It's Monday! Find These Books!

  

      Visit Kellee and Ricki at UnleashingReaders and Jen at Teach Mentor Texts to see what they and others have been reading! Your TBR lists will grow! 

Saying Hello to fall!

        I took a pic of some of my favorite fall books, in case you don't know them and want to discover a special one. Each one's a gem! 

         And, I'm saying goodbye to summer! Baseball and weather hot enough to go outside with bare feet are nearly done! 

         

       This is a 2007 publication from the then newly-created Center for Cartoon Studies, a two-year MFA program still in existence that focuses on sequential art. You can read all about them here and see what other work has been published! There is more about it, too, on Wikipedia. 

       Narrating this Negro League baseball story is Emmet Wilson who was a good player, but when facing the great Satchel Paige, he got a hit, and sadly, sliding into home, scoring a run, too, blew out his knee. Career over! It brings back much about both the times and the way Satchel Paige brought so much attention to how good the Negro League was and the way Jim Crow laws kept them challenged, too. Emmet remains a sharecropper and tells his own story, too, showing his white man neighbors and their power over him even as he tries to ignore it all. It's wonderful to see it all in the graphic style, and there is quite a lot of information added at the back for some of the pages, like more about Satchel Paige's long, long career, which spanned six decades! 

         (Did you know there is a Negro League Baseball Museum in Kansas City, Missouri? I visited long ago, grew up in Missouri, so still visit family there. You can find their site here!)

       In her poetic text with Kenard Pak showing us the magical night, Deborah Hopkinson tells readers her story, of a young girl who awakens, unsure how, goes outside to feel the quiet and cool earth beneath her feet. In this cumulative text, she continues to see small movements, her cat stretching on the kitchen table, the neighbor's dog yapping, and a rabbit peeks out from a bush. What she sees as she moves around the yard make a bigger mystery and she wonders each time "Who has woken the cat, the dog, the rabbit, even a cloud? Or, was it you? What is discovered makes a peaceful and sweet ending.

        Discovered at my library is a new book by Travis Jonker and illustrated by Matthew Cordell. From the beginning, I could see this was a magical tale. Where else can one find a mouse who, along with a young boy, who lives with a man in a little cabin by a little lake? That man, I assume is the father, has spent a lot of time building a wonderful model ship, and both the boy and the mouse, named Mabel, wonder if it will float, like a real ship. The opportunity arrives, and that's the rest of this wonderful story, with Cordell's signature black and white lines and a bit of  the color blue, like the cover! It will be a special read-aloud about dreams and finding courage! 

 

Thanks to Candlewick Press for this copy!

         What fun to say hello to Alma, again, this time in her home and with both English and Spanish phrases. She's up and ready for breakfast, has her brother read a picture book before he leaves for school, then Alma starts her own day, outside with her little Pajarito! See him there with Alma on the cover! Juana Martinez-Neal brings another sweet story of Alma's life!

Still Reading! All The Colors of The Dark, by Chris Whitaker. It's very long and I've simply not found enough time to keep going, though I'm enjoying it very much!