Lynn: Linda Sue Park, like so many readers, was a childhood devotee of the Little House books. Also like many, she was bothered by some of what was said and what was left out in terms of race but she loved the stories deeply. As she says in her wonderful Author’s Note, Park wrote Prairie Lotus (Clarion, 2020) “as an attempt at a painful reconciliation.” I think she does a wonderful job of honoring what so many young readers loved about the LH books while making a very successful job of including another important side of the story.
Hanna is racially mixed, white father, Chinese/Korean mother, in a time when anyone other than white is despised and has to deal with ugly and systemic discrimination and restrictions both legal and cultural. After the death of Hanna’s mother, her father moves them to the western territories, seeking a place to set up a Dry Goods store. Hanna dreams of designing and creating women’s dresses and of graduating from school but she faces enormous obstacles to both dreams. Readers of the LH books will recognize many of the elements they loved: the details of daily life on the prairie, finding food and creating meals, building a home on an often hostile land. I loved Park’s descriptions of dressmaking, the fabrics, sewing, and details of the dress goods store.
Hanna’s voice is wonderfully crafted and her hopes and dreams, struggles and heartbreaks are so vivid and have a deeply authentic feel. Park tells an important story here but she never allows the compelling story to be slowed by her intent to show a more realistic story of pioneers, Native people, and the settling of the west. Kids will read it for the engaging story and come away with a new understanding of the time, the people, and the issues.
Cindy: Like author Linda Sue Park, Laura was an imaginary friend of mine as I read her books again and again in the late 60s and early 70s. I still have a fondness for the stories and for what they meant to me growing up. While I pretended to explain the wonders of microwave ovens and electric lights and the bounty of children’s books to Laura, I remember admiring how happy the Ingalls were with any small treat. An orange and a penny for Christmas, for instance. The orange appears in Hanna’s story as well, as does the theme of being satisfied with what you have. I hated Wilder’s scenes with Nellie Oleson as she was so mean spirited; her spirit lives on in Park’s book in many of the prejudiced characters who are offended by Asian American Hanna living in their midst. From tactless questions about her ability to see well through her slanted eyes, to discriminatory acts to prevent her from attending school with the white children, Park tells another story of our country’s struggle to accept people who they feel “don’t belong.” That many of the hateful acts are drawn from Park’s personal experience makes the story all the more important for a new generation to read. Hanna’s spirit is indomitable and readers will be rooting for her success at school, with a friend, and with her dressmaking profession in this little insular town on the prairie.
Home in the Woods by Eliza Wheeler (Penguin/Random/Nancy Paulsen, 2019)
Lynn: The title of Candy Cooper and Marc Aronson’s upcoming book, 
vel. In fact, lead poisoning from paint was featured in the 2004 middle school novel, 
While we were in Philadelphia for the 2020 American Library Association Midwinter Meetings last weekend we were fortunate to get to tour author/illustrator Greg Pizzoli’s new studio. After several stand-alone children’s books, he is launching a new beginner reader graphic novel series called 
showed us his collection of Ed’s books near where he works. He practiced his drawing with those books as a child and decided to include similar step-by-step lessons in the back of this book so that his readers can draw Baloney and his friends and create their own stories. He has a beautiful space to work and his wife has her studio up a circular staircase so they can share the dog while they work. There’s a lot of talent under this one roof.
Greg and Kay were incredibly kind to open their studios to a bunch of librarians and to give us a peek at their creative processes. Check out Kay’s drawn, screen printed, and stuffed fabric installations which are brilliantly created. I loved her work too and was trying to figure out if any of them would fit in my suitcase. Fortunately, I regained control! Thank you to the wonderful people at Disney/Hyperion and to Greg and Kay for a memorable event.
Lynn: One of us here at Bookends is something of a curmudgeon when it comes to “inspirational” books. Ahem, I will leave you to guess which one of us it is but let me just say that one of us usually finds such books waay too sweet, gooey, and simplistic. Eye rolling is also quite often occurs during reading them. However, a notable exception to this prejudice happened when I, oops, when WE read Reynolds’ wonderful new picture book, 
Lynn: Who doesn’t love an underdog or in this case an underplanet? Lots of us have been rooting for Pluto ever since it got reclassified as an ice dwarf a while ago. Adam Rex tops my planetary chart though with his hilarious AND informative new picture book on Pluto,
Lynn: Veteran authors Eric Walters and Kathy Kacer have joined forces in their new middle-grade novel, 
That new substitute teacher sure looks familiar in Mylisa Larsen’s 
Naughty elves are showing up everywhere, and this time 
bookendsblog.net 