Today's Stop On The "Fab Four Friends" Blog Tour: Those Boys Could Work

 I may be the only blogger taking part in the Fab Four Friends blog tour who is not a major Beatles fan. I enjoy the music, respect the musicians, but never wanted to marry Paul. I was very taken with the Fab Four Friends: The Boys Who Became the Beatles by Susanna Reich with illustrations by Adam Gustavson, but not because I think the next generation absolutely must be exposed to these musicians. Instead, I liked Reich's portrayal of "the boys" training themselves to live a life with music.

Reich writes about John Lennon rehearsing in his mother's bathroom with some "mates." "...pounding out souped-up folk songs and some rock 'n' roll. They had no idea how to play, but they loved making noise--lots of noise!" He met Paul McCartney when Paul saw him playing at a church fair. John was impressed because Paul could tune a guitar correctly. The two of them got together "bashing away" on guitars. "Most of the time they tried to imitate the hard-driving songs on the radio." "If only they could figure out the chords!" George Harrison seems to have been better at working out those. "...he knew a lot of chords." When he came into the picture, he taught them to John and Paul.

Reich also covers the Hamburg (still pre-Ringo) period. To digress, just a little, Malcolm Gladwell writes in Outliers about the significance of Hamburg for the Beatles. The many hours of performing, he claims, contributed to the thousands of hours of practice he believes is necessary to become proficient at a skill. When they left Germany, Reich says, George was only seventeen years old. They had put in all that time and effort when they were still what most of us would consider kids.

Fab Four Friends is for young readers, and the title itself is all about youth. "Friends," is one of the biggest concerns of childhood. "Boys," is a state of childhood. What I like so much about this early Beatles' story is that it addresses how hard these guys worked while they were very young. Yes, they were still young when they became successful. But the success didn't come until after they'd worked. They didn't just toss up the 1960's version of a YouTube video and become international stars.

This picture book group bio is probably most appropriate for older gradeschoolers. However, I wonder if it wouldn't also be a good choice for reluctant readers on the middle school level.

Tomorrow's stop for the blog tour will be at Tales from the Rushmore Kid.  You can catch everything Fab Four here.

Correction: This post originally stated that both George and Paul left Germany because the authorities there found out they were under 18. Only George went back to England for that reason.

Marc Tyler Nobleman On Biography And Historical Nonfiction

I was just writing about historical nonfiction here on Monday. Last night I spent an hour listening to Marc Tyler Nobleman's talk at the Richmond Memorial Library. He was speaking specifically about two of his books, Boys of Steel and Bill the Boy Wonder, biographies about mid-twentieth century comic book writers and illustrators. Boys of Steel is about the co-creators of Superman, and Bill the Boy Wonder is about the uncredited co-creator of Batman. So, there you go. I'm writing about historical nonfiction again.

Nobleman's description of his books and how he went about writing them illustrate a couple of points made in a Horn Book article from a few years back on contemporary children's historical nonfiction.

1. Children's history books are no longer simplified versions of subjects that were already covered for adult readers. Instead, they often involve new research. Nobleman describes lengthy searches for the pictures of the childhood homes of some of his subjects and finding and interviewing people who had never even been contacted before. Some of these people are now dead, so no one is going to be interviewing them again.
2. Because children's writers often seek out new topics to write about, it's not unusual to find children's books that are the first on a subject or even the only book on a subject. That's the case with the titles discussed last night. Boys of Steel was the first stand alone book on Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. Bill the Boy Wonder is still the only book on Bill Finger.

Attending last night's talk so soon after reading Jane Sutcliffe's The White House Is Burning makes me wonder if children's historical nonfiction won't become another area in children's literature that attracts adult readers. Well-organized presentation and new research on little-known subjects--who wouldn't want to read that?

"Bad News" Is Good News For Readers

I was so taken with Vaunda Micheaux Nelson's article Mind the Gaps in The Horn Book last winter that I went on to read her book Bad News for Outlaws: The Remarkable Life of Bass Reeves, Deputy U.S. Marshal. Like Nelson, I grew up watching westerns, so I had noticed a review for this book when it was released in 2009.

Bad News for Outlaws is a fantastic book. It's marketed to grades 3 to 6, so expect more text than in a traditional picture book. It is fascinating text, well-constructed as Bass Reeves' life story. The Reeves' story is told within the context of his world, as well. Just what was the deal with the so-called Indian Territory, anyway? And what were the deputy marshalls vs. any other kind of lawman out in the west? Additionally, Nelson uses some great stories about Reeves' activities as a marshal to illustrate what was so interesting about him. And she subtly throws in language from Reeves' era.

In addition to the great writing, this is a beautiful looking book, illustrated by R. Gregory Christie. The design of many of the pages calls to mind old books or maybe wanted posters. The back material is some of the best and most inviting I can recall seeing.

Because Bass Reeves was an African American, I imagine Bad News for Outlaws being displayed prominently in libraries during Black History Month. But this is a book that could be used for so much more. It could support history units because it is so good on the time period when Reeves' lived. It could be used to support a writing unit with the the stories Nelson uses about Reeves lives illustrating use of detail in writing. Oh, and the book also illustrates using an opening hook.

I learned from this book. I was left wondering about one thing, though. Was poor pretty Jennie Reeves left raising Bass's eleven children on her own while he was off taming the Wild West? But then I wonder about that with many books about men from the past.

Book 3. "Josephine" By Patricia Hruby Powell And Christian Robinson

When I first heard about Josephine Baker, way back in my youth, I found her fascinating. I don't know if it was the banana costume, the gyrating hips, or the life in France, but I was impressed. So when I heard there was a picture book bio, I decided to keep an eye out for it.

Josephine, The Dazzling Life of Josephine Baker by Patricia Hruby Powell with illustrations by Christian Robinson is a sharp and arty book.  It's written in free verse that is both effortless to read and expressive and intense. Many picture book bios don't cover an entire lifetime. This one does. I think Hurby Powell is able to do that because she uses dance and Baker's experiences with the segregated world she was born into as threads that keep her focused.

Baker's experience with segregation and work as a civil rights activist give this book another level of interest. As with Persepolis, it doesn't feel as if the reader (this reader, at least) is being instructed. A segregated world is just the well-defined setting for the book.

Environmental Book Club

I found another good book for our club.

I didn't expect to like Rachel Carson and Her Book That Changed the World by Laurie Lawlor with illustrations by Laura Beingessner as much as I did. Picture book bios are often problematic to me. They sometimes seem too old for picture book folks, too young for older ones, so who are they for? This one, not so much. Definitely for mid-grade school readers. Maybe third or fourth grade.

The first thing that struck me about this book is that very early on we hear that Rachel as a child explored the outdoors by herself and had a mother who had an interest in nature. This child got her start without any formal environmental instruction, such as we would want for children these days, and, yet, she turned into Rachel Carson.

Another thing I liked about this book, and, yes, this is just me, is that it describes a woman's story. Carson as a young woman had needy family to deal with. As often happens with achieving women of her era, she had help. In her case, her mother hustled to pull together money for school. She was encouraged by a female college professor. A male superior at the Bureau of Fisheries advised her to submit work to The Atlantic. She was a professional woman without a personal family. If you read the Epilogue, you'll find that after Silent Spring was published critics referred to her as "an hysterical woman." Someone asked "why a spinster with no children was so concerned about genetics."

Okay, so maybe I got into this story because of the feminist angle I read into it. But, really, the part in the beginning about simply growing up enjoying the outdoors was very significant, too.

Love the period illustrations, too.

Sometimes Name Recognition Works

I have to admit that I don't have a lot of interest in Albert Einstein. I picked up Albert Einstein when I saw it at the library because I recognized the author, Kathleen Krull's, name. I remember her picture book Fartiste, and I liked what I thought was the novelty of her book Lincoln Tells a Joke. Plus, I believe Kathleen is a Facebook friend. My point being, that name is definitely filed away in my mind, and when I saw it on a book cover, the metaphorical equivalent of a bell rang.

I found Albert Einstein, part of Krull's Giants of Science series, to be a very readable book. Seriously, on a couple of occasions I looked forward to going back to this book over some other ones I was reading at the time. The text seemed as if it could have come from one of those well done magazine profiles that often grab me.

I can't say that I have a better understanding of what Einstein actually did, though I think I do have a grasp of his process. I have a much better understanding of the significance of his work in the bigger scheme of things. I am left, after reading Albert Einstein, not liking him very much. That was an interesting aspect of this book. I felt that Krull put out details of Einstein's personal life (his treatment of the women in his life, for instance) without making any value judgments, herself. I, however, felt free to do so. I also felt she did a good job of placing him within his time period and showing historical events' impact upon him. In one case, in particular, she showed the impact he appears to have had on a historical event.

This book includes a list of sources, but no citations in the text. I am seeing this in nonfiction books for adults, as well as children, and don't know what the significance is. The absence of citations wouldn't keep me from encouraging a young person to read the book.