New Nonfiction- November 2022

Hanged! Mary Surratt and the Plot to Assassinate Abraham Lincoln

by Sarah Miller

Random House

Braiding Sweetgrass for Young Adults
by Robin Wall Kimmerer
adapted by Monique Gray Smith
illustrated by Nicole Neidhardt
Zest Books

Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents

Adapted for Young Readers

by Isabel Wilkerson

Delacorte Press

Notes from a Sickbed 

by Tessa Brunton

Graphic Universe

Buildings That Breathe: Greening the World's Cities

by Nancy F. Castaldo

Twenty-First Century Books

Nic Bishop Elephants

by Nic Bishop

Scholastic Press

Wild Animals of the World

by Dieter Braun

Flying Eye Books

Puffin

by Martin Jenkins

illustrated by Jenni Desmond

Candlewick Press

The Universe in You: A Microscopic Journey

Jason Chin

Neal Porter Books

A Song for the Unsung: Bayard Rustin, the Man Behind the 1963 March on Washington

by Carole Boston Weatherford and Rob Sanders

illustrated by Byron McCray

Henry Holt and Co.

Mr. McCloskey's Marvelous Mallards:

The Making of Make Way for Ducklings

by Emma Bland Smith

illustrated by Becca Stadtlander

Calkins Creek

She Sang for India: How M.S. Subbulakshmi Used Her Voice for Change

by Suma Subramaniam

illustrated by Shreya Gupta

Farrar Straus Giroux

Not Done Yet: Shirley Chisholm's Fight for Change

by Tameka Fryer Brown

illustrated by Nina Crews

Millbrook Press

A Land of Books: Dreams of Young Mexican Word Painters

by Duncan Tonatiuh

Abrams Books for Young Readers

Of Walden Pond: Henry David Thoreau, Frederic Tudor, and the Pond Between Them

by Lesa Cline-Ransome

illustrated by Ashley Benham-Yazdani

Holiday House

Elephants Remember: A True Story

by Jennifer O'Connell

Tilbury House

The First Notes: The Story of DO, RE, MI

by Julie Andrews and Emma Walton Hamilton

Little, Brown Books for Young Readers

Tree Hole Homes

Tree Hole Homes: Daytime Dens and Nighttime Nooks
by Melissa Stewart
illustrated by Amy Hevron
Random House Studio, 2022
Grades PreK-3

Tree Hole Homes asks young readers to "imagine what it would be like to live in a tree." This scientific picture book uses an inviting and lyrical writing style that carries the story through woods, fields, and rain forests where animals make their homes in tree holes. Readers will learn about the tree hole homes of fishers, tree frogs, barred owls, black bears, little brown bats, and more. Expository paragraphs offer facts and details about the featured animals and their activities both inside and outside the trees.

Bold acrylic, charcoal pencil, and digital illustrations on wood depict animals snoozing, nesting and hiding from prey inside tree holes. Budding scientists will be excited by the additional facts in the back matter about the animals.

Stewart and Hevron have succeeded in crafting a high quality and engaging science book for young readers that is both scientifically accurate and accessible to children in primary grades.  A recommended purchase as a gift book for children who love learning about nature as well as a solid addition to an elementary science classroom or library.

Visit Melissa Stewart's site to learn about how she came up with the idea for the book. There are also extensions including a video visit to the Amy Hevron's studio.

Caves

Caves
by Nell Cross Beckerman

illustrated by Kale Chock

Orchard Books, 2022

Grades K-5

Readers are invited to explore caves in this stunning science picture book. Beckerman pairs poetry written in the 3rd person with expository text to give readers a glimpse inside the caves. The poetic text employs gorgeous word choice to bring the world of caves to life while the parallel expository text teaches readers about rock formations, stalactites, crystals, cave temperatures, fossils, bats and glowworms. 

Chock's realistic style illustrations use a dark palette and different points of view to give readers a sense of the darkness and wonder found inside caves.

Back matter includes a list of cave rules, fun facts and spelunking equipment. Give Caves as a gift to young readers interested in science and nature or use it as a mentor text for teaching students to write about science topics. 

Visit the author's site to view page spreads from the book.

Numb to This: Memoir of a Mass Shooting by Kindra Neely

Numb To This: Memoir of a Mass Shooting

Kindra Neely

Little, Brown and Company. 2022

Graphic artist, Kindra Neely, is a survivor of the mass shooting at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon in October 2015. Her memoir, told in graphic novel format, tells the story of the shooting, and her journey to try and heal from this trauma. Making this ordeal extra challenging is the continued steady stream of mass shootings throughout the United States.

Neely was no stranger to the negative influence of guns. Living in Texas, her school had metal detectors, police dogs, and officiers. “There were a lot of guns. Everybody carried in Texas.” After a drive-by shooting a few houses from where she lived, Neely’s mother had enough. She packed then 13-year-old Kindra into the car and they relocated to her mother’s hometown: Roseburg, Oregon. 

Life improved a lot! Kindra felt safe in her new surroundings. She made friends. The calmness of Oregon allowed Kindra to have the space to find herself and figure out exactly what that meant for her future. 

“Gun violence wasn’t something I was accustomed to. It just wasn’t expected.” Not here in Oregon.

Then, on her fourth day attending Umpqua Community College, a gunman opens fire on campus. Nine people killed and eight people injured. Even before she arrived home that awful day, a national newspaper posts a picture of Kindra and a friend hugging. “I felt so violated. People were going to make their own assumptions about the people in the photo without ever knowing how we actually felt or what it was like. The nation was watching us while were were most vulnerable, but it felt like we were entertainment.” 

The trauma of that day never leaves Kindra. Even when she attends art school in Georgia, the events of that day haunt her. She copes, yet suffers panic attacks. With more and more mass shootings happening, and seeing a video posted by the NRA on how to spin school shootings to their advantage, Kindra finally makes up her mind. It was time to tell the story of mass shootings from the point of view of those who were there.

This is a powerful memoir. Neely went from feeling pointless - someone without feelings - to feeling hopeless - to acknowledging there is a loss with something there to believe in.

Included is an author’s note and a list of resources.

Read an Interview with Neely on NPR

Road Trip by Claudia Friddell

 Road Trip: Camping with the Four Vagabonds Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, Harvey Firestone, and John Burroughs
by Claudia Friddell;
Illustrated by Jeremy Holmes
Calkins Creek. An Imprint of Astra Books for Young Readers. 2022.

Four friends, Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, Harvey Firestone, and John Burroughs decide to take a road trip, a trip wandering through the Appalachians and the Alleghenies in 1918. A true story, Friddell captures the friendship and excitement of these four very successful men who took time out of their busy lives to relax and have fun.

All four men knew the importance of teamwork, and so together they had a marvelous time hiking, camping, playing games, and just hanging out. They liked it so much, that they continued their summer journeys for several years.

The author includes an afterword with more details about each individual and details about how the idea of road trips would become popular, a selected bibliography, and related children's books on these four men. 

The full-page illustrations were created using cut paper, watercolor, and pastels. The individual pieces of cut paper were hand-rendered, glued, and assembled into the final illustrations. 

Share this very engaging nonfiction picture book with fans of Edison, Ford, Firestone, and Burroughs. Or anyone who craves adventure.

Dazzling' Dolly by Suzanne Spade

 

Dazzlin' Dolly: the Songwriter, Hit-Singing, Guitar-Picking Dolly Parton
by Suzanne Slade;
illustrated by Edwin Fotheringham
Calkins Creek; An Imprint of Astra Books for Young Readers. 2022

This very inspirational picture book biography opens with a quote from Dolly Parton.

"If you're gonna make a dream come true, you gotta work it. You can't just sit around." 

An extraordinary performer, Dolly Parton has been entertaining audiences for six decades. Not only is her voice distinctive, she is also admired for her kindness and honesty. 

Born with a powerful voice, the young Dolly was always singin'. She sang to the geese who flew overhead, to the bobwhite at night, and when Mama snapped beans, "Dolly pounded a pot with a spoon and belted out her bean-snapping' tune." 

Her perseverance paid off. When she announced at her graduation her dream of going to Nashville and be a star, readers will learn just how much work the young Dolly put into getting that dream realized. "Nothing was going to stop her from run-in' full steam after her dream (in high heels!)"

Slade's charming narrative reads like Dolly herself is speaking. Paired with Fotheringham's double-page art created digitally on a tablet with a stylus, makes for an engaging story.

Included is More about Dolly, a timeline, and a selected bibliography.

A fun, inspiring book to share with others. 

Oh! Be sure to have some Dolly Parton music playing in the background.

Action! by Meghan McCarthy

Action!: How Movies Began
by Meghan McCarthy
A Paula Wiseman Book: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers. 2022                                 

In Action!, McCarthy, explains in this fun nonfiction picture book, how we went from taking photos that required a long exposure time to our fast-paced, action-packed movies.

McCarthy’s engaging narrative show the main inventions that would allow movies to be made. We see how each invention built upon itself. From stop-action movies, silent films to movies that incorporate all kinds of sounds that creates an atmospheric experience for movie watchers. Think 3-D movies.

We also learn how movies from the 1920’s still influence filmmakers today. 

For example, in 1917, comedian Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle, in his movie, The Rough House, sticks forks into two dinner rolls and makes them dance. Charlie Chaplin does the same thing in his movie, The Gold Rush in 1925. Johnny Depp, in Benny & Joon, 1993, has his own rendition. 

Also placed into perspective was the prejudices towards African Americans during the Twenties when Josephine Baker left America to have more freedom to become a star in Paris. Baker paved the way for other African American actors to be movie stars today. “In 2018, a Marvel movie, The Blank Panther, with a majority black cast was a smash hit!”

The full-page, very colorful spreads in McCarthy’s comic-style illustrations are rendered in acrylic paint. 

An Author’s Note and more in-depth back matter on aspects discussed in throughout the book, and a selected bibliography, is included.

Highly recommended for all ages, especially those who love movies.

New Nonfiction- October 2022

 

Underground Fire: Hope, Sacrifice, and Courage in the Cherry Mine Disaster

by Sally M. Walker

Candlewick Press

I Could Not Do Otherwise: The Remarkable Life of Dr. Mary Edwards
by Sara Latta
Lerner Publishing

Beware the Burmese Pythons and Other Invasive Animal Species

by Etta Kaner and Phil Nicholls

Kids Can Press

The Lady and the Octopus: How Jeanne Villepreux-Power Invented Aquariums and Revolutionized Marine Biology

by Danna Staaf

Carolrhoda Books

The Girl Who Built an Ocean

by Jess Keating and Michelle Mee Nutter

Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers

Operation Pangolin: Saving the World's Only Scaled Mammal

by Suzi Escterhas

Millbrook Press

Mega-Predators of the Past

by Melissa Stewart and Howard Gray

Peachtree Publishing

Tree Hole Homes: Daytime Dens and Nighttime Nooks

by Melissa Stewart and Amy Hevron

Random House

Going Places: Victor Hugo Green and His Glorious Book

by Tonya Bolden and Eric Velasquez

Quill Tree Books

Curve & Flow: The Elegant Vision of L.A. Architect Paul R. Williams

by Andrea J. Loney and Keith Mallett

Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers

The Universe in You: A Microscopic Journey

by Jason Chin

Neal Porter Books

Caves 

by Nell Cross and Kalen Chock

Orchard Books

A Walk Through the Rainforest

by Martin Jenkins and Vicky White

Candlewick Press

Ice Cycle: Poems About the Life of Ice
by Maria Gianferrari and Jieting Chen
Millbrook Press

The Search for Sasquatch

by Laura Krantz

Abrams

Seen and Unseen: What Dorothea Lange, Toyo Miyatake, and Ansel Adams's Photographs Reveal About the Japanese American Incarceration

by Elizabeth Partridge and Lauren Tamaki

Chronicle Books

We the People: Big Ideas That Changed the World

by Don Brown

Amulet Books

Unbreakable: The Spies Who Cracked the Nazis' Secret Code 

by Rebecca E. F. Barone

Henry Holt and Co.

Brothers in Arms: A True World War II Story of Wojtek the Bear and the Soldiers Who Loved Him

by Susan Hood and Jamie Green

HarperCollins

Crash from Outer Space

by Candace Fleming

Scholastic Focus

Piece by Piece: How I Built My Life (No Instructions Required)

by David Aquilar and Ferran Aguilar

Amazon Crossing Kids

Infinity: Figuring Out Forever by Sarah C. Campbell

Infinity: Figuring Out Forever
By Sarah C. Campbell; Photographs by Sarah C. Campbell and Richard P. Campbell
Astra Young Readers. An Imprint of Astra Books for Young Readers. 2022

In this informational picture book, husband and wife team, Sarah and Richard Campbell, challenge readers to think deeply about the mathematical concept: “What is infinity?”

“Thinking about infinity is tricky. You have already thought of a large number and added one, but that might lead you to make the mistake of thinking infinity is something really, really big. Remember, though, infinity is not something big. Infinity is endlessness.”

Calculus is the branch of mathematics that puts infinity into practical use. NASA scientists use calculus and the idea of infinity when making the calculations to send rockets into space.

The marriage of words and pictures work exceptionally well here as the Campbell’s present the not-so-simple task of defining the concept of infinity. The book includes an author’s note, glossary, further reading(which includes websites and books), and an exercise - The Infinite School and the Surprising Results of Adding with Infinity.

“The next time you find yourself counting stars in the sky, remember that even though the number of stars is finite, your mind has no limits.”

Highly recommended reading aloud for older students. 

The Greatest Song of All written by Megan Hoyt

 The Greatest Song of All: How Isaac Stern United the World to Save Carnegie Hall 
by Megan Hoyt;
Illustrated by Katie Hickey
Quilt Tree Books.
An Imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. 2022

This informational picture book tells the story of how the violinist, Isaac Stern, upon learning that on March 31, 1960 the elegant Carnegie Hall would be demolished, fought to save this historic building in the heart of New York City, built in 1891. 

The narrative is engaging, and would work well for a terrific read aloud in music class to students of all ages. The addition of Hicky's art, rendered in gouache, coloring pencils, and Photoshop to create the digital illustrations, make this an overall engaging read. Read to students of all ages. Please!

Included is an author's note, more historical information about Carnegie Hall, more fascinating stories about Isaac Stern, a timeline, source notes, and the petition written by Stern that was signed by twenty internationally known musician. 

American Murderer

 

American Murderer: The Parasite That Haunted the South
by Gail Jarrow
Calkins Creek, 2022
Gades 6 and up
On shelves Sept. 27, 2022

American Murderer is the highly anticipated third book in Gail Jarrow's Medical Fiasco series.  Jarrow is known for writing about medical conditions and illnesses from an historical perspective. Her latest work focuses on a mystery illness that plagued rural communities in the South at the turn of the 20th century. 

Readers will be drawn into the story from the first chapter (entitled "Vampire") as Jarrow describes a "deathly, pale, hunched-over figure" standing on a train platform. A scientists on the train indicates the man is a victim of "America's bloodsucking murderer." 

The medical mystery is solved by parasitologist, Charles Wardell Stiles, who studied parasites and hookworms in Europe. Stiles identified the Necator americanus or American Murderer, a bloodsucking parasite that attaches to the intestines and cause anemia. pica and malnourishment. While Stiles traveled through the South sharing a cure for hookworm, Arthur Loos was determined to figure out how Americans are getting infected with the parasite. This leads to the story to another medical mystery for scientists to solve.

The engaging narrative grounded in mystery will keep readers turning the pages. Microscopic images of hookworms magnified 700 times (such as the cover image) are terrifying and fascinating. Primary documents such as posters, newspaper articles, cartoons, and photographs are thoughtfully placed throughout the book.

Equal parts science and history, readers will be surprised to learn how doctors, politicians and the public viewed and responded to this common and debilitating illness dubbed the "lazy germ." As government and philanthropic groups were created to study and eradicate hookworm in the South, the book explores issues of class, race, geography, and social status. Jarrow finds connections to present day in the final chapter, "The BloodSucker Lives On."

Highly recommended for public libraries, school libraries, and biology and American History classes. 

Side-By-Side Declaration of Independence: with side-by-side “plain English” translations! by David Miles

The Side-by-Side Declaration of Independence: with side-by-side “plain English” translations!
by David Miles 
Bushel & Peck Books. 2021

At a time in our world, when words are being twisted to serve a particular purpose, this 2021 title offers a visually appealing presentation of America’s historical document that was the first step in our democracy. 

In, Side-By-Side Declaration of Independence, Miles pairs the original text of the Declaration of Independence with “plain English.”

The book begins with five pages to explain the “Buildup to the Declaration,” then a brief explanation on “How To Use This Book.” The left-hand pages are in red and show the original text from the Declaration of Independence, written in 1776. The right-hand pages, in blue, provide the “Plain English” translation. The addition of pictures of Founding Fathers, maps, and additional information places what the text is saying into a historical context.

Let me give you an example:

Original text: “When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.”

Plain English: “When a group wants to separate from another group and be independent, it’s polite to explain why.”

The book’s design uses collage illustrations from visuals sourced from illustrator Albert Pinilla, public domain archives, and Shutterstock. Though each double-page spread is quite active visually, the pairing of original document translated into present day English, historical facts, pictures of historical figures makes this a attractive and engaging. Because of the topic, older readers studying American history will find it very useful. 

Cover Reveal- Supermoms!: Animal Heroes

We are excited to reveal the cover of Supermoms!: Animal Heroes by Heather Lang and Jamie Harper today.

Supermoms! is an engaging, nonfiction picture book that is part of the Animal Heroes series from Candlewick. Look for Supermoms! in the spring of 2023.  We're looking forward to getting out hands on this science picture book with comic book elements.

10 Ways to Discover and Share Nonfiction with Young People

 

The Kids Love Nonfiction team of Mary Ann Cappiello, Melissa Stewart and Xenia Hadjioannou have created a flyer with tips for sharing nonfiction with young people. 

Click here to view the flyer.  Feel free to share this wonderful resources with parents, caregivers, teachers and librarians. If you share on social media, use the hashtag #KidsLoveNonfiction.