(2) 4-6 McKendry (Beneath the Streets of Boston) documents the birth, decay, and revival of Times Square. There's no drama (the porn, prostitution, and street-crime decades are treated matter-of-factly), but visually the book is a spectacle worthy of its subject, featuring technical construction drawings, stirring double-page paintings of the neon-lighted nightlife, and drawings of street scenes from the past. A source list is appended.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: November, 2012

(1) 4-6 Illustrated by Dušan Petričić. Ti-Jean, cheerful, hapless stripling of French-Canadian folklore, makes a winning appearance in three tales of European origin lightly transposed to a New World setting. Andrews is a storyteller, and these zesty, well-paced texts virtually read themselves. Source notes are appended, but these are not so much retellings or even adaptations as simpatico re-imaginings. Petričić's sly drawings underpin the fun throughout.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: July, 2011

(2) K-3 Illustrated by John Hassett. No sooner has the plumber de-flooded Nana Quimby's cellar than frogs emerge...first ten, then twenty, thirty (count 'em), and more. For each escalation, children playing outside have a solution (e.g., put them in a goldfish bowl). The ultimate answer? Re-flood the cellar. Delicious to look at--with its explosion of acrobatic frogs, primitivist-detail décor, and confectionery colors--and a treat to listen to.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: July, 2011

(2) K-3 Illustrated by Leo Dillon & Diane Dillon. In 1725 Mali, Dinga the Blacksmith calls upon the Mother Elements to help him raise his boy, Mustafa. When Mustafa disappears, Wind, with help from Earth, Fire, and Water, travels to a blacksmith shop in Charleston, South Carolina, where Mustafa has been enslaved. The Dillons' rousing illustrations--at once bold, complex, and lucid--impart dramatic conviction to McKissack's free-verse text.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: September, 2011

(3) YA This handsome volume, extensively illustrated with clear photographs and some architectural drawings, gives a personalized account of the career of the Chinese-born superstar architect. The informative text focuses on Pei's major projects including Boston's Kennedy Library; the National Gallery of Art, East Building, in Washington, D.C.; and the subterranean addition to the Louvre, with its distinctive pyramid entrance. Reading list, timeline, websites. Bib., ind.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader

(1) YA Bartoletti tackles a tough, grim subject with firmness and sensitivity. Once past the origin of the Klan and its brushfire spread, the narrative focuses on the victims, not their tormentors. Period illustrations throughout make seeing believing, and the appended civil rights timeline, bibliography, and source notes are an education in themselves. Exemplary in scholarship, interpretation, and presentation. Ind.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: September, 2010

(2) K-3 Illustrated by Wendell Minor. In George's compact ecodrama, we first see the buffalo slaughtered to decimate the Indians and open the prairie to settlers. Moving to the somber Dust Bowl migrants, we then turn to the reversal: the discovery, instigated by President Theodore Roosevelt, of three hundred remaining wild buffalo. With illustrations that both document and dramatize, it's another small triumph from a seasoned team. Websites. Bib.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: July, 2010

(4) 4-6 In this sequel to My One Hundred Adventures, twelve-year-old narrator Jane Fielding, her eight-year-old sister, and their two little brothers have barely resettled in Saskatchewan before the family sets off again, ricocheting around North America. Less graced by Horvath's lingering evocations of place and time and ending with virtually nothing explained, this narrative also relegates the engaging children to the role of responders.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: January, 2010

(2) K-3 Illustrated by Paul O. Zelinsky. Angelica Longrider, a.k.a. Swamp Angel, returns, this time in 1831 Montana. When a dust storm strikes, Angel rides the whirlwind; in its midst she finds a giant horse who carries her in pursuit of some outlaws. Zelinsky makes the comical most of outlaw leader Backward Bart and his band (mounted on oversize mosquitoes).

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: November, 2010

(4) K-3 Illustrated by Bruce Whatley. A pet parrot asks its owner, a rich Persian merchant traveling to India, to tell the parrots there about its wonderful golden cage. Upon receiving the message the parrots fall over, apparently dead--craftily sending an escape-method message to their caged mate. Despite some stereotyping in text and illustrations, this amiable tale is effective in its own obvious way.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader

(2) K-3 Teddy bear Otto goes from being plaything of a Jewish boy, David, and his non-Jewish friend, Oskar, in 1930s Germany, to mascot of a wounded black GI; he's later reunited with elderly David and Oskar in the United States. The affecting story could serve as an introduction to the Holocaust for not-too-young children.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: November, 2010

(2) 4-6 Mohawks have been in high steel for more than a hundred years, since construction of the first railroad bridge over the St. Lawrence in 1886. Throughout this useful book, Weitzman effectively mingles social and industrial history to tell the mens' story. Ironworker testimony, along with other eyewitness reports, gives the volume a documentary, you-are-there feel. Historical photographs appear throughout. Bib., glos., ind.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: November, 2010

(3) 4-6 Illustrated by Ashley Bryan. Photographs by Bill McGuinness. With vintage and contemporary photographs, original artwork and illustration, and lyrical evocations of Maine's landscape, this book explores Bryan's creative life. Readers will learn of his setbacks, tenaciousness, and artistic and philosophical prowess. The volume's scattered format doesn't do Bryan's books justice. However, the expansiveness and exuberance of the artist and his work carry the day.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: January, 2009

(2) 4-6 Illustrated by Tom Pohrt. Abandoned feline Rachet adapts to the feral cats of Roxville Station--and cautiously bonds with Mike, an orphan boy. After clawing her way to top-cat rank at the station, Rachet becomes Mike's "outside pet." Meanwhile, in George's practiced manner, the other cats go their various ways, all easily followed in Pohrt's bird's-eye view of the town and seen close-up in his drawings.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: July, 2009

(2) YA Through copious photo documentation, Jacobs is shown as independent-minded and outspoken, with a vivid historical imagination and a poetic turn. The bulk of the book--Jacobs's authorship of her seminal work and role as scourge of so-called urban renewal--is handled clearly and efficiently. Each chapter opens with a full-page illustration by one of the co-authors, an apt, personalizing mix with the many photos. Timeline, websites. Bib., ind.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: July, 2009

(2) YA With customary zeal, Aronson speaks his mind on virtually every issue of Israeli-Palestinian relations. Throughout, he draws American parallels; some are a stretch, but most, however shaky, are thought-provoking. What he knows from experience, and airs, forthrightly, is what American and Israeli Jews of like mind think and, in closing, how American Jewish teens might help to heal the rift. Bib., ind.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: January, 2009

(4) 4-6 Folktales of the World series. Illustrated by Stefano Vitale. This collection is divided into major culture zones. A prefatory note describes the people and ways of life of each area. Three or four tales follow, with brief introductions; some of the stories' plots are heavily Europeanized. The book is illustrated with fanciful adaptations of Native American styles and motifs, deftly done (if hardly genuine). Source notes.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: January, 2009

(2) K-3 Illustrated by Francisco X. Mora. From a house above Manila Bay, the birds' good-night songs end the day--until the raucous, ungovernable gecko shatters the evening idyll. How to get rid of him? This is the eagle's doing, and it takes some maneuvering--with the suspense and humor of traditional nuisance-routing tales. Climo's telling is fluent and vivid, and Mora's calm, sweeping watercolors let the words register.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: May, 2008

(2) 4-6 Twelve-year-old Jane has three siblings and a poet-baker-beachcomber mother. Over the course of one summer, four strange men turn up, and Jane's adventures (e.g., distributing Bibles from a hot-air balloon, all-day babysitting for the "smelly, runny" Gourd brood) tumble after one another--a lumpy mix of farce and burlesque. Along with a plenitude of mundane, poetic moments is a vibrant current of story.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader | Horn Book Magazine Issue: September, 2008

(4) 4-6 Translated by David Unger. Illustrated by Domi. With Dante Liano. Ixkem, a seven-year-old Mayan girl, is selected to be caretaker of her grandfather's vast cornfields. After inadvertently calling up the b'e'n spirits, she's brought underground to tell stories. Though the prose is generally flat (and seldom in the voice of a child), some of the tales, thoughtfully presented, might have appeal. Bright, primitivist illustrations accompany the text. Glos.

Reviewer: Barbara Bader