Tag Archive | non-US artist

Bedtime reading, if you dare… NIGHT STORIES: FOLKTALES FROM LATIN AMERICA, by Liniers (Graphic Novel)

Jun11
Book cover of Night Stories: Folktales from Latin America, shows a brother and sister in their bunk bed flying across the night sky above roads, trees, and hills, with author name Liniers and introduction by David Bowles below them.

Danger on the river,
in the town,
on the pampas!

One night in their bunk beds, a brother and sister are telling each other scary stories from folktales they’ve heard.

There’s the one about the mermaid and the pink dolphin in the Amazon River – that’s Iara, Mother of the water.

And beware the Witch-Owl of the Mexico borderlands – when this bruja calls your name, you know that your death is near!

On the pampas grasslands of South America, the Evil Light threatens to steal travelers’ souls – is it the gates of Hell opening a crack?

“As you read these stories, you will get at thrill from them. You might feel scared. But I hope you will keep in mind all the layers of meaning they contain,” says writer David Bowles in the heavily researched introduction “Why We Tell Tales” (pg. 6).

More about each folktale is found in the notes at the end of this entertaining and chilling graphic novel. Available in Spanish as Cuentos de noche: Relatos de Latinoamérica.

What’s your favorite folktale from the Western Hemisphere?
**kmm

Book info: Night Stories: Folktales from Latin America / Liniers; introduction by David Bowles. Toon Graphic, 2024. [about the author/artist https://www.lambiek.net/artists/l/liniers.htm] [publisher site https://www.toon-books.com/store/p330/Night_Stories%3A_Folktales_from_Latin_America_by_Liniers.html ] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher, via Publisher Spotlight.

MINNOW, who speaks for the orcas in peril! by Willie Poll & Emily Graceanna Pearson (MG Graphic Novel review)

Jun10
A large orca and a First Nations girl with fish tail swim beneath the nighttime waves, a city silhouetted against hills behind them and graphic novel title Minnow, by Willie Poll & Emily Graceanna Pearson below.

Called to the sea,
concerned about its creatures,
what can she do?

As Minnow walks the Vancouver shoreline, picking up trash on the beach as she always did with her grandmother, the grieving young teen is certain that an orca just offshore is following her. But that can’t be true – orcas stay in deeper safe waters, right?

Mom takes her to the aquarium, where the fish follow Minnow as she walks along their huge tanks and the sea lions flee in the middle of feeding time – very strange.

There she meets Celia, new here from the Great Lakes. When they use the aquarium’s equipment to listen to the captive orca there, Celia hears screeches and clicks, but Minnow hears words!

Their summer times together include days at the beach, where Minnow’s feet turn to flippers in the water and her eyes become as black and deep as an orca’s – what is happening?

Minnow’s mom tells her the ancestral story of this gift handed down by countless generations of grandmothers – the ability to communicate with water creatures and the responsibility to speak for them to the human world.

Gran has been missing for 74 days, last seen at the proposed pipeline site on the shoreline, but investigating the disappearance of indigenous women isn’t a priority for Canadian authorities.

Time to find Gran’s journal and decide how a pair of young women can help the remaining group of orcas, before it’s too late!

This debut graphic novel by First Nations author and illustrator duo celebrates the power of community and connections for change.

Which sea creature would you like to hear speaking to you?
**kmm

Book info: Minnow / Willie Poll; art by Emily Graceanna Pearson. Medicine Wheel Publishing, 2026. [author site https://www.williepoll.com/] [illustrator site https://emilygraceannapearson.ca/about/] [publisher site https://shop.medicinewheelpublishing.com/en-us/products/minnow1] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher, via Publisher Spotlight.

Competing and playing: THE ORIGINS OF SPORTS, by Sekaninova, Velcovky, & Ilcik (kids nonfiction book review)

Jun4
Book cover of The Origins of Sports, surrounded by badminton shuttlecocks. golf clubs, ski poles, helmets, ice skates, racquets, mitts, and many different sport balls

Running and kicking,
throwing and batting,
many sports have long histories.

“This book is not about the first to the finish line. It is about who started things. It is about those who felt that playing was more important than winning.” (pg. 1)

In prehistory, running fast and throwing accurately meant survival. Celebrating a strong mind and a strong body, the Ancient Greeks insisted on education and began the Olympic Games.

Swimming has been a life skill and sport for over 900,000 years, we know from very ancient cave paintings! The first manuals on how to swim appeared in 1534.

Skiing developed from Stone Age snowshoes, with the first written records of skiing in China in 206 BCE. New technologies led to professional skiing, snowboarding, and snurfing.

On ice, people first glided with their feet on skates made of bone, then went faster with steel blades. Did you know that ballet dancer Jackson Haines invented figure skates in the 19th century?

With game elements from Egypt, Greece, Native peoples of Canada, France, and England, the first ice hockey matches were played by Canadian university students in the 1870s, who introduced a goaltender and set the rules.

Scotland is called the home of golf, but similar games with a club and ball were played in ancient Rome, China, Belgium, and the Netherlands.

Ball-kicking games played in the Roman Empire, China, and Japan led to soccer, rugby, and football – each with their own rules about ball shape, scoring, time, field markings, and whose hand can touch the ball.

Keeping a feathered ball in the air has been a game for over 2000 years, whether using hands or feet or a paddle or a racket; badminton with feathery shuttlecock and tennis with rubber ball and heavier racket.

Basketball began in 1891 by James Naismith as a year-round indoor sport. Soon after, W.G. Morgan invented volleyball as an indoor winter sport with less running.

Baseball in its modern form was developed in the USA, echoing bat and ball games played in ancient Egypt and England from the 14th century.

Which sport is your favorite?
**kmm

Book info: The Origins of Sports / Stepanka Sekaninova & Tom Velcovsky; illustrated by Matej Ilcik; translated by Andrew Oakland. Albatros, 2023. [publisher site https://www.albatrosbooks.com/book/the-origins-of-sports/] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher, via Publisher Spotlight.

Yes, indeed BLACK HISTORY IS YOUR HISTORY! by Taylor Cassidy (YA nonfiction & memoir review)

May28
Book title Black History is Your History is encircled by hand-drawn portraits of noteworthy Black men and women, below author's name Taylor Cassidy

Angelou and Hurston,
Banneker and Jemison,
the who and the how and the why.

Based on her popular TikTok series “Fast Black History,” Taylor Cassidy presents the stories of 12 important Black people in US history, some of whom should be much better known.

Chapter titles spotlight each person’s legacy, like actress “Cicely Tyson and why good representation matters.”

We meet Ledger Smith, who roller skated from Chicago to D.C. in 1963 to attend the March on Washington and encourage others to go, too.

Gordon Parks overcame many obstacles to become a noted photographer of everyday Black life, segregation, and the Civil Rights Movement.

Each chapter includes a very personal “Taystory” section where the author relates experiences in her young life where she called upon lessons learned from these Black heroes to deal with her emotions and others’ expectations.

Whose example inspires you?
**kmm

Book info: Black History is Your History / Taylor Cassidy; illustrated by Adriana Bellet. Atheneum / Simon & Schuster, 2025. [author site https://www.instagram.com/taylorcassidyj/] [illustrator site https://jeezvanilla.com/] [publisher site https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Black-History-Is-Your-History/Taylor-Cassidy/9781665957700] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

D IS FOR DOG! and everything dogs do! By Em Lynas and Sara Ogilvie (kids picturebook review)

May19
The sketched heads of 3 different happy dogs are seen through a large cut-out capital letter D on a short, wide book cover of D is for Dog! by Em Lynas and Sara Ogilvie

If you like who dogs are
and what dogs do,
here, my friend, is the book for you!

This whimsically illustrated poem begins “A is for action… and B is for bark” with a running dog chasing pigeons, then a hound on its hind legs barking at the cat atop its letter B.

Unlike most tall, square picture books, this one is short and wide, so “F is for flopping” displays a very furry dog spread out across both pages, as does “N is for napping…and napping…and napping again” where the very large dog slowly slips off its chair as it naps – common dog habits that we all recognize.

The cover’s capital D is cut out, giving a peek at the cute canines within, and at the end of this alphabetic poem, you’ll find all the dog breeds pictured, letter by letter, some with very unusual names!

Be sure to scan the included QR code so you can hear an audio reading of this rollicking, rhyming book.

What is your favorite dog behavior?
**kmm

Book info: D is for Dog! / Em Lynas; illustrated by Sara Ogilvie. Nosy Crow Inc. 2024. [author site https://www.instagram.com/emlynas/] [illustrator info https://nosycrow.us/contributor/sara-ogilvie/] [publisher site https://nosycrow.us/product/d-is-for-dog/] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher, via Publisher Spotlight.

THE BIG BOOK OF PI: The Famous Number You Can Never Know, by Lehmann, Aubin & Sildre (kids nonfiction book review)

May12
A large symbol of Pi surrounded by a circle of numerals and silhouettes of people measuring and observing, overlaid with book title The Big Book of Pi: the Famous Number You Can Never Know

Pi r-squared – everyone’s heard that formula, but where did the name for that constant come from?
How was it discovered?
What makes it unique in mathematics?

This highly illustrated book begins examining those questions in the introduction, chapter 3.14, noting 2 unusual facts about Pi: it’s infinite and irrational. Did you know that you can find any number sequence of any length in pi? (pg. 19)

Characters Pi-Rat the questioner and Little Horsey PiPi who loves math help readers learn about scholars in many eras and many lands worked diligently to discover Pi’s hidden digits.

In 1761, Johann Heinrich Lambert proved that Pi wasn’t a rational number, and the race was on for mathematicians to calculate as many of Pi’s decimal places as possible!

Srinivasa Ramanujan’s 1913 formula came to him in a dream, was ignored by university mathematicians, then proven correct over 70 years later, leading to even more efficient formulas. From pen and ink to calculating machines and computers, trillions of digits have been discovered!

But why do we need to know so many decimals of Pi? Testing new supercomputers and standing in for random number selections are just two reasons.

Pi-Rat and Little Horsey PiPi want us to have fun with Pi, with tricks for memorizing its digits, silly jokes, brain-twisting paradoxes, and how to cut a pizza exactly in half without cutting the crust.

The proofs behind historic examples cited and a glossary round out this very entertaining look at Pi and its never-ending digits. Check out the educator’s guide here: http://hello.helvetiq.com/en-us/bigbookofpi.

How many decimals of Pi can you recite?
**kmm

Book info: The Big Book of Pi: The Famous Number You Can Never Know / Anita Lehmann & Jean-Baptiste Aubin; illustrated by Joonas Sildre. Helvetiq, 2026. [author site https://www.anita-lehmann.com/] [publisher site https://helvetiq.com/us/the-big-book-of-pi] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher, via Publisher Spotlight.

OF THE SUN: a Poem for the Land’s First Peoples, by Xelena Gonzales & Emily Kewageshig (Picturebook)

May5
In front of a bright sun, an indigenous person looks to the right where an eagle soars. Both are surrounded by branches of flowers and berries, with book title Of the Sun: a Poem for the Land's First Peoples, by Xelena Gonzales

“Child of the sun, you’ve been blessed since birth…”

So begins a poem celebrating the First Peoples of the Western hemisphere, from the Yamana at the far tip of South America to the Ben Za in Central America to the Inuit in North America’s Arctic regions.

The artist uses saturated colors and bold outlines with motifs from many Indigenous cultures of the Americas and Caribbean – eagle and bison, butterfly and dreamcatcher, Plains beaded embroidery, dancers and native produce.

“Child of the sun, on this land you are home.”

As you read along, listen to the poet recite this heartfelt work https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzDjOnJGQJE

Includes notes on the Native peoples named in the poem, plus wonderful letters to the reader from the poet and the artist.

I live on lands of the Caddo and Kickapoo people, shows https://native-land.ca/
On whose land do you now live?
**kmm

Book info: Of the Sun: a Poem for the Land’s First Peoples / Xelena Gonzales; illustrated by Emily Kewageshig. Barefoot Books, 2025. [author site https://www.xelena.space/about] [artist site https://www.emily-kewageshig.com/] [publisher site https://www.barefootbooks.com/of-the-sun] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher, via Publisher Spotlight.

U is unbelievable, astounding, enlightening: LISTIFIED! Britannica’s 300 Lists That Will Blow Your Mind, by Pettie & Lozano (kids nonfiction) #A2Z

Apr24
Book title LISTIFIED! down center of book cover, with hand-drawn collections of bugs, living things, dinosaurs, bones, eggs, snowflakes, dogs wearing graduation hats, vehicles, and sea creatures to the left, and text to right: Britannica's 300 lists that will blow your mind, about all sorts of things... by Andrew Pettie

A brachiosaurus would equal the weight of how many housecats?
If Earth were the size of a cherry, how big would Saturn and Mars be?
What animals can run faster than a horse for 20 miles?

Fastest travel time around the world, surprising things that have fallen from the sky, organs that your body can survive without (and why) – if you want to know lots of things about lots of subjects, turn to Listified!

Its highly illustrated lists are grouped into chapters on
space, nature, dinosaur times, animals, the body, being human, inventions, and game changers.

Learn about the most visited monuments and buildings in the world, biggest machines ever built, important women in medical history, most unusual modern jobs, and much more.

Whether you choose a page at random or read an entire chapter, you’ll discover something new and can be absolute;u sure that it’s true because everything has been thoroughly reviewed by the Encyclopedia Britannica team.

Are you a list-maker, too?
**kmm

Book info: Listified! Britannica’s 300 Lists That Will Blow Your Mind / Andrew Pettie; illustrated by Andres Lozano. Britannica Books, 2021. [author site https://www.instagram.com/andrewjpettie/] [artist site https://www.sensgallery.com/artists/andres-lozano] [publisher site https://www.whatonearthbooks.com/us/product/listified/] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

P is for THE PENCIL, precious in their iglu home, by Avingaq, Vsetula, and Chua (Picturebook) #A2Z

Apr18
Inside their iglu, a young Inuk girl wearing a traditional Indigenous Canadian parka holds a short pencil as her younger sister and brother look on eagerly, on book cover of The Pencil, by Susan Avingaq and Maren Vsetula; illustrated by Charlene Chua

The children and Ataata stay home in the iglu while their mother is away helping a neighbor.

How should they pass the time?

When the sun is out, the two big girls can trace their letters in the frost on the iglu’s ice window.

They play games with baby Peter, and their father tells them stories, and still Anaana isn’t back.

Is Ataatu really letting them use their mother’s one precious pencil and the last piece of paper to draw on?

What will Anaana say when she sees how short the pencil is now?

The author fondly remembered living in an Inuit iglu as a child in Nunavut, Canada, where they learned to use all things wisely, because the trading post was so very far away. Find learning resources in English and Inuktitut here https://inhabitmedia.com/2021/04/22/the-pencil-educators-resource/.

What special object have you saved because it’s the last one?
**kmm

Book info: The Pencil / Susan Avingaq and Maren Vsetula; illustrated by Charlene Chua. Inhabit Media, 2018. [illustrator site https://charlenechua.com/picture-books] [publisher site https://inhabitbooks.com/products/the-pencil?_pos=1&_sid=b3e677320&_ss=r] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher, via Publisher Spotlight.

K is for Korobá: THE CASE OF THE MISSING KOLO in her fishing village, by Àlàbá Ònájìn (kids graphic novel) #A2Z

Apr13
Three kids and a puppy race down the wooden dock-walkways of a Nigerian fishing village, following a trail of wet footprints, on the book cover of Korobá: the Case of the Missing Kolo, kids' graphic novel by Àlàbá Ònájìn.

A visitor,
a theft,
a mystery to solve!

Korobá enjoys exploring the waterways and walkways of her Nigerian fishing village with best friends Saldat and Joba – and her dog Popi, of course!

During school holidays, the ten-year-old helps her mother at the fish market (but can’t stand eating fish). Someday her little brother and baby sister will, too.

The harvest festival is soon, and the kids of Makoko will break open their wooden Kolo banks and use their saved coins to buy clothes for the Festival…and treats! Joba will unveil his newest invention then, so don’t even try to sneak a peek now.

Saldat has been too busy noting how much money she’s put in her Kolo to decorate it with paint and beads like her friends do. Her snobbish cousin visiting from city thinks everything here is terrible – such a bad attitude!

Oh, no! Saldat’s Kolo has been stolen! The three friends must think like detectives from their favorite books to find it – fast!

Was it the carpenter working at Saldat’s house?
Could it be snooty cousin Risi?
Can they find the Kolo before Breaking Day?

Run the wooden walkways of Makoko village with Korobá and her friends as they try to solve the mystery, first in a new graphic novel series!

What’s your favorite festival tradition?
**kmm

Book info: Korobá: the Case of the Missing Kolo / Àlàbá Ònájìn. Holiday House, 2026. [author/illustrator site https://www.alabaonajin.com/about] [publisher site https://holidayhouse.com/book/the-case-of-the-missing-kolo/] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.