Tag: Sarah Albee

Posted in Intermediate, Non-Fiction

That’s the way the ball bounces: Bounce! is a history of rubber

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

Bounce! A Scientific History of Rubber, by Sarah Albee/Illustrated by Eileen Ryan Ewen, (Oct. 2024, Charlesbridge), $18.99, ISBN: 9781623543792

Ages 6-9

Learners who love the “why” of things will enjoy this one: illustrations and history pair with scientific explanation to deliver a concise and fascinating history of rubber. Entertainment in Europe wasn’t terribly exciting in the early days: to play ball, one had options like leather stuffed with feathers or an animal bladder stuffed with dried peas. You know where there were bouncing balls, though? The pre-Columbian Americas, where the rainforest had trees that yielded latex. The Spaniards “discovered” the balls along with everything else they “discovered”, leading to centuries of experimentation and innovation and culminating with simultaneous discoveries by American Charles Goodyear and Englishman Thomas Hancock; they discovered how to “vulcanize” rubber, making it moldable, shapable, and less likely to melt in the summer or freeze in the winter. Illustrated scientific explanations appear throughout the history, and pen, ink, and watercolor illustrations show people through the ages bicycling, sitting on inner tybes, splashing through puddles, and swimming underwater. Endpapers show a variety of balls bouncing across the spreads. Notes on history, details about rubber, a timeline, and a bilbiography round out the back matter. An excellent nonfiction resource.

Bounce! A Scientific History of Rubber has a starred review from Kirkus.

 

 

Sarah Albee is the New York Times best-selling author of more than 100 books for kids, including Troublemakers in Trousers: Women and What They Wore to Get Things Done and Accidental Archaeologists: True Stories of Unexpected Discoveries. Prior to being a full-time writer, Sarah worked at Children’s Television Workshop (producers of Sesame Street) for nine years. She played basketball in college, and then a year of semi-professional women’s basketball in Cairo, Egypt. She lives in Connecticut.

Eileen Ryan Ewen is the illustrator of many books for children, including H is for Honey Bee, Jonas Hanway’s Scurrilous Scandalous Shockingly Sensational Umbrella, and Nature’s Friend: The Gwen Frostic Story. http://www.eileenryanewen.com

Posted in History, Middle Grade, Non-fiction, Tween Reads, Uncategorized

Big nonfiction roundup!

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

I have been curating a pile of nonfiction over the last several weeks, ready to do a back to school post, but all these other great books started coming out, too… so, before this pile crushes me, let’s do this!

North America: A Fold-Out History, by Sarah Albee/Illlustrated by William Exley, (Oct. 2019, What on Earth Books), $19.99, ISBN: 978-1999967925

Ages 8-14

That What on Earth Books fold-out are so much fun! This time, we’ve got a fold-out graphic timeline of Canada, the United States, Mexico, and the Caribbean islands, going from 11,000 BCE to 2017. It’s fully illustrated and offers a wealth of history on early indigenous peoples, including the Olmecs, Maya, Taino, and Aztec. European invasions are covered – first the Vikings; later, Columbus and the conquistadors – and American history covers much of the book’s second half. History is captured with dates and a brief blurb about standout moments, and callout boxes call attention to larger happenings, like the spreading out of humans across the land, and how European conflicts played out in North America. Back matter includes facts; glossary; source notes, and an index.

Not one for circulation – it’ll sustain damage quickly – but it’s a good reference tool and darn fun to have at home. My little guy loves these books.

Source: Bounce Marketing UK

 

Migration: Incredible Animal Journeys, by Mike Unwin/Illustrated by Jenni Desmond, (Aug. 2019, Bloomsbury USA), $18.99, ISBN: 9781547600977

Ages 9-13

Originally published in the UK, Migration profiles 20 different migrating animals, including the humpback whale; emperor penguin; ruby-throated hummingbird; blue wildebeest, and green turtle. Each spread contains acrylic, watercolor, ink, pencil and crayon illustrations of these animals, captured in the progress of their journeys. Some artwork gives an incredible breadth of scale, like the spread dedicated to the Christmas Island red crabs, which form a “river of crabs” as they march to the sea. Others, like the humpback whale, are a more personal journey shared between a mother and her calf. Each spread provides a migration story, which reads like an I Survived novel: crossing rivers; digging through snow for food; flying for miles to reach their destination; marching across an icy landscape. Each spread also offers a quick animal fact. Back matter includes a migration map and notes on making the world safer for migrating animals.

Animals of all shapes and sizes make epic journeys across our planet, through harsh weather, avoiding hungry predators, in their efforts to survive. Travel around the globe with some of the world’s most incredible animals and discover their unique migration stories. A nice addition to your nonfiction collections, especially if your books on migration are spare.

Mike Unwin is a UK Travel Writer of the Year, and Jenni Desmond is a winner of the New York Times Best Illustrated Children’s Book, The Polar Bear. Migration: Incredible Animal Journeys has a starred review from Publisher’s Weekly.

 

National Geographic Kids Student World Atlas (Fifth Edition), (July 2019, National Geographic Kids), $12.99, ISBN: 978-1426334795

Ages 8-12

This latest edition of this handy-dandy student reference has a wealth of facts, figures, and maps at your fingertips. There are over 100 maps, 70 incredible color photos, 50 charts and graphs with the latest data on climate change, the human footprint on our world, and most populous urban areas. Back matter includes an updated flags of the world section; a list of important websites on world resources, religions, languages, and quality of life; a glossary, thematic and place-name indexes, and more. If your budget allows for you to order two of these, do it: I like to keep one on hand at reference and put one into circulation. Along with the NatGeo Kids Almanac, you can’t go wrong with having these available for homework help.

 

1000 Facts About Ancient Egypt, by Nancy Honovich (February 2019, National Geographic Kids), $14.99, ISBN: 978-1426332739

Ages 8-12

The 1000 Facts series from NatGeo Kids is almost as popular as the digest-sized Weird/Gross/Silly Facts books in my library. These are the books that prove that kids LOVE nonfiction! There are fast, bite-sized facts all about Ancient Egypt in this book: facts about the Egyptian gods and goddesses; facts about the Nile River; about making mummies and about the most famous mummy of them all, Tutankhamun; facts about inventions and temples; facts about hieroglyphics. There’s so much here, presented in compulsively readable, memorable chunks and illustrated with photos of artifacts. Back matter includes a glossary, a look at a tomb excavation, a timeline of Ancient Egyptian civilization, an index, and further resources. Have history fans? Is Ancient Egypt on the schools’ report list this year? Get this book on your shelf.

 

Walk This Underground World, by Kate Baker/Illustrated by Sam Brewster, (Oct. 2019, Big Picture Press), $19.95, ISBN: 978-1536208566

Ages 5-8

Lift the Flap fun! Readers can wander through underground worlds, from Montreal’s famous underground city to the ancient, underground tombs of Ancient Egypt. Wander the hidden natural world and see prairie dog dens, ant cities, and naked mole rat burrows. See Australian fortune hunters and Poland’s salt-rock mines; the bustling London Underground and the sleek underground train stations in Tokyo. There are 12 spreads with over 80 flaps to discover, making this a great gift book for the kiddos in your life. Definitely not going to last in circulation, but you could score a few copies for a program on underground ecosystems or travel.

That’s all for now – I have to get this copy of Walk This World back into my son’s room before he notices it’s gone!

Posted in Middle Grade, Non-fiction, Preschool Reads

NatGeo Kids is going to the dogs!

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

NatGeo Kids has two books on dogs out, and they are ADORABLE. We’re in the Lunar Year of the Dog, May is National Pet Month, and today is National Pet Day – so what better time to celebrate our best friends? (Full disclosure: My cat scoffed at me as I ran this by her. But she’s a cat, so…)

Dog Days of History: The Incredible Story of Our Best Friends, by Sarah Albee, (March 2018, NatGeo Kids), $19.99, ISBN: 978-1-4263-2971-5

Recommended for readers 8-13

Dogs have been our companions from the beginning: humans have had canine companions for more than 15,000 years. Dog Days of History is a kid-friendly look at that relationship through time; author Sarah Albee starts with the origins of the dog, from wolf to domesticated companion, to mixed breeds, and then takes us through an illustrated history of this long-lived relationship: from dogs in the ancient world, through the Middle Ages and Renaissance, to the present day and the future. We learn about dogs as pampered companions and hard workers; dogs like Balto, the famous sled dog who braved the Alaskan snow to bring medicine to the people of Nome, Alaska, and Laika, the canine cosmonaut who went to space in 1960.

There are great photos – it’s a NatGeo book – and fun facts aplenty throughout the book. One of my favorites is the list of common names for dogs in Ancient Egypt, which include “Good Herdsman”, “Grabber”, and “Blackie”. There are Algonquin names, too; my favorites are “Where’s That?” and “Ask Him”. Top Dog callouts highlight famous dogs in history, like Stubby, a stray bull terrier found by an American soldier in 1918, smuggled into France, and who went on to win medals of valor after warning a sleeping sergeant about a gas attack, locating wounded soldiers on the battlefield, and capturing a German spy. Want to translate dogspeak in other languages? There’s a list of how other dogs say “Bow-wow” in other languages. A comprehensive biblidography (that is not a typo) and list of rufferences (that’s not one, either), index, and further sources and places to visit make this slim volume a perfect gift for dog fans or an addition to your domestic animals collections.

 

It’s a Puppy’s Life, by Seth Casteel, (March 2018, NatGeo Kids), $16.99, ISBN: 978-1-4263-3069-8

Recommended for readers 3-6

Join the cutest group of puppies ever in this easy-to-read, fully illustrated chronicle of a puppy’s day! Join these pups on a daily routine of adventure as they wake up, explore and play, nap, have a nighttime treat, and get ready for bed. Is it ruff to be a pup? You be the judge.

This is one of those books I still haven’t been able to get through without squealing. Several times. My kiddo and I will be cuddling and reading, and I’ll just squeal, “LOOK AT THIS PUPPY FACE!”, which leads to my son looking at me and saying, “Mom. You SAY THAT ALL THE TIME.” But I digress.

There are spreads and standalone pages of full-color photos of puppies eating, playing, cuddling, and sleeping. The simple text is big, easy to read and great for storytime, and has colorful backgrounds to set them apart from the rest of the page. It’s a great way to talk about daily routines: ask the kids what they have in common with puppies!

I’m currently building up my pets and domesticated animals collection at my library, so these will be a nice, eye-catching add to my shelf. Make a nice doggie display with Science Comics’ volume on Dogs, and put some fun picture books and fiction on the shelf, too. Mainstays like Clifford and Carl books are great, as are books like Peter McCarty’s Hondo and Fabian, Jane Yolen’s Henry and Mudge and Puppy Mudge Easy Readers,  Beverly Cleary’s classic, Ribsy, Ann M. Martin’s Autobiography of a Stray, and Because of Winn-Dixie. If you’re like me and don’t want to read doggie tearjerkers, From the Mixed-Up Files has a suggested “No Dead Dogs” reading list.