The Story of a Mexican Freedom Fighter
A TRUE TALE WITH
A CHERRY ON TOP
Scholastic Press
(pub.3.7.2023) 48 pages
Author: Aida Salazar
Illustrator: Molly Mendoza
Character: Jovita Valdovinos
Overview:
" Jovita dreamed of wearing pants! She hated the big skirts Abuela made her wear. She wanted to scale the tallest mesquite tree on her rancho, ride her horse, and feel the wind curl her face into a smile.
When her father and brothers joined the Cristero War to fight for religious freedom, Jovita wanted to go, too. Forbidden, she defied her father’s rules – and society’s – and found a clever way to become a trailblazing revolutionary, wearing pants!
Tantalizing taste:
" Sorrow swirled inside Jovita's heart.
Her sadness found sympathy with other Cristeros, who met one evening to form a plan for justice.
When she returned, Jovita cut her long hair short. Next, she put on Ramon's cotton shirt, overalls, riding boots, and wide-brimmed straw hat. Jovita was reborn as a pants-wearing coronel named Juan. She was ready to reignite the revolution."
And something more: Aida Salazar, in the Author's Note explains that "Jovita Valdovinos was my distant great-aunt...My mother says that Jovita was a 'gran señora, a "great lady," and that whileshe was relatively small in stature, her presence was as large as the Mexican mesquite tree which they sat when she visited.
The information in this book is taken primarily from Joviat's memoir, as well as from anecdotes and personal interviews. No person is entirely good or bad, and Jovita's life was as rich as it was complex."
Shirley Chisholm's Fight for Change
A TRUE TALE WITH
A CHERRY ON TOP
Millbrook Press
(Lerner Books)
(pub.11.1.2022) 32 pages
Author: Tameka Fryer Brown
Illustrator: Nina Crews
Character: Shirley Chisholm
Overview:
" Brooklyn-born Shirley Chisholm was smart and ambitious. She poured her energy into whatever she did―from teaching young children to becoming Brooklyn’s first Black assemblywoman. Not afraid to blaze a trail, she became the first Black woman elected to Congress and the first woman to seriously run for US president. With a vision of liberty and justice for all, she worked for equal rights, for the environment, for children, and for health care. Even now, her legacy lives on and inspires others to continue her work . . . which is not done yet."
Tantalizing taste:
" A little schoolteacher can't lead us, they said.
What we need is a big, strong man.
This made women furious!
Show them with your vote,
Shirley said.
They did ... and she won!
The first Black woman ever elected to Congress!
She made history!
But she wasn't done yet."
And something more: In A Note About Quotations, Tameka Fryer Brown explains "Shirley Chisholm was a powerful, eloquent speaker. In writing her story as a narrative free verse poem, I made the decision to paraphrase her statements, and those of others, to maintain poetic form and ensure the text would be accessible to young readers. Statements in the main text are all based on things Chisholm said or recounted ...[The following] statements on the endsheets and back cover are exact quotes of hers..."
"Don't listen to those who say you can't. Listen to the voice inside yourself that says, 'I CAN.'"
-Shirley Chisholm
Jane Taylor's Beloved Poem
of Wonder and the Stars
A TRUE TALE WITH
A CHERRY ON TOP
Bloomsbury Children's Books
(pub. 2.15.2022) 40 pages
Author: Elizabeth Brown
Illustrator: Becca Stadtlander
Character: Jane Taylor
Overview:
"In the days when most girls were brought up to run a home, Jane Taylor had a different kind of education in the English countryside, where she was inspired by nature and the stars, and dreamed of becoming a writer. But in the late 1700s, it was not considered proper for women to be writers. Jane and other female poets were shunned, unable to use their own names when published. But Jane did write, and she never forgot her love for the beauty of nature and the glow of stars, or her desire to write for children. Her published poetry became universally known for generations to come: Twinkle, twinkle little star."
Tantalizing taste:
" Jane and [her sister] Ann hoped that people reading their poems would feel what they experienced: running in the meadows, gazing at stars, a childhood of poetry.
Children loved how Jane's words sparkled, her verses shined, her poems were bright as stars."
And something more: The section titled, Jane Taylor 1783-1824, explains: "Jane hoped to inspire young children's imaginations through her poetry. Her works were among the first of their kind written for children's enjoyment rather than for purely educational purposes... there is no doubt that women writers of the Romantic era struggled in the shadow of male writers. But the perseverance of women like Jane blazed the path to the acceptance of women as writers in the nineteenth century and beyond."
