Top Shelf Productions
March: Book 3
John Lewis and Andrew Aydin; illustrated by John Powell Top Shelf Productions, 246 pp., $19.99; ages 10 and up
This final book in the remarkable graphic novel trilogy received the 2016 National Book Award for Young People’s Literature. Accepting it, civil rights leader U.S. Rep. John Lewis wept, recalling how as a boy he was barred from the public library because he was “colored.” Lewis’ roots in rural Alabama, his life-changing meeting with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and his role as a leader in the 1963 March on Washington are covered in the first books. This one traces the events leading up to the Freedom Summer of 1964, and Lewis’ pivotal role in the 1965 march from Selma, Alabama, to the state capital of Montgomery. As a youth, Lewis was thrilled by a comic book version of King’s life. The superb art and compelling story of this series offer similar inspiration. Grade: A
Dutton
The Inquisitor’s Tale, or The Three Magical Children and Their Holy Dog
Adam Gidwitz; illustrated by Hatem Aly
Dutton Children’s Books, 363 pp., $17.99; ages 9-13
Like “The Canterbury Tales,” this novel of the Middle Ages employs numerous colorful narrators. Quaffing tankards of ale, they piece together the story of three children: a peasant girl, an orphaned Jew and a prodigiously strong Saracen. Charged as heretics and wanted by King Louis, the children are on a mission to save rare Talmuds. With foes that include a farting dragon, legions of knights and the queen of France herself, their task is not easy. A mix of history and slapstick – there are a lot of chase scenes – the book wobbles at times, but its questions about religious misunderstanding and discord remain painfully relevant. Gidwitz delineates the difference between facts and imagination in his excellent author’s note. Grade: B+
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Some Writer! The Story of. E.B. White
Melissa Sweet
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 161 pp., $18.99; all ages
Author and illustrator of glorious biographies of William Carlos Williams and Peter Roget, Sweet has found her true soulmate in Andy White. Following him from boyhood to legendary New Yorker writer and beloved author of classics such as “Stuart Little,” she shares anecdotes, quotes from journals and letters, and – of interest to writers and readers of any age – reproduces drafts of the (immortal) first page of “Charlotte’s Web.” Her beautiful collaged illustrations evoke his “intimate and ardent” connections with nature, domestic and wild. Of writing “Charlotte,” White said, “It was one of those rare interludes that can never be repeated, a time of enchantment.” That describes reading this bio as well. Grade: A+
Katherine Tegen Books
The Poet’s Dog
Patricia MacLachlan
Katherine Tegen Books, 88 pp., $14.99; ages 6-10
MacLachlan, author of the beloved “Sarah, Plain and Tall,” is a master of the lyric yet spare. Her slender new book tells the story of Nickel and Ruby, a brother and sister lost in a snowstorm and rescued by the Irish wolfhound Teddy. Teddy leads them to the cabin he shared with the poet Sylvan, who has recently died. Living with Sylvan has taught Teddy the power of words, and now, when he speaks, the children understand him. Through Teddy and the children and, by extension, the readers of this story, the poet’s song lives on. A story about loss but also resilience and hope, this would make a good family read-aloud. Grade: A
Alfred A. Knopf
The Warden’s Daughter
Jerry Spinelli
Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers, 352 pp., $16.99; ages 9-12
Newbery medalist Spinelli strolls down Nostalgia Lane in this story set in small-town Pennsylvania in 1959. Cammie, the daughter of the title, is not exactly a happy child. There is, she says, “no glow I could not darken, no sweet I could not sour.” Motherless since infancy, she seeks comfort in female inmates Eloda, stolid and taciturn, and BooBoo, ebullient and full of stories. Plenty of havoc ensues, some comic, some tragic. Cammie’s fierce, funny voice steers this somewhat meandering, idealized story to a warm conclusion. Young readers will be intrigued by the freedom kids had in those days, and will want to learn how to do the Twist. Grade: B+
Springstubb is a critic in Cleveland Heights.
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