According to an old Kabbalah legend, when God made the world, “he wanted to paint everything with a special kind of light so the world would shine with goodness.” Too powerful to be stored in a jar, the light burst forth, shattering into shards all over the globe. To make the world whole and peaceful again, God created people to help search for and find each broken piece of light. This rendition of an old midrash creation story is filled with a beautiful and simple message of hope. A peaceful coexistence is still possible for a world that is torn apart by war, hunger and blind hatred, if people look for the spark of light in everyone and everything. As in her biographical collection, Paths to Peace (2006), Zalben departs from her usual artistic style with this symbolic and elegant interpretation of the Judaic practice of “Tikun Olam,” or healing of the world. Using a combined media of paints, pencil and various household and other objects such as pieces of sand, seaweed, kasha grains, flower petals and cleansers, Zalben matches her well-crafted words with detailed and delicate collages of naturalistic plant and animal scenes and a multicultural group of dancing, joyful children surrounded by the glitter and glow of all those shards of light. Special and inspiring for all cultures. (Picture book. 5-12)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2007
ISBN: 978-0-525-47827-0
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2007
Continuing to find inspiration in the work of Virginia Lee Burton, Munro Leaf and other illustrators of the past, Long (The Little Engine That Could, 2005) offers an aw-shucks friendship tale that features a small but hardworking tractor (“putt puff puttedy chuff”) with a Little Toot–style face and a big-eared young descendant of Ferdinand the bull who gets stuck in deep, gooey mud. After the big new yellow tractor, crowds of overalls-clad locals and a red fire engine all fail to pull her out, the little tractor (who had been left behind the barn to rust after the arrival of the new tractor) comes putt-puff-puttedy-chuff-ing down the hill to entice his terrified bovine buddy successfully back to dry ground. Short on internal logic but long on creamy scenes of calf and tractor either gamboling energetically with a gaggle of McCloskey-like geese through neutral-toned fields or resting peacefully in the shade of a gnarled tree (apple, not cork), the episode will certainly draw nostalgic adults. Considering the author’s track record and influences, it may find a welcome from younger audiences too. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-399-25248-8
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2009
SEEN & HEARD
Fast-paced and plot-driven.
In his latest, prolific author Gratz takes on Hitler’s Olympic Games.
When 13-year-old American gymnast Evie Harris arrives in Berlin to compete in the 1936 Olympic Games, she has one goal: stardom. If she can bring home a gold medal like her friend, the famous equestrian-turned-Hollywood-star Mary Brooks, she might be able to lift her family out of their Dust Bowl poverty. But someone slips a strange note under Evie’s door, and soon she’s dodging Heinz Fischer, the Hitler Youth member assigned to host her, and meeting strangers who want to make use of her gymnastic skills—to rob a bank. As the games progress, Evie begins to see the moral issues behind their sparkling facade—the antisemitism and racism inherent in Nazi ideology and the way Hitler is using the competition to support and promote these beliefs. And she also agrees to rob the bank. Gratz goes big on the Mission Impossible–style heist, which takes center stage over the actual competitions, other than Jesse Owens’ famous long jump. A lengthy and detailed author’s note provides valuable historical context, including places where Gratz adapted the facts for storytelling purposes (although there’s no mention of the fact that before 1952, Olympic equestrian sports were limited to male military officers). With an emphasis on the plot, many of the characters feel defined primarily by how they’re suffering under the Nazis, such as the fictional diver Ursula Diop, who was involuntarily sterilized for being biracial.
Fast-paced and plot-driven. (Historical fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9781338736106
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2025
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