Picture books for everyone

A is for Another Rabbit by Hannah Batsel

We've seen a trend recent years of alphabet books that do their best to be more. Some are informative. Others, like this one, use humor. This one uses a single object, rabbits, to illustrate every letter. Sometimes this is in the form of a sentence like "Can you believe how many rabbits are on this page". Other times it's through trickery, like disguising the rabbits as something else. It's not a story exactly but there's a lot of humor in the creative uses of rabbits and the increasingly exasperated owl. It's humor that will reach early elementary kids and the adults reading to them alike. And the illustrations are charming so it's also fun just to leaf through.
Advanced Reader Copy provided by NetGalley.

Non-fiction book review - The Mermaid Atlas

The Mermaid Atlas by Anna Claybourne

Personally, I've never really been into mermaids. Especially the typical portrayal we get in cartoons of pretty, empty-headed things that just giggle and flirt with men. What does interest me is the various portrayals of merfolk in folktales. And that's what Claybourne is looking at here. We have friendly, aggressive, and indifferent creatures. Single gender or fully cultured. Even some proto-merfolk like selkies. Each legend gets just a couple of paragraphs but that's enough to see both how the idea of mermaids is cross-cultural and how other cultural elements influence the nature of the legend. This is a great book for any kid with an interest in folk creatures.

More information:  The Mermaid Atlas releases June 1.
Advanced Reader Copy provided by NetGalley

Book review - Orphan Eleven

Title: Orphan Eleven
Author: Gennifer Choldenko
Genre: historical fiction
Similar books: Dave at Night by Gail Carson Levine
                      Listening for Lions by Gloria Whelan
Rating:

a bit fanciful

Summary (provided by publisher): An engaging adventure from a Newbery Honor-winning storyteller for readers who love the circus, and anyone who has dreamed of finding the perfect home.
Four orphans have escaped from the Home for Friendless Children. One is Lucy, who used to talk and sing. No one knows why she doesn't speak anymore; silence is her protection.
The orphans find work and new friends at a traveling circus. Lucy loves caring for the elephants, but she must be able to speak to them, and to warn others of danger. If Lucy doesn't find her voice, she'll be left behind when the circus goes on the rails. Meanwhile, people are searching for Lucy, and her puzzling past is about to catch up with her. 

My opinion: Choldenko certainly isn't afraid to show us marginalized populations in historical contexts and the harshness of everyday lives. Here we have orphaned/abandoned children coming into contact with circus folk, a group bound to be populated by outsiders. We see these people trying to find a place in life, a place they can belong and feel safe. This is paralleled in the elephants. The young elephant's loving acceptance and general skittishness are a direct reflection of various characters. The plot never digs too deep into any topic, somewhat to a disappointing degree. I might have liked more reflection on the reality of the life Lucy has left behind ,the future that awaited her. Or even more reflection on the things that influence the four orphans, the hurts that have caused the to act out, to act not in their own self interest.  Add in the circus which had an almost magical air, a sense of unreality, and I found I wasn't as satisfied with the book on the whole as I'd have liked.

More information: Orphan Eleven releases May 26.
Advanced Reader Copy provided by NetGalley

Cardboard Corny Crab

I'm still participating in the Cardboard Creature Club on Instagram. This week's prompt was corny crab creature. I made my entry with a box, a little extra cardboard, some paint, and a pair of wiggle eyes.

 

Book review - The Elephant's Girl

Title: The Elephant's Girl
Author: Celesta Rimington
Genre: magical realism
Similar books: Forever Glimmer Creek by Stacy Hackney
                      Breadcrumbs by Anne Ursu
Rating:

a solid read that gives us something to consider

Summary (provided by publisher): An elephant never forgets, but Lexington Willow can't remember what happened before a tornado swept her away when she was a toddler. All she knows is that it landed her near an enclosure in a Nebraska zoo; and there an elephant named Nyah protected her from the storm. With no trace of her birth family, Lex grew up at the zoo with Nyah and her elephant family; her foster father, Roger; her best friend, Fisher; and the wind whispering in her ear.
Now that she's twelve, Lex is finally old enough to help with the elephants. But during their first training session, Nyah sends her a telepathic image of the woods outside the zoo. Despite the wind's protests, Lex decides to investigate Nyah's message and gets wrapped up in an adventure involving ghosts, lost treasure, and a puzzle that might be the key to finding her family. As she hunts for answers, Lex must summon the courage to leave the secure borders of her zoo to discover who she really is--and why the tornado brought her here all those years ago. 

My opinion: Rimington leans hard into the magical realism, giving us a protagonist who can communicate with the wind and elephants as well as a ghost. The presentation of ghosts in this particular novel is fairly unique and creates a metaphor for exploring the changes to a friendship in adolescence. Lex's devotion to the ghost parallels her changing relationship with Fisher and reinforces the message that one person shouldn't be somebody else's everything. Add in our ties to the past, the ways that the people who came before us influence our present, and we have a solidly interesting read. The metaphors are a bit blunt but this is not uncommon in books for this age group.
More information: The Elephant's Girl releases May 19.
Advanced Reader Copy provided by NetGalley

Graphic novel spotlight - Saturday and Sunday: Rock Heaven

Saturday and Sunday Rock Heaven by Fabien Vehlmann

If you read many European comic you begin to recognize a sort of random quality to the narrative absent from their American counterparts. Fans of Asterix and Tintin will find similarities in Saturday and Sunday. At face value, this is a story about a pair of friends having a low level adventure around their home, talking to other residents and exploring their island. At heart, it's an exploration of existential questions. These characters are asking about the nature of life and our purpose on this planet, seeking wise figures and sources of knowledge. Most of their attempts at an answer are met with silliness, but for the most part that humor adds to the meaning. The cartoony style, reminiscent of the Smurfs, belie  the complexity of the topic. While it doesn't find any real answers it does reassure the reader that these questions are a normal part of life and that none of us are alone.

Advanced Reader Copy provided by NetGalley

Non-fiction book review - Won't Get Fooled Again

Won't Get Fooled Again by Erin Steuter

There are, of course, other books out there that explore the "fake news" phenomenon and explain how to check a story's viability. Steuter takes this idea a step further. In a series of scenarios we see how "fake news" gets perpetuated, how to check for truth, and verifying our own sources of research, being certain to warn about spoofed websites. She warns us against marking every "weird" story as false and preventing our own biases from coloring our research. Even more than that, she shows us how fake news harms the general perception of truth in news and even of truth in general. While the artwork is a bit rough and noisy, the information is invaluable making this well worth the read.
Advanced Reader Copy provided by NetGalley.