteries. She sent me to the children's collection to pick stuff to read to our 5-year old grandson. This is one of the books I chose, but more for me than for him, I think. I have a cyber friend who was a Vietnamese refugee. I believe that he said he'd had a pretty smooth path to the U.S., but that his spouse had a more circuitous rout, and spent considerable time as a boat person.

So, I read this to better understand what had gone on back in the day. To better understand what hell we had wrought for other people. Sadly, we're still doing it—albeit in the Middle East now—even though we declare ourselves be a Christian Nation. WTF?

"Little Red Writing" surpassed all of my expectations. I expected it to be a simple story about little red riding hood except the girl is now a pencil. I was very wrong. This book teaches while entertaining! It goes through the writing process, details many different parts of speech, and talks about punctuation. I would use this in an upper grade classroom by reading it aloud to the class before the students have to write a story or paper. It would remind them of grammar rules and sentence structure while letting their minds think about what they want to write. Just like in the book, I would give students 15 categorized words to use in their story. After reading the book aloud to the class, I would have the students come up with a 2 page story using those 15 words. 

 

Lexile: AD 740L

Guided Reading: O

Grade Level Equivalent: 3.5

So I may have mentioned before that I love a good anthology, particularly of the contributions of women in history. The point is not that men haven't done great things that we deserve learning about but that they aren't the only ones who have. Despite hardship and opposition, women have invented lots of things, some that we couldn't live without today and others that are so common, I didn't even realize that it used to be a problem. 

 

This book takes just about an hour to listen to. It has some women I was already familiar with (like my hero, Admiral Grace Hopper) and others that were new (Margaret Knight invented the machine that makes paper grocery bags, they had to be made by hand and were expensive before that). 

 

If you want to see some more great anthologies of women making history, I have a shelf dedicated to them.