The Girl Who Thought in Pictures. The Story of Dr. Temple Grandin

by Julia Finley Mosca, illustrated by Daniel Rieley

I saw the excellent movie about Temple Grandin (trailer below) a few years before I came across this book at the library.  I knew that Temple was autistic, knew a little about her background and youth, her work and accomplishments with animals, so was interested to read this children's biography about her. 

This book is written in verse and I think it’s really well done.  I think it will be appealing to some children and is a treat introduction to who who Temple Grandin is and why she's different and special. 

I especially liked the point that being different is not being worse.  At the end there is a 2-page spread with fun facts and tidbits from the author’s chat with Temple; another 2-page spread with a time line; and a more detailed biography for adults.

This is the movie trailer for "Temple Grandin."  I watched a presentation by Dr. Grandin a few days ago and she seemed to be very supportive of this movie and its presentation of how she thinks visually.



Here's a brief interview with Dr. Grandin, from CBS News, discussing how to help and support children with autism.



Click here for a list ob Grandin's books.

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Real Clothes, Real Lives. 200 Years of What Women Wore. The Smith College Historic Clothing Collection

by Kiki Smith

This book has beautiful, full-page photographs of clothing from the 1800s to today that everyday women wore.  There is a brief description of each item of clothing and a page or two describing the item, how it was made, when it was worn, and the likely life situation of the woman who may have worn it. 

There are also old photographs of women in similar clothing, newspaper ads and articles, and printed pattern envelopes.  Some of the oldest dresses had visible repairs.  The clothing is organized into categories:  home, public dress, accessories, rites of passage, service, and suits.  Within each category the items of clothing are generally arranged chronologically with the oldest shown first.

I was most interested in seeing and reading about the clothes that were from earlier than my own lifetime: the 1865 work dress, the 1860-1880s home dresses, the 1895 wrappers.  I know that some of grandmothers may have worn similar clothing. 

There are close-ups of some of the clothes but I wish there were more so the details of how each was created or repaired was shown.

Be sure to read the Introduction by Vanessa Friedman.  It explains the rationale for collecting and saving old, worn women’s clothes.  In the Smith College collection, she wrote, “were clothes that were valuable not because they had been created by a famous designer..., or because they belong to famous people..., but because they had been worn out in the process of everyday life by anonymous owners.  Because they were stained, torn, mended, and otherwise flawed, and through those flaws told a story of life and times: families, responsibility, hardship, aspiration.”

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The Dressmakers of Auschwitz: The True Story of the Women Who Sewed to Survive

by Lucy Adlington

Excellent!  In some ways it was hard to read (as in sorrowful) but so worth it.  The author introduces the reader to a number of young, female seamstresses as they grow into adulthood in Slovakia, Czechoslovakia, Germany, and France and then find themselves prisoners in the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp where they were eventually selected to become seamstresses in a salon for the wives of Nazi leaders.  (I can’t imagine having to do a work I love for people who treat me like vermin.) 

Without being too graphic the author presents the situation of the captives and takes us into the concentration camp, showing the reader several areas of the camp including Kanada, warehouses of looted goods from captured Jews.  It was almost a behind-the-scenes look at some aspects of Auschwitz.

It was interesting to learn how friendships formed and how some prisoners supported each other, creating solidarity.

The book is based on research and interviews with 98-year-old Bracha Berkovic Kohút, and daughters, granddaughters, and other family members of those who were in Auschwitz.

Early in the book the author discussed how fashion can create unity (and to some extent, pride) in a group of people, something I had never thought about.  Think Boy Scout uniforms to military uniforms and even national folk costumes.  Fashion can also create divisiveness.

I came away with two lessons/reminders:

• First, we are all human beings.  We should not let the color of skin, the nationality, the religion of an other individual become a reason to reject, taunt, bully, or in any way harm another person, either physically or emotionally.
• Second, resistance can be manifest in a variety of ways. 
  

More about the book at https://www.timesofisrael.com/sewing-for-survival-the-last-of-auschwitzs-forgotten-dressmakers-dies/

This is a video of the author, Lucy Adlington  who is a fashion historian.  On the video she talks about her research, and how clothing was important to the Germans.  She also shares some background information that isn't in the book.



It's a fabulous book and you will probably came way grateful for your own circumstances and amazed at the resilience of the dressmakers of Auschwitz. 

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The Downstairs Girl

 by Stacey Lee

I loved this book.  The language and writing were beautiful and the story was interesting and insightful.  It is filled with surprising similes.  Written in first person, the story takes place in 1890 in Atlanta where 17-year-old Chinese girl Jo Kuan lives with Old Gin, an older man who took her in when she was a baby.  They secretly live in the basement of the home and print shop of one of the local newspapers. 

At the beginning of the story Jo works in a hat shop decorating women’s hats but is fired because she makes the customers “uncomfortable.”  She returns to work for the wealthy Paynes as a lady’s maid to their haughty daughter, Caroline, who is about the same age as Jo.  The story leads us through mysteries (to learn who Jo’s parents are), romance, surprising challenges, and adventure, all with the thread of discrimination running through it—against blacks, Chinese, and women—and their attempts to overcome it. 

It was just so well and engagingly written.  One thing I will say is that Jo seems older and more mature than any 17-year-old I’ve ever known.  And though published as a teen/young adult book, I think some of the content would be more appropriate for a slightly older audience.

Quotes

Robby speaking. ‘”Sometimes things fall apart so better things can come together,’ he says gently....  “My point is, a blessing loves a good disguise.’”    p. 281,  ¶2, 4

“What is the job of a parent but to teach a child that she has worth so that one day she can transform herself into whatever she wants.”    p. 365 top

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The Lost Spells

by Robert MacFarlane and Jackie Morris

Oh my goodness, what a beauty of a book!  Just exquisite.  It is filled with watercolor paintings of animals, birds, nature.  Each painting is accompanied by a delightful, insightful poem.  Some are a single page, others several pages long. 

There are poems for fox, moth, daisy, jackdaw, jay, gorse, swifts, goldfinch, oak, snow hare, barn owl, heartwood, curlew, egret, grey seal, gannet, thrift, woodpecker, beech, swallow, and silver birch.  I almost think I learned more about the character and attributes of these animals and plants from the poems than from reading descriptions in a science book or online.  I loved, loved, loved jackdaw, thrift, and woodpecker.  All were great, though.

Here's a video showing the pages, but the beauty of the books is created by both images and words (another version of images in the hands of Robert MacFarlane). 



Best to see and read it in person, holding it in your own hands!

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The Last Bookshop in London. A Novel of World War II

by Madeline Martin

Grace and her friend Viv have been best friends since they were children and had always dreamed of moving to London.  When they arrive there as young adults in 1939, it is nothing like they imagined or expected.  They board with Mrs. Weatherford, Grace’s deceased mother’s best friend, at a discount. 

Viv has a (forged) letter of recommendation.  Grace has none, even though she’d worked for years at her uncle’s hardware store.  Mrs. W. to the rescue: she has arranged employment for Grace at a dusty, cluttered, disorganized bookshop.  Grace doesn’t enjoy reading and is not excited about this work.  When she arrives the first day, Mr. Evans, the owner, immediately dismisses her.  Mrs. W. will have none of it and returns to visit Mr. Evans who, the next day, grudgingly acknowledges Grace.  Grace has a good work ethic and a knack for organization.  She begins to put the shop in order.  And then there’s the war, the Blitz, and Grace becomes a warden for the ARP (Air Raid Protection).

This was a great book for putting the reader in the setting of WWII in England with all its limitations and restrictions on citizens—rations, black-out curtains, getting around outside at night without lights, going on little sleep because of the bombings and sleeping in shelters, etc.  And then there was all the dust and debris and the dangers of moving in an environment that was tumbling down.  I realized that while the Germans were trying to obliterate England in order to conquer it, one of the other outcomes (Was it an intentional strategy?) was wearing the people down.  How did the the British survive on so little sleep, with such limited food?  The British are a resilient people!

I keep saying I’m done with WWII books, but I’m glad I read this one.


Quotes

George speaking: “‘Reading is . . . . It’s going somewhere without ever taking a train or ship, an unveiling of new, incredible worlds. It’s living a life you weren’t born into and a chance to see everything colored by someone else’s perspective. It’s learning without having to face consequences of failures, and how best to succeed.” p. 73 ¶5

“As much as she loved reading the story, no one had prepared her for the end being so bittersweet. No one told her finishing the book would leave her so bereft. It was as though she’d said goodby for the last time to a close friend.” p. 115-116

“There was a special scent to paper and ink, indescribable and unknown to anyone but a true reader. She brought the book to her face, closed her eyes and breathe in that wonderful smell.” p. 195, top

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Mrs. Quinn's Rise to Fame

by Olivia Ford

At the age of 77, Mrs. Jennifer Quinn decides she’d like to enter the Britain Bakes contest.  After all, she’s baked most of her life.  But she keeps her desire and the application process a secret from her husband, Bernard, thinking she wouldn’t get chosen and feeling uncertain about his response.  This leads to his suspicions that she has some medical problems.  There is one other secret she’s kept from him for fear of destroying their solid and loving marriage.

I enjoyed reading this book but the second secret seemed to me an odd addition to the story. 

"It’s strange, she thought, how recipes outlive the people that wrote them and yet they almost bring a part of that person back to life, as if a tiny piece of their soul lives in those instructions.”    p. 3 ¶ last

“Life could take away opportunities, but never your imagination.”    p 95 ¶2

“She studied the photograph of all that Ann and Fred had made [their grandchildren].  Although they were no older than five or six, it struck her that they were little time capsules of all those who came before them, mirrors of their ancestors who had lived through wars and fallen in love and, by a stroke of luck, survived.  That red hair, an aptitude for math, was in fact an age-old gift from someone that they had never met, but without whom they would not exist.”    p. 99, ¶1

“She would never be able to comprehend the strange borrowed time that you experience before bad news hits; the minutes, hours, sometimes days where you reside in a bubble of ignorance, a place where small things still matter, before it is pierced by the needle of perspective.”     p. 216 ¶5

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Home

by Isabelle Simler, translated by Vineet Lal

This is a beautiful picture book, one appropriate for both children and adults, with bright illustrations of homes of various animals, birds, and insects.  I was familiar with some of the animals but others were new to me:  the comet moth, European fan worm, hummingbird, satin bowerbird, case-making caddisfly, diving bell spider, elf owl, Eurasian harvest mouse, red ovenbirds, and many others. 

The illustrations for each animal fills two pages.  They are less illustrations and more drawings.  The colors are rich, deep, and brights, as appropriate for each animal.  Accompanying the drawings are brief poem-like descriptions of the animals and their homes.  At the end of the book is a paragraph about each animal, its locality, and its home. 

I can imagine this book being a good jumping off point for further research into the animals, especially for upper elementary students.

Truly, a beautiful book.

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