Book picks similar to
A Most Clever Girl: How Jane Austen Discovered Her Voice by Jasmine A. Stirling
picture-books
biography
non-fiction
picture-book
The Pilot and the Little Prince: The Life of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Peter Sís - 2014
Antoine dreamed of flying and grew up to be a pilot—and that was when his adventures began. He found a job delivering mail by plane, which had never been done before. He and his fellow pilots traveled to faraway places and discovered new ways of getting from one place to the next. Antoine flew over mountains and deserts. He battled winds and storms. He tried to break aviation records, and sometimes he even crashed. From his plane, Antoine looked down on the earth and was inspired to write about his life and his pilot-hero friends in memoirs and in fiction. Peter Sís's remarkable biography celebrates the author of The Little Prince, one of the most beloved books in the world. A Frances Foster Book.
Dancing Hands: How Teresa Carreño Played the Piano for President Lincoln
Margarita Engle - 2019
If she felt sad, music cheered her up, and when she was happy, the piano helped her share that joy. Soon she was writing her own songs and performing in grand cathedrals. Then a revolution in Venezuela forced her family to flee to the United States. Teresa felt lonely in this unfamiliar place, where few of the people she met spoke Spanish. Worst of all, there was fighting in her new home, too—the Civil War. Still, Teresa kept playing, and soon she grew famous as the talented Piano Girl who could play anything from a folk song to a sonata. So famous, in fact, that President Abraham Lincoln wanted her to play at the White House! Yet with the country torn apart by war, could Teresa’s music bring comfort to those who needed it most?
On Wings of Words: The Extraordinary Life of Emily Dickinson
Jennifer Berne - 2020
In a small New England town lives Emily Dickinson, a girl in love with small things—a flower petal, a bird, a ray of light, a word. In those small things, her brilliant imagination can see the wide world—and in her words, she takes wing. From celebrated children's author Jennifer Berne comes a lyrical and lovely account of the life of Emily Dickinson: her courage, her faith, and her gift to the world. With Dickinson's own inimitable poetry woven throughout, this lyrical biography is not just a tale of prodigious talent, but also of the power we have to transform ourselves and to reach one another when we speak from the soul.• Fantastic educational opportunity to share Emily Dickinson's story and poetry with young readers• An inspirational real-life story that will appeal to children and adults alike.• Jennifer Berne is the author of critically acclaimed children's biographies of Albert Einstein and Jacques Cousteau.Fans who enjoyed Emily Writes: Emily Dickinson and her Poetic Beginnings, Emily and Carlo, and Uncle Emily will love On Wings of Words.• Books for kids ages 5–8• Poetry for children• Biographies for childrenJennifer Berne is the award-winning author of the biographies Manfish: A Story of Jacques Cousteau and On a Beam of Light: A Story of Albert Einstein. She lives in Copake, New York.Becca Stadtlander is the illustrator of many children's and young adult publications, including Sleep Tight Farm. She was born and raised in Covington, Kentucky.
Exquisite: The Poetry and Life of Gwendolyn Brooks
Suzanne Slade - 2020
A picture book biography about Gwendolyn Brooks, the influential poet and the first African American to win a Pulitzer Prize.
Little Libraries, Big Heroes
Miranda Paul - 2019
From an award-winning author and illustrator, the inspiring story of how the Little Free Library organization brings communities together through books, from founder Todd Bol's first installation to the creation of more than 75,000 mini-libraries around the world.
Miss Mary Reporting: The True Story of Sportswriter Mary Garber
Sue Macy - 2016
“That’s Mary Garber. She doesn’t care who you are, but if you do something good, she’ll write about you.”Mary Garber was a pioneering sports journalist in a time where women were rarely a part of the newspaper business. Women weren’t even allowed to sit in the press boxes at sporting events, so Mary was forced to sit with the coaches’ wives. But that didn’t stop her.In a time when African-American sports were not routinely covered, Mary went to the games and wrote about them. Garber was a sportswriter for fifty-six years and was the first woman to receive the Associated Press Sports Editors’ Red Smith Award, presented for major contributions in sports journalism. And now, every year the Association of Women in Sports Media presents the Mary Garber Pioneer Award in her honor to a role model for women in sports media.Sure to inspire future journalists, athletes, and any child who has a dream, this illustrated biography of Mary Garber captures her feisty and determined spirit and brings her story to life.
Some Writer!: The Story of E. B. White
Melissa Sweet - 2016
B. White’s Charlotte’s Web. In Some Writer!, the two-time Caldecott Honor winner Melissa Sweet mixes White’s personal letters, photos, and family ephemera with her own exquisite artwork to tell his story, from his birth in 1899 to his death in 1985. Budding young writers will be fascinated and inspired by the journalist, New Yorker contributor, and children’s book author who loved words his whole life. This authorized tribute is the first fully illustrated biography of E. B. White and includes an afterword by Martha White, E. B. White's granddaughter.
Danza!: Amalia Hernández and El Ballet Folklórico de México
Duncan Tonatiuh - 2017
As a child, Amalia Hernández saw a pair of dancers in the town square. The way they stomped and swayed to the rhythm of the beat inspired her. She knew one day she would become a dancer. Amalia studied ballet and modern dance under the direction of skilled teachers who had performed in world-renowned dance companies. But she never forgot the folk dance she had seen years earlier. She began traveling through the Mexican countryside, witnessing the dances of many regions, and she used her knowledge of ballet and modern dance to adapt the traditional dances to the stage. She founded her own dance company, a group that became known as el Ballet Folklórico de México. Using his signature illustration style, inspired by the ancient art of the Mixtecs, award-winning author and illustrator Duncan Tonatiuh tells the story of Amalia Hernández and the formation of the Folkloric Ballet, one of the most famous and successful dance companies in the world.
Miss Dorothy and Her Bookmobile
Gloria Houston - 2011
Dorothy's dearest wish is to be a librarian in a fine brick library just like the one she visited when she was small, but her new home in North Carolina has valleys and streams but no libraries. So Miss Dorothy and her neighbors decide to start a bookmobile. Instead of people coming to a fine brick library, Miss Dorothy can now bring the books to them - at school, on the farm, even once in the middle of a river! Miss Dorothy and Her Bookmobile is an inspiring story about the love of books, the power of perseverance, and how a librarian can change people's lives.
When the Beat Was Born: DJ Kool Herc and the Creation of Hip Hop
Laban Carrick Hill - 2013
Her brother, Clive Campbell, spun the records. He had a new way of playing the music to make the breaks—the musical interludes between verses—longer for dancing. He called himself DJ Kool Herc and this is When the Beat Was Born. From his childhood in Jamaica to his youth in the Bronx, here's how Kool Herc came to be a DJ, how kids in gangs stopped fighting in order to breakdance, and how the music he invented went on to define a culture and transform the world.
Ocean Speaks: How Marie Tharp Revealed the Ocean's Biggest Secret
Jess Keating - 2020
She loved solving problems. And she loved pushing the limits of what girls and women were expected to do and be. In the mid-twentieth century, women were not welcome in the sciences, but Marie was tenacious. She got a job in a laboratory at Cambridge University, New York. But then she faced another barrior: women were not allowed on the research ships (they were considered bad luck on boats). So instead, Marie stayed back and dove deep into the data her colleagues recorded. She mapped point after point and slowly revealed a deep rift valley in the ocean floor. At first the scientific community refused to believe her, but her evidence was irrefutable. She proved to the world that her research was correct. The mid-ocean ridge that Marie discovered is the single largest geographic feature on the planet, and she mapped it all from her small, cramped office.
Seeds of Change: Wangari's Gift to the World
Jen Cullerton Johnson - 2010
A picture book biography of scientist Wangari Maathai, the first African womanand first environmentalistto win a Nobel Peace Prize (in 2004), for her work planting trees in her native Kenya.
The Extraordinary Mark Twain (According to Susy)
Barbara Kerley - 2010
They saw Mark Twain as "a humorist joking at everything." But he was so much more, and Susy was determined to set the record straight. In a journal she kept under her pillow, Susy documented her world-famous father-from his habits (good and bad!) to his writing routine to their family's colorful home life. Her frank, funny, tender biography (which came to be one of Twain's most prized possessions) gives rare insight and an unforgettable perspective on an American icon. Inserts with excerpts from Susy's actual journal give added appeal.
A Boy Named Isamu: A Story of Isamu Noguchi
James Yang - 2021
Wandering through an outdoor market, through the forest, and then by the ocean, Isamu sees things through the eyes of a young artist . . .but also in a way that many children will relate. Stones look like birds. And birds look like stones.
Frida Kahlo and Her Animalitos
Monica Brown - 2017
Her artwork brought attention to Mexican and indigenous culture with images renowned in celebrating the female form.Brown's story recounts Frida's beloved pets—two monkeys, a parrot, three dogs, two turkeys, an eagle, a black cat, and a fawn—and playfully considers how Frida embodied the many wonderful characteristics of each animal.