Watercress by Andrea Wang

 A young girl is driving along a country road in Ohio with her parents and her older brother. They are in the family's old red Pontiac. Suddenly her mother spots watercress in the ditch beside the talk stalks of corn. They stop and out of the car trunk, comes a brown paper bag and rusty scissors. Her parents are remembering a time in China.

The young girl and her brother are told to remove their sneakers and socks, roll up their jeans and help them gather the watercress. The water is cold and the mud squelches between her toes. As they gather bags of the small plant, the young girl hopes no one sees her in the ditch with her family. Her brother shoves some watercress, dripping muddy water and snails near her face.

At home that night, a dish of watercress is served for dinner but the young girl refuses to eat it. Her parents try to convince her to try it, but to the young girl anything different is bad.

 The young girl's mom shows her an old photo of her family, her China family. She never talks about her family. She points to her young brother, the girl's uncle and for the first time speaks about her family in China. During the great famine, they ate whatever they could find. But it was not enough, and her young brother died. Looking at the picture of her uncle who never survived and at the watercress, the young girl is ashamed of being ashamed of her family. And so, she makes a decision.

Discussion

Watercress is a story based on author, Andrea Wang's experiences as a child of Chinese immigrants growing up in a town in Ohio. In her poignant "A Note From The Author" at the back of the book, Wang writes that she "was very aware of how different my family and I were from everyone else. It's hard to feel like you don't belong, and collecting food from a muddy roadside ditch just made that bad feeling more intense for me -- something my very practical parent's didn't understand." Wang writes that her parents didn't talk about their life in China and the hardships they experienced during war. At the same time, she feels it's important for children to know their heritage.One way to learn this is through the memories parents offer. These memories, according to Wang, "...have the power to inform, to inspire, and to heal."

This simple story is full of meaning, rich with the power memories have. This is captured so beautifully by the expressive artwork of illustrator Jason Chin. The illustrations are rendered using watercolour on 140 pound cold press Saunders watercolor paper. In his "A Note From The Artist", Chin writes that he chose the medium of watercolour which is common to both Chinese and Western art. He writes that his colour palette and technique were also carefully chosen to reflect the themes in the story. In an attempt to "add another layer to Andrea's remarkable story", Chin "drew on my own memories of exclusion, loss, and guilt". He has succeeded admirably. Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of this exceptional picture book, is the ability of the illustrations to convey these exact emotions so deeply and purely.The reader experiences the shame, the anger and the guilt of the young girl as she struggles to come to terms with her identity and her heritage. Highly recommended.

Book Details:

Watercress by Andrea Wang
New York: Holiday House    2021

One Step Further by Katherine Johnson

In One Step Further: My Story of Math, the Moon, and a Lifelong Mission, Katherine Johnson, famed human computer who helped with the space race, and her daughters tell their story and how her life influenced them.

Katherine Johnson loved numbers as a child. This love she passed on to her daughters, Joylette, Connie and Kathy. At this time she was married to Jimmie Coleman. In her own home, math and music were prominent. They went to Sunday school and regular school.

During the time that Katherine's children attended school, Jim Crow laws were in effect. This meant that black people had to be kept separate from white people. Often the segregated facilities were not as nice as those for white people. Although life was hard, the three sisters were protected by the community they lived in.

Katherine had graduated summa cum from West Virginia State college, earning here degree in math. She found work as a teacher but it was considered a dangerous job for a black woman due to discrimination. Many did not want Black children to be educated. So Katherine and Jimmie moved their family to a new place. But even in their new home, Katherine's daughters still experienced segregation. 

Then Katherine got a new job at the National Advisory Committee of Aeronautics as a human computer. Instead of computers, humans would make the calculations that engineers relied on to help planes fly farther and faster. So every morning, Katherine dressed in her pearls and a good skirt and jacket, went to work with many other college-educated African-American women who worked as mathematicians. Katherine's daughters found role models in these women.

Because white people felt that African Americans were not as smart, Katherine felt that they had to look and be perfect. Like the society they lived in, her workplace was also segregated.

Unlike most of the other computers, Katherine wanted to know the why of the math and how it was being used. After pressuring to attend meetings, Katherine was allowed to go. At this time NACA was renamed NASA and it's mission was to send humans into space. This work was top secret so she couldn't talk about it at home either. At night Katherine would talk to her daughters about the stars, pointing out the Big Dipper and Orion's Belt.

As her children grew up they became involved in the fight for equality. Her daughter Kathy attending college peacefully protested to end racial segregation. 

John Glenn Jr. was chosen to be the first American to fly into space. To help with the space race, NASA began to use machine computers. While these machines were faster than the human computers, were they just as accurate. John Glenn wasn't so sure and he would not fly until the machine calculations were checked by Katherine! She also helped with the calculations that were needed to send man to the moon. Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Mike Collins blasted into space on their way to the moon.

Katherine's daughters did go one step further inspired by their mathematician mother: Joylette worked at NASA, while both Kathy and Connie became teachers. Katherine retired from NASA in 1986.In 2018, NASA named an entire facility after Katherine Johnson.

Discussion

This engaging picture book tells the story of Katherine Johnson, human computer and mathematician extraordinaire. One Step Further not only tells Katherine's remarkable story but focuses on how her life and accomplishments encouraged her own daughters to go "one step further". It is a story of a brilliant, determined African-American woman who overcame  several social obstacles to become a major force in the race to put a man on the moon. Despite the obvious obstacles racial segregation presented, Katherine also had to confront sexual discrimination in the workplace. One Step Further portrays Katherine as a woman who did not back down. In this way, Katherine is presented as a good role model for women and especially women of colour to confront and break down barriers.

And Katherine's daughters were able to go "one step further" due to changes brought about by the civil rights movement and their own determined efforts. Joylette Goble Hylikc received a Masters of Science in Management Information Systems and worked at NASA before working at Lockheed Martin as a senior requirements engineer. Katherine Goble Moore also received a masters from Montclair State University and worked as an educator for thirty-three years. Connie Goble Boykin Garcia passed away in 2010. She also worked as a teacher after completing a bachelor's degree from Hampton Institute/University.

Accompanying the text, are many interesting photographs of Katherine and her children, as well as historic photos of racial segregation, protests against segregation  Katherine working at NASA, John Glenn Jr. and Buzz Aldrin. The photographs of racial segregation are important as they show younger readers what living under Jim Crow laws was like for Katherine and her family and other African-Americans.

Illustrator Charnelle Pinkney Barlow, granddaughter of Caldecott-winning illustrator Jerry Pinkney, wanted to portray both Katherine, John Glenn Jr. and Buzz Aldrin in a way that fit with the photographs included, adding a layer of context to the story.

The back matter includes detailed Historical Notes & Context: Racial Segregation in the United States and About Katherine Johnson, as well as a Timeline and a Glossary. 

A very well-done children's biography about an amazing woman, whose contributions to space science were considerable and long overdue in being recognized.

Book Details:

One Step Further: My Story of Math, the Moon, and a Lifelong Mission by Katherine Johnson
Washington, D.C.: National Geographic Kids    2021

Paying The Land by Joe Sacco

Renowned graphic artist, Joe Sacco explores the life of the Dene in the Northwest Territories as well as the issues they have experienced over the past decades as a result of colonialism and European influence.

Part 1 offers the insights of Paul Andrew, an elder and former chief of the Tulita who tells about the Dene way of life. He was born when his family were travelling in a moose skin boat. Paul lived on the land, "learning about relationships and connections with the land and the animals." Their day began at dawn and they went to bed with the sunset. Their lives were dictated by their environment and the animals. When the fish ran, they caught fish, when the moose hide was thick, they hunted moose.

A nomadic life meant people had several teams of dogs and travelled light. Children were identified at a young age as to what they might be best at: a leader or a hunter. By the time a child was five, he knew what his role in the community would be. There were no separate roles for men and women: for example, men learned to sew. Everyone had to learn different skills in the event they found themselves alone on the land. Everyone looked at what needed to be done and then acted. Andrew states that although there were times they were hungry, their bodies adapted like the animals did.

From the Europeans they used tents, stoves, guns and knives but he remembers his uncle showing him how to use flint to skin a moose. People were close to one another, marrying into other tribes and meeting with other families in July.

In Part II Shauna and Joe take a red Toyota pickup and travel north along the Mackenzie River Valley to Norman Wells, travelling along winter roads. Shauna lives on an island in Great Slave Lake, in a cabin that is off the grid. She knows the people and the region. 

The Northwest Territories, with a population of less than forty-five thousand, is the size of France and Spain combined. Shauna tells Joe that the oil and gas industry has had a significant impact on the northern ecosystem and the Indigenous peoples, just as the fur trade did previously.

Shauna and Joe are staying with her non-Indigenous friends in Tulit'a in the Sahtu Region where the Great Bear River meets the Mackenzie River. The Dene, whose name means "the people" have a culture rooted in the land. When Paul Andrews lived in the bush, the Dene were referred to as "Indians" and Tulit'a was called Fort Norman. 

Shauna tells Joe that fracking, the process of injecting chemicals and water into shale to release the hydrocarbons has divided the community. Douglas Yallee tells him that fracking has led to doubts and increased social issues. But unable to find scientific evidence that fracking harms the environment Douglas acknowledges there have been benefits. In Yellowknife, Darrell Beaulieu, president and CEO of Denendeh Investments, states that while communities want development they do not want the land damaged. 

In Part III, Paying the Land, Joe talks with Paul Andrew's cousin, Frederick Andrew who is also Shuhta-ot'ine, Mountain Dene. He explains how he was taught by the elders to be careful on the land after being away for a time and to "pay the land". He talks with Fr. Rene Fumoleau who was born in France but came to Fort Good Hope in 1953 with the Oblates. He learned the language and spent the winters in the bush, travelling from family to family as they trapped animals. He tells Joe that over time, more people began to leave the land and get work.

In Part III, Joe explores the history of the treaties 8 and 11, "negotiated" with the Indigenous peoples of the Northwest Territories. In the 19th Century, Indigenous peoples supplied fur pelts to the Hudson's Bay Company which unknowing to them, had been granted their land. In 1870, their ancestors land was given to the Dominion of Canada. However, when minerals and oil were discovered, Canada sought control of the land, including most of the Northwest Territories, through treaties. The Dene viewed the treaties as "a friendship pact guaranteeing their livelihood -- based on hunting, fishing, and trapping - that in no way prejudiced their relationship to the land."

Through interviews, Joe learns how the Dene began to fight back through court challenges asserting their aboriginal rights to the land. The Paulette Case and the Berger Hearing were just the beginning. The latter challenge saw the Dene begin to reclaim their identity, calling themselves by their true names rather than referring to themselves as "indian". However, what began as a collaborative effort among the various Dene-Metis groups, soon collapsed with the northern-most Dene tribe leaving. After this, some Dene like Stephen Kakfwi and Jim Antoine joined the colonial system to try to enact changes that way. They both served as premier of the Northwest Territories and were able to accomplish some changes.

In Part IV, Our Culture Is Slowly Dying, Joe highlights the Dene's attempts to keep alive their skills that have helped them over generations survive in the bush. Jonas Antoine talks about how the Dene use many modern means of transportation to "get" to the land whereas in the past they were a part of the land. But Gordon Yakeleya remembers the hardships of living off the land when he was younger, compared to being a "wage earner" today. Cecile Raymond also remembers the hardships of bush living. Peter Redvers who has conducted ethnographic research in the Dehcho region states that the shift to living in towns and villages changed the culture of the Dene.This transformation has resulted in a loss of their language, their traditional laws and customs.

In this section, there are interviews with Dene who talk about the problems alcohol has created both in the community at large and within families. Binge drinking and drugs have led to a cycle of physical and sexual abuse. It is at this point that Sacco, through talking with many in the Dene community, details the horrific impacts of Canada's residential school system.

In Part V, Sacco explores the impact on the Dene of becoming more connected to the outside world. He talks with Dolphus Jumbo, chief of the Dehcho region community of Trout Lake, a town of fewer than one hundred people. It is located one hundred kilometers  from the Mackenzie Highway. 

Trout Lake has always been seen as being least affected by civilization. Dolphus himself is a survivor of the residential schools. In Trout Lake, the old ways lasted until the 1970's when the last family came in from the bush. Slowly, Trout Lake was transformed from the old Dene ways of nomadic life to settling down in a house with a mortgage. Despite his experience with the residential schools, he's not willing to condemn all the priests, mainly because of his experience with Father Mary, a French priest who worked in the area for over thirty-five years and who became part of the community, learning the language and eating the food. Dolphus believes that they have to continue the Roman Catholic faith because it's become part of the Dene culture. At the same time, he feels that the community of Trout Lake has not really been finding the right balance between modern culture and the old ways.

Jessica Jumbo, Dolphus's daughter explains how the community changed over time with land claims and the problems bred by handouts: self-sufficiency versus dependency on welfare. Trout Lake is very different than its sister community, Fort Liard, which used to be part of the same band. Fort Liard broke away from the Dehcho Process instituting their own land claim, and confronting neighbouring Dene communities (Trout Lake and Nahinni Butte) have made others hate them. Chief Harry Deneron of the Acho Dene Koe First Nation is interested in bringing in the resource extraction industry to remove the social handouts that have devastated his community.

In Part VI, Sacco interviews the younger Dene who are interested in advocating for their communities. Willard Hagen says the government process of pulling people out of the bush to educate them, took away their independence. When the jobs in the resource sector dried up, they turned to welfare. He's interested in promoting the economy, but he says they need to determine how to get the benefits without too much impact to the land.

Eugene Boulanger, a Shuhtaot'ine Dene from Tulit'a believes that they must do better, be better men and challenge themselves. He belongs to the group, Dene Nahjo "The Dene Way" whose motto is "land, language, culture - forever." These younger Dene are rediscovering their culture, reclaiming aspects of the way their ancestors lived, pre-contact. This way of life was lost in the generation that attended the residential schools.

Discussion

Paying The Land offers a detailed look into the ongoing Dene efforts in reclaiming their ancestral lands and their identity, through interviews with many of the stakeholders in the Dene communities. Accomplished comic artist, Joe Sacco wanted to write about how "resource extraction intersects with indigenous peoples." Eventually he was able to arrange a visit to the Northwest Territories with the help of Shauna Morgan who planned the trip, acted as driver and guide. Sacco made those visits in 2015 and 2016 and after years of writing, has produced a truly informative book that explores the effects of colonialism, the residential schools, and resource extraction on the Dene people.

The graphic novel format is often associated with fiction and less serious subject matter. However, Sacco's renowned artistic abilities, and his attention to detail, help to make this format the ideal medium to educate and inform readers on the issues of land claims, indigenous identity and governance. He's done an admirable job that he hopes will meet the approval of the indigenous communities he met during his visits.

At times, the stories are truly heartbreaking; the effect of alcoholism in families that leads to physical and sexual violence, suicides and self harm, the children forcibly taken from their large, loving families, the destruction of their beliefs and language.

There are many complex issues highlighted in the book. Today's young Dene leaders are attempting to reclaim their culture and their way of life. But their parents who are the product of the residential school system, have often lost their knowledge of the land and their culture. Some have been able to reclaim it but many have not. So their children are having to turn to the elders, their grandparents and great-grandparents to recover this knowledge. It is not just language skills, but how to cut wood, hunt caribou and moose, how to tan a moose hide, how to live as a community where everyone knows their place and their identity. And in some cases, it can be very difficult because there may be no one in a community who has such skills.

A second issue is the reclaiming of their ancestral lands from government treaties negotiated in bad faith by the various Canadian governments. The process of going through territorial and government organizations is complicated, time consuming and not very successful. Sacco is able to portray the complexity of the process and how it has come to divide communities and Dene nations. Some are now advocating that the Dene do what the Haida have done - simply live on the land and be Dene. It is their land and they have lived there since "time immemorial" .

A third issue revolves around what kind of life to live on their land: a return to the bush or working to set up sustainable industries on land that has many natural resources? These are options that no one person or Dene nation necessarily agree on. There are good and bad points to both ways, but one thing is clear from Sacco's many interviews, young people must be steered away from the government handouts and learn to be self-sufficient and to live productive lives without alcohol and drugs. Paying The Land shows that the Dene, like many other Indigenous peoples, are still struggling to overcome the inter-generational fallout from the residential system, the loss of their culture and the exploitation of their land by governments and businesses.

Sacco ends by questioning his own culture, one that doesn't consider the land. The Dene practice of paying the land means giving back to the land, respecting it. Near the end of the book, Joe and Shauna visit the Giant Mine, which extracted gold, and in the process produced tons arsenic trioxide. Joe wonders about his own culture, "What is the worldview of a people who mumble no thanks or prayers, who take what they want from the land, who pay it back with arsenic?"

For those looking to understand indigenous issues in Canada's far north, Paying the Land offers considerable insight in a truly engaging format. While Sacco includes many small maps throughout the book, a larger version of the maps showing the region, the different Dene nations and the land claims would have been helpful. Paying The Land is a must-read for those interested in exploring Indigenous issues in Canada's far north. It offers a good starting point to begin learning about these complex issues.

Further reading:

About the Dene nation: https://denenation.com/about/history/

Dene land claims: https://www.eia.gov.nt.ca/en/priorities/concluding-and-implementing-land-claim-and-self-government-agreements/sahtu-dene-and-3

Sahtu land claims:https://www.srrb.nt.ca/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=176&catid=99

Fr. Rene Fumoleau's stories:https://www.storytellers-conteurs.ca/en/featured-storytellers/Rene-Fumoleau.html

The Canadian Encyclopedia: Comprehensive land Claims: Modern Treaties: https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/comprehensive-land-claims-modern-treaties

Book Details:

Paying The Land by Joe Sacco
New York: Metropolitan Books/Henry Hold and Company      2020
264 pp.

DaVinci's Cat by Catherine Gilbert Murdock

Eleven-year-old Sir Federico Gonzaga, son of Duke Francesco II of Mantua and Lady Isabella d'Este of Ferrara is a "guest" of Pope Julius II in the Vatican. He is in fact being held hostage by the pope to guarantee that his father, who leads the pope's army will not be lured away by France. So Federico lives in a villa with his nurse, Celeste, a quarter mile from the pope's residence.

On this night, Federico can see the people attending a banquet. The smells and sounds make him hungry so he sets off to retrieve a platter of figs from the pope's new study. Federico had been sitting in the study in the afternoon while Master Raphael Sanzio painted Federico's portrait. He decides to travel the corridor connecting the villa to the pope's palace. On the way Federico passes a large wooden box.

In the pope's new study, he finds Michelangelo Buonarroti at work. Federico is surprised to see the sculptor, but finds the figs and eventually walks back to the villa. On his way he hears a sound near the strange box, which upon closer inspection appears to be a kind of closet. He finds a kitten, tawny coloured with black-tipped ears in the closet. After playing with Federico, the kitten enters the closet and disappears. As the bells of the church strike midnight, he hears the cat meowing but when Federico opens the door of the closet, he finds a full grown cat.

The next morning, Federico purchases a collar of red leather trimmed in pearls for the cat who keeps him company through his lessons. That night Federico attends a banquet hosted by a cardinal and his nephew where he learns that the strange wooden closet was a present from the King of France to the pope. Later that night when Federico examines the closet, he notices that the gems in the closet door are glass balls forming the tips of an eight point star with symbols above. The inside of the closet has eight mirrors and on the back of the closet door is a glass globe containing water.

As the church bells toll midnight, the cat leaps from Federico's arms into the closet. But when he reaches in to grab the cat, out steps a man, strangely dressed who asks Federico  where he is and the date. Federico tells him it is 1511 and he is in the Vatican Palace. While giving the man a tour of the Vatican, Federico learns the cat is called Juno and the man is Herbert Bother of New Jersey. Herbert has studied art and sells sketches. After sharing with Federico, chocolate filled with peanuts, he suggests that Federico bring him sketches from Raphael and Michelangelo in exchange for more chocolate. He tells Federico to return at midnight, which is when the closet works.

The next day the French ambassador reveals to Federico that the closet was designed by Leonardo Da Vinci, who now works for the King of France. The ambassador tells Federico that DaVinci had the idea to send things through the air, but there was an accident and he refused to use the closet any more. He told the ambassador that he'd lost his "little Juno". Federico sneaks into the pope's private office and steals a sketch of an old man signed by Michelangelo for his friend Herbert. As he's leaving he learns that Raphael's papers have been stolen.

At midnight Herbert returns via the wardrobe and Federico gives him the sketch in exchange for chocolate. Federico realizes that Herbert has stolen the Raphael papers and he tells him he needs to return them. Herbert cannot because they have already been sold in his time, making him well off. Herbert reveals to Federico that the closet on his side of time came from a trunk he found in a junk shop in Mantua. After reading a notebook by DaVinci about a closet machine, he was able to turn the trunk back into the closet. Out of the closet came a little kitten - DaVinci's kitten. Herbert explains to Federico that he comes from a country called America that does not yet exist in his time and that it is 1928 in his time. He now wants Federico to arrange for him to see Raphael and also the Sistine Chapel.

When Herbert returns the next night he tells Federico that twelve years have passed in his time. He has with him an unsigned sketch of a boy he found in the trunk from Mantua and both believe it was done by Raphael. Herbert wants Raphael to sign it so that he can sell it. This means travelling to Raphael's house in the middle of the night. However, his plan collapses when they are seen by the Swiss Guards and Herbert finds a girl dying in the gutter. He flees into the closet with the girl and does not return.

The story now moves into the twenty-first century with eleven-year-old Beatrice (Bee) Bliss and her mom staying at a house in New Jersey while her mother attends a conference. She was supposed to be visiting her grandparents in Italy right now but they won a last minute cruise. Her second mom, Moo helped the couple who own the house and they have offered the use of their house which was once the home of a doctor. Mom tells Bee that a sketch done by Michelangelo was found in the home and it was sold for millions of dollars. 

That evening Bee pulls the neighbour's cat away from catching a bird. When she takes the cat to the house next door, the elderly woman, Miss Bother startles Bee because she seems to recognize her. That night at the neighbours home, Miss Bother tells them that her father saved her from diphtheria by rushing her to the doctor who owned the house they are staying in. She shows them a drawing hidden behind a painting her father Herbert Bother did of a peacock. The drawing is that of Bee with her scar from the can opener and a mole. She tells them that her father found it in Italy before he found her and that it is probably the work of Raphael.

When Bee's mom leaves for her conference, she is left alone at the house. Soon she realizes that Miss Bother is in trouble next door and makes her way into the house only to discover that the elderly woman has fallen on the stairs.As they are waiting for the ambulance, Miss Bother tells Bee that her father tried to go back to Rome to get Raphael's signature on the drawing but he found her and never returned. 

Puzzled by the elderly lady's story, Bee investigates the house and discovers the closet on the third floor in Herbert Bother's old office. Thinking the closet is like the wardrobe in Narnia, Bee decides to enter it. She doesn't realize she's about to embark on the greatest adventure of her life.

Discussion

DaVinci's Cat is a modern story of time travel, in which a young girl from the present meets a boy from 500 years in the past. Together they must work together to save their families from the changes they cause. This unique story is crafted around the real historical figures of Federico II Gonzaga, Pope Julius II, Michelangelo and Raphael.

Federico was indeed held hostage by Pope Julius II to ensure his father Federico I remained loyal. Federico was born May 17, 1500 to Francesco II Gonzaga and Isabella d'Este. He became Marquis of Mantua in 1519 under the regency of his mother. Although he was slated to marry Maria Palaeolongina, he eventually married her sister, Margaret after Maria died prematurely. Federico was a patron of the arts and had the Palazzo Te built for himself.

Pope Julius II led the Catholic Church from 1503 until 1513. He was a patron of the arts in the High Renaissance, establishing the Vatican Museums, commissioning Michelangelo to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel and Raphael to paint the frescos in the Raphael Rooms. Julius II was very much involved in Italian politics during his reign as pope and was a singular force in protecting the integrity of the papacy.

Murdock also offers a portrayal of Michelangelo Buonarotti, showing him as an intense, creative individual who felt his genius was not much appreciated. He is described as a smelly, uncouth given to being very impulsive. His rivalry with the younger Raphael is also featured in DaVinci's Cat.

The novel uses time travel to bring together two children from very different time periods. Federico Gonzaga is the son of an Italian prince. The device is a wardrobe or closet, reminiscent of the wardrobe in Narnia.  Did Leonardo DaVinci ever create the special closet in DaVinci's Cat? Not likely, but this Italian artist famous for his paintings of the Mona Lisa and the Last Supper, was also an inventor who had many interesting ideas. And it's DaVinci's cat that travels back and forth between the two times, befriending both Federico and Bee.

In the novel Federico is separated from his family, lonely and very self-centered. His desire for a friend leads him to behave badly and make two wrong choices: he steals from Michelangelo and he steals the key to the Sistine Chapel and takes Raphael to see the ceiling, against the expressed wishes of Michelangelo who has forbidden anyone from seeing the paintings. This latter event has the effect of changing time; Michelangelo flees Rome in a fury, never to finish the Sistine Chapel which is painted over by Bramante. Both Michelangelo and Federico die in 1511, ending the Gonzaga family line.  Without the Sistine Chapel to study, Bee's mom and Moo never meet and she is never born. 

When Federico learns the consequences of his actions, he vows to never disobey again. Instead  he becomes focused on saving his family and makes many sacrifices to accomplish this task. He thinks his way through the problem at hand, appealing to Michelangelo's vanity, telling him he will become famous and live on in his art. In the same way, Bee attempts to save her family by also appealing to Raphael's vanity. Ultimately, Federico comes up with a way to ensure the drawing of Bee ends up back  in the trunk Herbert finds in Mantua, five hundred years later.

However, it is the turbulent relationship between Michelangelo and Raphael that Murdock mostly focuses on and that drives the plot forward in the latter half of the novel. Although Michelangelo Buonarotti saw Raphael as a rival, the latter greatly admired Michelangelo's genius. When Michelangelo discovers that Raphael has seen his work, he impulsively abandons work on the Sistine Chapel. It is this action which sets in motion drastic changes to the timeline affecting both Federico and Bee.

Murdock does incorporate some modern themes into her storyline. Beatrice Bliss is part of a very modern family with two moms, whom she calls Mom and Moo. In contrast is Miss Bother who grew up with only an adopted father. The message to children of course, is that families can be of any arrangement. 

The exquisite book cover will be sure to draw in young readers.Those who enjoy time travel, adventure and learning about art will want to read DaVinci's Cat. There are plenty of ideas to explore here: the feasibility of time travel, the life and artwork of DaVinci, Michelangelo and Raphael, Pope Julius II, Federico Gonzaga and life in the High Renaissance. Younger readers will find Murdock has incorporated some interesting facts along the way, such as Italians eating spaghetti with cinnamon sugar (tomatoes would not come to Italy until the mid-1500s and were introduced by the Spaniards from Mexico), and hose with leather soles sewn into them. DaVinci's Cat is a interesting historical adventure novel for juvenile readers.

Book Details:

DaVinci's Cat by Catherine Gilbert Murdock
New York: Greenwillow Books    2021
278 pp.

The Forest of Stolen Girls by June Hur

It is 1426, five years after the events in the ancient Gotjawal Forest. Eighteen-year-old Hwani is travelling to Nowon village on Jeju Island, a penal island for political prisoners.   She is disguised as a man and is travelling with her father's badly burned five-stitched black notebook. It was sent to her by a stranger named Boksun. How does Boksun know her father and why has she sent her the journal?

Hwani's father, Detective Min has disappeared on the island.Commander Ki told Hwani that her father had gone to Jeju to investigate the disappearance of several girls.

On the boat travelling from Mokpo port to Jeju, Hwani meets a middle-aged man who questions her about her journey. Without revealing her identity, she tells him that relatives of Detective Min have asked her to investigate his disappearance. He warns Hwani that she shouldn't listen to the rumours from the peasants in the village about their missing daughters. Hwani learns that this man is Magistrate Hong. He tells her that he told Detective Min that they girls were all pretty, tired of poverty and likely ran away to escape their lives.

Hwani wonders if she's been foolish in coming to Jeju. Commander Ki had declared her father dead after a twelve month investigation in which only the left sleeve of his outer robe had been recovered in Gotjawal Forest. She wonders though, why her father would care about this case since it's outside of his jurisdiction. But the note left in his chamber, questioning if a man can "undo his errors? Undo his sins?" bothers her.

Hwani becomes lost trying to find her way across Jeju Island to Nowon village. After asking an old woman for directions, Hwani asks about the village. The old woman tells her that thirteen girls have gone mission in the past four years but that recently an elderly resident saw the missing thirteenth girl running through the woods near Seonhul village. The girl, Hyunok did not return back to her parents ask expected and the woman thinks she may be dead.

With the old woman's directions, Hwani is able to remember the location of the shaman's hut. Hwani lived in Nowon for the first thirteen years of her life. She would visit Shaman Nokyung, the woman whom her sister Maewol was taken to by their father five years earlier at age ten.

When Hwani arrives at the jeomjip, the shaman tells her about a witness claiming to have seen one of the girls being taken by a man in a white mask. This immediately calls to mind the Forest Incident in which Hwani and her sister were found in the forest unconscious next to a dead girl. While Hwani remembers nothing, her sister saw a man in a white mask.  The shaman tells Hwani that her father returned to Jeju because he believed that Maewol as a witness, from the Forest Incident might be in danger. He hoped to solve the case. The shaman advises Hwani to return home, get married and live her life, that her father is dead.

However, later that evening the villagers arrive at the shaman's hut, asking that Shaman Nokyung come with them to Mount Halla where the body of the missing thirteenth girl has been found. Instead, Maewol and Hwani go. The victim's sister, Koh Iseul tells Hwani that a villager named Chul discovered Hyunok. They find her at the base of a cliff, face up. When Hwani and a man named Scholar Yu examine the body they find that Hyunok had been bound at the wrists and ankles.

As Hwani continues to investigate she learns from Maewol what really happened in the forest five years previous. She also begins to develop a list of potential suspects that include Convict Baek who was tied to Hyunok's family through a debt they owed him, Shaman Nokyung, Village Elder Moon who seems to have not been able to find enough evidence to convince the magistrate to act and Magistrate Hong who refuses to act.

But when Hwani with the help of Maewol begin to close in on the truth, events turn deadly. Can Hwani save herself, her sister and the missing girls?

Discussion

The Forest of Stolen Girls is the sequel to Hur's first novel, The Silence of the Bones. Set in fifteenth century Korea, the novel has as its basis the practice of human tribute, a practice in Asia of acknowledging a country's preeminence (usually but not restricted to China) through the payment of tribute. Hur explains the concept and practice very well in her Historical Note at the back of the novel. In thirteen-century Goryeo dynasty-era Korea, tribute was paid to the Mongol empire who ruled the country. Horses, fur and over two thousand Korean maidens were taken against their will as a form of tribute. When Mongul rule was followed by the Ming Dynasty in China, countries wishing to have a formal relationship with China were required to continue the tradition of paying the tribute. Korea was one of several countries who entered the tribute system. Once again, young Korean girls and women were taken against their will to the Ming dynasty. This practice in Korea ended in 1435.

Hur uses the practice of tribute as the event that triggers a series of disappearances and murders, including that of Hwani and Maewol's father, Detective Min. The story is a complex one that Hur adeptly weaves, leading readers to a thrilling resolution.The story is told by Hwani, a determined, intelligent young woman who amazingly survives attempted murder, poisoning by arsenic and a kidnapping. 

Set against the main story of Hwani attempting to determine her father's fate and unravel the connection between the missing girls and her family's encounter in the forest five years previous, is the devastating effect the tribute had on families in Korea. Families hid their young daughters, especially those who were considered very beautiful, father's scarred the faces of their beautiful daughters as Village Elder Moon had done, and bribes were offered to emissaries to save beloved daughters from the terrible fate. This later situation resulted in another girl being chosen to take her place. This is the situation Hwani uncovers in the village of Nowon.

A subplot is the sibling rivalry between Hwani and her younger sister, Maewol, supposedly abandoned by their father twice; once in the Forest Incident and then subsequently when it is believed she has a calling to be a shaman. This abandonment has resulted in the sisters not trusting one another when they are first reunited with Hwani's visit to Nowon. However, as they spend more time together, Hwani and Maewol begin to accept each other. Hwani, always believing their father loved her more, begins to realize that her father also deeply loved his younger daughter Maewol too. Together they solve the case of the missing girls and discover the fate of their father.

The Forest of Stolen Girls is highly recommended to fans of historical fiction as it explores a historical period in a country not often written about. As with her first novel, Hur does an excellent job of portraying fifteenth century Korea, populating her story with believable characters and creating exciting situations that engage the reader. The Forest of Stolen Girls has been nominated for the White Pine Award. 

Book Details:

The Forest of Stolen Girls by June Hur
New York: Fiewel and Friends Book      2021
369 pp.

Sergeant Billy by Mireille Messier

Sergeant Billy was a goat who travelled with a group of Canadian soldiers to the muddy trenches of France during World War I.

At the beginning of World War I, a train full of soldiers stop in a small prairie town and spy a goat named Billy. The soldiers ask Daisy, the young girl who owns the goat, if they can borrow him.They believe he will bring them good luck in the war. Daisy agrees and so Billy travels to training camp with the soldiers. They decide to call  him Private Billy.

Private Billy marched and trained with the soldiers of the 5th Battalion. When it was time go to England then on to war, the Colonel told his soldiers they could not take Billy. However, they couldn't part with their mascot and they managed to sneak him onto the ship.

When it came time for the Fighting Fifth to leave England and begin fighting, they were told Private Billy could not accompany the troops. Mascots were not allowed at the front. So determined to bring Private Billy to France, they purchased a large wooden crate of oranges, sold them and used the crate to smuggle the goat onto the ship.

In the trenches, Private Billy didn't seem to mind the mud, the rats or the bad food. When rations were low, Private Billy ate the colonel's papers! For that he was arrested and put in jail. But Private Billy was forgiven when the colonel saw how unhappy his men were without their mascot. Private Billy was promoted to sergeant for his role in the battalion. At Ypres, he captured an enemy soldier. At Hill 63, Sergeant Billy got trench foot and at Hill 70 he was shell-shocked. He even saved some soldiers lives at Festubert when he butted them into a trench, saving them from an incoming shell. He even became a decorated war hero being awarded the Mons Star.

After the war, the Fifth Battalion returned Sergeant Billy to Daisy in 1919.

Discussion

Sergeant Billy is the true story of a goat adopted by a group of soldiers as they passed through Saskatchewan, enroute to war. It is a story reminiscent to that of Winnie, a bear cub found by Harry Colebourn at a train station and who would become Winnie the Pooh,

Billy the goat was adopted by the 5th Battalion C.E.F. in 1914 as the soldiers headed east by train.The battalion was organized on August 10, 1914 and headed by train to Camp Valcartier in Quebec. On the way, the train stopped at Broadview, Saskatchewan where they saw Daisy Curwain and her goat Bill. The men wanted Bill as their mascot and Daisy agreed. 

After their training at Valcartier, they travelled with Billy on the S.S. Lapland at Quebec in a convoy with naval escort from Gaspe" on October 3, 1914. They arrived at Plymouth on October 14, 1914 and disembarked at Devonmouth on October 20th. The battalion spent the winter of 1914-15 training on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, England. 

When the battalion received orders to go to the front,  they were told animals were not allowed to be brought along. The men, determined to bring along their mascot, purchased a crate of oranges from a woman and Billy was placed into the crate and spirited onto the ship. The battalion travelled on the S.S. Lake Michigan arriving at St. Nazaire, France on February 14, 1915.

Life in the trenches appealed to Billy who loved canteen beer and often ate any papers he found. All of the events described in Messier's delightful picture book actually happened. Messier tells all the basic facts of Billy the goat's service in World War II. At the back is a short section on animals in World War I along with some photographs of Sergeant Billy with his beloved troops and on display in the Broadview Museum in Saskatchewan. Canadian artist, Kass Reich handpainted the illustrations using gouache and then added details digitally. 

Sergeant Billy is another interesting picture book that highlights the role animals have in helping soldiers during war. In Sergeant Billy's case, he not only helped with morale but even saved the lives of some soldiers.

Book Details:

Sergeant Billy: The True Story of THE GOAT Who Went To War by Mireille Messier
New York: Tundra Books   2019

The Incredible Nellie Bly by Luciana Cimino and Sergio Algozzino

It is December, 1921 and the college periodical of Columbia University wants to publish a special issue celebrating American journalism in honor of the tenth anniversary of Columbia's Journalism school. Miriam, a fictional student at Columbia University's School of Journalism, wants to write about Nellie Bly's investigation of the insane asylum almost thirty years ago. Despite the passage of time, women journalists are still assigned frivolous topics and there are limited employment opportunities. Miriam hopes that by learning about Bly's experiences, she can highlight just how little has changed for women.

Miriam reaches out to Bly but is repeatedly turned away until finally Miss Bly gives in and agrees to see her. Miriam tells Bly that she wants to write an article about her to start a public debate about the issue of so few women admissions to Columbia's journalism school. But Bly remembers how in 1885, she wrote a letter to the Pittsburgh Dispatch, protesting an article denigrating those women who wanted to work. Bly signed her letter anonymously but came forward when Mr. Madden published an add asking the writer to come forward. Madden offered Bly whose name then was Elizabeth Cochrane, the opportunity to write an article about the status of women. She was paid and she got to know Wilson, the author of the offending article better. 

Miriam asks Bly how she came to have these modern ideas back then. Bly tells Miriam her real name and that she was born in 1864 during her mother's second marriage.  Her family lived in Pennsylvania and were well off, until her father's death. Her mother remarried a man who was violent and an alcoholic.Her mother left the abusive marriage and asked for a divorce. Seeing what her mother went through, Elizabeth decided she wanted to make sure she was economically independent.

When Bly refuses to tell Miriam about her investigation of the insane asylum because she believes she is "playing" at journalism, Miriam tells her she is "blinded by her own prejudice." Miriam informs Bly that she comes from a poor family and has had to work in a doctor's office. She reminds Bly that her mentor, Joseph Pulitzer founded Columbia's journalism school.

However, Bly relents and invites Miriam back the next evening to talk.But before talking about the asylum, Bly tells Miriam how she wanted to investigate the working conditions of female factory workers. There were stories about poor working conditions and low wages. Wilson convinced the paper's editor, Madden and suggested Bly disguise herself as a factory worker. Bly's reports caused a stir and threats from angry industrialists to withdraw their advertisements from the Pittsburgh Dispatch.

Bly continues, telling Miriam about her failed attempt to work in Mexico as a foreign correspondent, her decision to eventually leave for New York. In New York, Chief Editor Mr. Cockerill believed Bly to be an amateur and proposed that she prove herself by investigating Blackwell's Island, New York City's female mental institution. Posing as a mentally ill woman, Bly spent ten traumatic days in the institution but her report was ground changing.

Bly also tells Miriam about her investigation of women workers in factories, something she began while in Pittsburgh and her interview with Belva Ann Lockwood, who ran in the 1888 U.S Presidential election! She finally relates the events that led to her undertaking a journey around the world  for which she became famous.

Miriam comes to learn that some of Nellie's greatest accomplishments were ones that didn't garner much publicity. While she continued to cover the Pullman's Factory strikes and interview people like Eugene V. Debs, Emma Goldman and feminist Susan B. Anthony, she also reported from the front lines of World War I and quietly helped abandoned children and women in need.

Discussion

The Incredible Nellie Bly is an engaging account of the early life of Elizabeth Cochran Seaman whose pen name was Nellie Bly. A solid Introduction written by British journalist and author David Randall provides the basics of Nellie's life and is the perfect lead-in to this well done graphic novel. The authors use a story within a story to portray Nellie Bly's remarkable life. Fictitious journalism student Miriam decides to interview Nellie in 1921 in order to highlight the barriers women still are encountering in gaining admission to Columbia's school of journalism. Through these interviews, Nellie tells her story to an admiring Miriam.

Nellie's early family story is a bit unclear from the graphic arts panels: Her father,  Michael Cochrane had ten children with his first wife, Catherine, remarried and had five more children with his second wife Mary, including Elizabeth Cochrane. It was Elizabeth's stepfather, her mother Mary's second husband who was an alcoholic and abusive. However, for the most part the details of Nellie's story are well portrayed in the graphic artwork and the accompanying text.

Cimino and Algozzino incorporate not only the important events of Nellie's professional career but also their significant impact on social conditions of the late 1800s. For example, her investigative report on Blackwell's Island resulted in more funding to mental institutions and major reforms of other public institutions, while her investigation of women workers in factories helped increase the number of women editorial staff at The World.

Nellie also encourages Miriam to be persistent in spite of how she's treated by her editors and by Karl, when she takes her to see Belva  Ann Lockwood's grave. She also encourages Miriam to consider having both a career and marriage after Karl proposes but tells Miriam her work as a  journalist is a "hobby". 

Graphic artist Sergio Algozzino writes in his About The Artist at the back of the novel, that he was looking for a different technique to tell Nellie Bly's story. He "wanted a full, important line..." and after struggling to find the right tool, ended up creating the superb panels digitally.

The Incredible Nellie Bly captures her courage, determination and willingness to break social conventions in order to gain the right for women to be treated with respect and equality. This is still a timely lesson for today's young women and is done beautiful in this excellent graphic novel.

Book Details:

The Incredible Nellie Bly by Luciana Cimino and Sergio Algozzino
New York: Abrams Comic Arts  2019
144 pp.

Trapped In Hitler's Web by Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch

It is October 1942. Nathan Segal and Maria Fediuk are considering the ad on the wall outside the Reich Employment Office, in Nazi-occupied Lviv, Ukraine. Nathan and Maria are from the village of Viteretz which they have fled because Nathan is Jewish.  He had escaped the Nazis and arrived at Maria's home begging for refuge. Now under the assumed identity of a Christian by the name of Bohdan Sawchuk who had been murdered by the Soviets, Nathan along with Maria have fled to Lviv. Maria has left behind her mother and her older sister, Krystia. 

Maria believes applying to work for the Reich, if effect, hiding in plain sight, might just be what works. The necessary forms are filled out and Maria sees that they have been assigned to work in a metalworks factory. The young typist, scans their forms and realizes Maria is only eleven years old and Nathan, just twelve years old. She carefully changes their work assignment to farm work in the Austrian Alps. They will be on the Huber farm in Thaur, Ostmark, the Nazi name for Austria.

At the train station, they are directed to the tracks where the train will take them to Innsbruck. Only Maria and Nathan along with a young girl Maya and her sister Krystia are waiting for that train. Maria learns that they were captured on the way to school.

When the train arrives, they are loaded onto a boxcar crammed with other kids, all exhausted. The train stops in Belzec where some children are removed and again in Vienna. Then at Salzburg, Nathan is forced off the train and Maria is made to go onto Innsbruck alone.

Maria is terrified, wondering if Nathan will be able to pass as a non Jew and if she will be able to survive without him. She arrives in Innsbruck but is locked up until the following morning when the farmer comes to pick her up. The man who comes to pick her up is Herr Lang, the father of Frau Huber who runs the farm. Herr Lang promptly takes Maria's passport and her identity papers.

Maria is surprised at the size of the Huber farm, which consists of "one large house, barns and sheds, and vast vegetable fields" many chickens and eight cows. The vegetable fields are filled with beets, carrots, cabbage and onions. There are also large fields of potatoes.

Beatrice Huber is disappointed at the arrival of only Maria when they were expecting many more workers. She sends Maria to dig potatoes with Bianka, another worker kidnapped in Warsaw.  At noon, Frau Huber tells Bianka and Maria they can take two potatoes from the field every day but warns them not to let anyone see them do this.

At lunch, while eating her ration of one black bun, the Maria and the other workers are visited by Blockleiter Doris Schutt who visits the farms, keeping track of the foreign workers as well as reporting on the Aryans like the Hubers and Langs.  She gives Maria a badge with the letter P on it signifying she is Polish. Bianka explains that because the area of the Ukraine she is from was part of Poland before the war, she is considered Polish. There are other workers who are from the Soviet Ukraine as well as Aryan workers from countries allied with Germany.

As the days pass, Maria begins to doubt her decision to work for the Nazis as a way of hiding from them. Harvesting the potatoes makes Maria think of all the starving people back in the Ukraine. As she is forced to cook delicious meals for the Nazi youth who come to the farm to help the harvest, Maria can't help but think of those who were robbed of the food they need to survive. Maria also learns that, despite what the poster said, they do not get Sundays off nor are they paid. She and the other workers must also deal with the cruel Blockleiter who continues to visit and scrutinize the workings of the farm almost every day. Even worse is Frau Huber's daughter, Sophie who belongs to the League of German Girls. Sophie is dismissive and abusive towards Maria and Bianka, calls her mother by the formal Frau Huber and spies on her own family for the Nazis.

When Frau Huber's son Otto returns from the Eastern Front, with a leg wound, he is not what Maria expects. After Sophie calls the Russians "subhuman", Otto reminds her that the people she considers "subhuman" are fighting with intelligence and bravery. Otto repairs the barn that Maria and Bianka sleep in and thanks her for the work done on the family farm. Unexpectedly he then offers her information on how to escape to Switzerland. With this new knowledge, Maria decides she has to try to find Nathan in Salzburg and pass on the information to him. But how will she travel to Salzburg without her identity papers?

Discussion

Trapped In Hitler's Web is another outstanding novel by Canadian author, Marsha Skrypuch. This book continues the story of the Fediuk family begun in her earlier novel, Don't Tell The Enemy. The focus on that novel was on the character of Krystia, Maria's older sister. Now Maria's story is told in Trapped In Hitler's Web, as she and Nathan flee further into the Reich, hoping to save themselves and help those back home.

In this novel, Skrypuch focuses on life in the Third Reich, specifically daily life in Austria, renamed Ostmark by the Nazis. Austria was annexed by Germany in 1938 and like other countries, its riches plundered to supply Germans and the Nazi army. The people who lived in Eastern Europe, in Poland and the Ukraine were labelled Slavs by the Nazis and considered "subhuman". It was Hitler's intent to starve and work them to death, emptying the rich lands of these countries so they could be resettled with German "Aryan" citizens. The war created a labour shortage in Germany and workers were brought in from Eastern Europe. While Jews were outright murdered in Eastern Europe, people like Maria, labelled Slavs and Poles and therefore considered subhuman, were tricked into coming to work in the Reich, believing they would be well fed and paid. This was not the case as Maria and Nathan quickly discover.

Maria is sent to a farm owned by Herr and Frau Lang and managed by their daughter Frau Huber, whose son Otto and husband are away fighting on the Eastern Front. The Langs do not support Hitler, but Frau Huber, although kind, seems to dislike "Slavs". However, as time passes, Maria realizes that Frau Huber tries to defy the Nazis in little ways, such as allowing the workers to take extra food.

Skrypuch portrays how Nazism effected family life in Austria. In particular, young people were indoctrinated to believe they were superior to other races and therefore had the right to treat them any way they wanted, even to beating and murdering people. In the novel,  Frau Huber has watched her daughter Sophie becoming increasingly more strident in her beliefs,  brainwashed by the Nazi youth group she belongs to. For example, at Christmas, Maria learns that Sophie and her family no longer celebrate Christmas. Instead of decorating a Christmas tree with traditional candles and festive ornaments, Sophie hangs a silver swastika on the Christmas tree. She tells Maria  "We celebrate Rauhnacht. Christ was a Jew. Why would we celebrate a Jew's birth? Our celebration is to give tribute to our holy father, Adolf Hitler." Sophie considers "A hanged Jew swinging on a scaffold" to be both interesting and funny. Shocked, Maria wonders, "What kind of world did I live in where people like Sophie thought it was funny to hang a replica of a murdered Jew onto a Christmas tree?"  When the tree is eventually cut and put up, Frau Huber does not allow her daughter to place the hanged Jew ornament on the tree.

This scene serves to show how Nazism perverted traditions. This scene is based on an old Bavarian tradition known as Rauhnaucht, celebrated during the Christmas season, and somewhat similar to Halloween in North America. People use incense to cleanse their homes of evil spirits (hence the word Rauch which means smoke) and sometimes dress in costumes, making noise to drive away monsters and evil beings. As with Halloween, children sometimes go from house to house asking for treats. But for Sophie, Christmas has lost its meaning and has turned macabre.

Skrypuch demonstrates how Nazism perverted family structure as well, removing children from the guiding influence of their parents, whom they were encouraged to address formally rather than the respectful, Mutter and Vater.

The years of Nazi socialism has also distorted social classes with the Aryan class simply stealing the property of murdered Jewish citizens. When Maria accompanies Frau Huber to Salzburg as she visits her wounded son, she begins to see the consequences of years of Nazi rule. The house Frau Schwarz lives in, has been stolen from a Jewish family who were likely executed.  Frau Schwarz steals designer dresses, has the labels removed and new false labels of her own shop sewn on. Maria sees people on the tram who are healthy looking, in contrast to the starving, emaciated slaves working on farms and on the bridge. Using the descriptions of every day events, Skrypuch is able to portray to her readers the contrast between those people enslaved by the Nazis and the "Aryan" population.

Throughout the novel, Maria struggles to come to terms with working for the Reich. Her initial intentions were good ones, to save Nathan and support her family. But when neither seems to have happened she experiences much internal conflict. As a result, she finds it difficult to accept Otto's thanks for her help on his family's farm. "I had mixed feelings about assisting anyone who was working on the Nazi side. I had come here for my own goals -- to help Nathan escape and to earn money so Mama and Krystia could survive the war. This farm was producing food for my enemy, and while I was helping the wrong side, what had I done for Mama, Krystia, or Nathan?"

One of the more poignant events in the novel occurs when Maria and Anna kneel in a small park opposite a Catholic church to hear Mass in Salzburg. Forbidden from entering the church by the laws in place, Maria and Anna find a place near the church. They are seen by the priest who blesses them and leaves the door ajar so they can hear the Mass. It's a touching example of the devotion many Catholics continued to have, despite serious persecution.

Trapped In Hitler's Web is a well written, interesting story that continues the saga of a cast of Ukrainian characters during World War II. The novel ends with Maria meeting up with her sister Krystia and learning some heartbreaking news about her family. They flee the Huber farm, narrowly escaping a death squad in the forest. With the death of Hitler and the end of the war, they finally arrive at a refugee camp and begin plans to travel to their Aunt Stefa Pidhirney in Toronto, Canada. 

The novel holds special significance for Marsha Skrypuch, whose father-in-law escaped both the Soviets and the Nazis by fleeing into the Reich where he worked as a farm laborer. He survived the war, ending up in a refugee camp. Trapped In Hitler's Web is a fine testament to him and many other survivors of the brutal Nazi regime.

Book Details:

Trapped In Hitler's Web by Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch
New York: Scholastic Inc.    2020
228 pp.

Escape From Syria by Samya Kullab, Jackie Roche & Mike Freiheit

In 2013, Amina lived with her entire family in one house. She loved walking home from school and visiting her Uncle Mahmoud to read his books. She would eat apples with her grandfather. Amina's family never thought Syria would be at war but her father explained that the roots of the conflict originated when Hafez al-Assad took control of the country. People lived in fear until 2000 when his son, Bashar came to power. Syrians were hopeful until a year into his rule, when he arrested those calling for democratic elections. Free speech, public gatherings were restricted and people were careful not criticized the government for fear of being watched.

But on March 15, 2011, everything got much worse when students in Dara'a, in southern Syria graffitied a wall with a resistance slogan. The students were arrested and possibly tortured. This outraged people and they began to demonstrate throughout Syria. As the unrest grew, Syria fell into civil war with soldiers from the Syrian army defecting to form a new group, the Free Syria Army or FSA. People were afraid that Assad was preparing to attack his own people in Aleppo.

When an explosion destroyed their home, Amina's father said they needed to leave. Amina's family - her parents, Walid and Dalis and her younger brother Youssef,  travelled to Lebanon where they planned to stay for only a few months and then return home. But their money ran out and they were forced to leave their apartment and live for two years in a refugee camp in Bekaa Valley. In the camp, Amina wants to work but her father tells her she must continue to go to school so that when the war ends she can attend university.

Lebanon was swamped with 1.3 million Syrian refugees. The country was still recovering from a fifteen year civil war and fears of another war were increasing.

Syrians were not allowed to assimilate into Lebanese society and were kept separate. This was because many extremists in Syria attempted to enter Lebanon to fight Hezbollah who were helping Assad. These extremists would bomb areas where Hezbollah had control. Because Lebanon did not have the infrastructure nor the money to cope with so many new people living conditions deteriorated and the schools were crowded. Amina was lucky to be able to attend school, learning in a new language. 

But one day Youssef became very ill with bacterial meningitis. The medication to save his life was expensive and the decision was made to have Amina leave school in order to work to help pay for Youssef's medications. Her father also made the difficult decision to not renew his residency papers meaning he could be arrested at any time in Lebanon. To make matters worse, the war in Syria was growing worse with many soldiers now abandoning the revolution and the emergence of jihadist and Islamist groups. Their dream of returning one day to Syria appeared to be vanishing.

Then Walid learned from his cousin about a potential way out of Lebanon. But when that failed, and just as the situation appeared even more dire, a new possibility appeared.  But do Walid and Dali have the courage to take it?

Discussion

Author Samya Kullab is currently a Baghdad-based Iraq correspondent for the Associated Press. In 2017, Kullab, in collaboration with illustrator Jackie Roche and colourist, Mike Freiheit, wrote Escape From Syria, about the Syrian refugee crisis in Lebanon. From 2013 to 2016, Kullab was a reporter and editor for Lebanon's Daily Star, covering the refugee crisis as it unfolded. 

Kullab observed first-hand, the refugee experience as well as the social and economic impacts on Lebanon as it absorbed almost a million displaced Syrians fleeing the war. In her novel's introduction, Kullab outlines some of the problems Syrian refugees experienced, problems which she vividly portrays in Escape From Syria.

This powerful graphic novel portrays the impact of the Syrian conflict through the character of Amina and her family. Kullab switches the narrative back and forth between the different time periods, gradually filling in the backstory as to how Amina and her family arrived in Canada. Amina and her family are now safe, living in Toronto, Ontario but she remembers times before the war when her mother made delicious dinners and her father, who owned a shoemaking business travelled the world. She also recollects the outbreak of the conflict and fleeing into Lebanon.Unlike many other refugee stories, the focus is not on Amina's family's escape from Lebanon. Fortunately, there was no dangerous sea crossing, although her father Walid almost drowned during his failed attempt to leave via human smugglers. 

Instead, Kullab focuses on what life was like in the refugee camps and how desperation can make good people do things they would never ever have considered. Conditions in the camp are terrible, with little food, poor sanitation and almost no schooling. A child who spends five to eight years in a camp, with no education, has poor prospects for a good life.Walid is determined Amina stay in school, until their circumstances become so dire that she is forced to work so they can pay for Youssef's medication.

The desperation is especially seen in the panels that show Amina meeting her friend Mona who was in her class in Aleppo. Mona offers Amina an invitation to her wedding but Amina is stunned because her friend is only thirteen years old! She is being married because her parents are afraid the camps are no longer safe. When Amina's mother brings up this idea, telling her they are considering the same, Amina refuses and runs out. Later at the UNHCR, Amina tells the case worker her mother wants to arrange a marriage for her as a means of protecting her.

Kullab reminds readers that even after finding safety in another country such as Canada, Syrian refugees struggle, feeling like outsiders as they work to adapt to a new country and culture. Walid tells Amina, "In Syria, I knew who I was. I knew the logic of the place, even when there was war. But here, I'm swimming in an ocean and I'm still searching for my footing."

Escape From Syria offers young Canadian readers an overview of the Syrian refugee crisis and how war, fleeing one's homeland and living in a refugee camp has a significant impact on the people experiencing these situations. The story is simply told, the art panels well crafted and coloured. Kullab presents the context of the story in her introduction and in the back matter fills in the details of quotes from the text in the End Notes. A brilliant, effective collaboration. Well done!

Book Details:

Escape From Syria by Samya Kullab
Toronto: Firefly Books       2017
95 pp.

Gaijin: American Prisoner of War by Matt Faulkner

It is Koji Miyamoto's thirteenth birthday on Sunday, December 7th, 1941. He has the radio on, listening to the Lone Ranger when the broadcast is interrupted by the announcement that the Japanese have attacked Pearl Harbor. Koji and his mother don't know where Pearl Harbor is, so they get out their atlas. Meanwhile they learn that thousands are reported dead or wounded.

Koji wonders if his father might have flown one of the attacking planes but his mother tells him this is ridiculous. Rumors are that President Roosevelt will declare war on Japan.

Although Koji tries to focus on his homework, it is impossible. That night he has a dream that his father was flying on the planes.

The next day Koji begins to experience hostility from people as he walks to school. He overhears people suggesting that every Japanese person should be sent back to Japan. And at school he gets into a fight after another student calls him a "Jap". Instead of helping him, Principal Dorfman accuses Koji of being a troublemaker.

Koji eats lunch alone and is refused entry onto a streetcar. He arrives home to find his mother crying and learns that FBI agents have taken their radio from anyone who is Japanese.

Koji's mother believes that things will quiet down, but the abuse continues both at school and on the street. Then they receive a letter informing them that Koji is to be sent to a "relocation camp" because he's considered an "enemy alien". 

The next morning his mother's attempted intervention at the army office doesn't work and instead Koji and his mother are assigned to the Alameda Downs Assembly Center. At home they learn they can only take two suitcases with them and they sell the rest of their possessions. They are also questioned by the FBI who want to know when Koji's mother last heard from her husband and Koji's father, Ichiro. She tells them he returned to Japan because his father was ill.

On relocation day, Koji and his mother Adeline are placed on a bus where they meet Ichiro's former employers, Hana and Yoshi Asai. They travel across San Francisco Bay to the Alameda Downs Assembly Center, which used to be a horse-racing track. There they are assigned to Stall 33, a horse stall that stinks of horse manure and urine. Dinner is a large room crammed with people eating spam, beans and turnip. 

The next morning when Koji takes a walk through the camp he is set upon by a group of teens and called "gaijin". Kohi gets into a fight, breaks a window and is taken to the commander who assigns him to work with his family's friend Mr. Asai. 

As the weeks go by, Koji continues to deal with the Japanese boys who refuse to accept him because of his fair hair and freckles, and who force him into stealing. He also believes his mother's apparent friendship with the camp commander is the source of gossip about her. But with Mr. Asai's help, Koji is able to break free of the gang tormenting him.

Discussion

Gaijin is based on the real life story of the author's great-grandmother Adeline Conlin, an Irish American woman who married a Japanese man in the 1920's. This inter-racial marriage was not accepted in neither Japan where the couple lived and had a daughter named Mary, nor in America where Adeline and Mary returned after the devastating earthquake of 1923. However, they found they were not accepted in Boston either, so they moved to Los Angeles, California. Mary married and had two children. With the bombing of Pearl Harbor, because Mary was part Japanese, she was forced to move with her two children to an internment camp. Adeline, who was not Japanese went with her daughter and grandchildren, travelling to Owens, California and then to Manzanar War Relocation Center. In 1943, the family was sponsored to move eastward, to Chicago. Falkner, in his back material titled, Finding Adeline, only learned about his family's past when he saw a post on the National Park Service-Manzanar website by Adeline's great-granddaughter, Anita asking for anyone who might be related to Adeline to contact her.

Through the graphic novel format, Faulkner portrays the story of a young Japanese American boy trying to find his place in the tumultuous world of World War II and the Pearl Harbor attack. The story is a personal one, because his own family experienced the lack of acceptance in both Japan and in America for being biracial. The focus in Gaijin is on the racism that a Japanese American boy, Koji experiences when America is attacked by the Japanese. The attack serves to focus the underlying racism towards Asian Americans that already existed in California and in other parts of the United States up until this time.

Koji not only experiences racism from white Americans, but when he arrives at the internment camp, he finds himself being attacked by Japanese Americans as well. He is called "gaijin", a derogatory term that means "outsider". Mr. Asai explains to Koji that the term is a very unkind one and he tells him to refer to his father as Issei or first generation, and that Koji is Nisei or second generation. 

Faulkner is able to effectively portray many of the problems Japanese Americans experienced during World War II. For example, many Japanese Americans were interrogated by the FBI who suspected them of being spies. In another example, Mr. and Mrs. Asai assume they have found someone decent to rent their home while they are away, in the internment camp. However, when Mr. Asai visits his property on a day pass, he discovers the tenants have broken into his shed and are using his property as though it is their own. Many Japanese Americans lost everything they owned prior to being sent to the camps, including their possessions, their homes, their businesses and their land.

Koji and Adeline's experiences are portrayed in illustrations using mainly brown, sepia and blue, creating a dreary and sad mood expected in being sent away to a concentration camp in a dusty desert. Koji's dreams are done in vivid red, orange and yellow.

Gajin offers young readers an excellent starting point for learning about this important era in United States history and to explore racism and how it impacts both perpetrators and victims.  Faulkner includes a variety of resources at the back including Books and Periodicals, Documentary Films and Websites.

Book Details:

Gaijin: American Prisoner of War by Matt Faulkner
New York: Hyperion Books      2014

The Triumphant Tale of the House Sparrow by Jan Thornhill

In this exquisite nonfiction picture book, author/illustrator Jan Thornhill explores the relationship between humans and the ubiquitous House Sparrow.

House Sparrows have lived around humans for more than ten thousand years. Despite the efforts to remove sparrows, they continue to thrive because they are so adaptable. In prehistoric times, another species of sparrow lived in the wild, in the Middle East. Every year it migrated. Then about twelve thousand years ago, as humans settled into an agrarian lifestyle, growing grain, the sparrow no longer needed to migrate to find food. Instead of building nests in the wild, it began to build them in the dwellings of humans, near wheat and oat fields.

The House Sparrow followed humans as they switched to an agriculture lifestyle, spreading from the Middle East into India, North Africa and Europe.As human settlements grew larger, from villages to towns and cities, the House Sparrow adapted, finding new ways to nest and feed. Their numbers increased to the point that they were considered a pest.

There is archeological evidence to show that the House Sparrow was used as a food source for humans and their pets.  An Egyptian tomb contained a falcon mummy with the remains of a House Sparrow in its stomach.

The House Sparrow's ability to adapt is shown by its spread throughout Britain. In 50 B.C. there were no House Sparrows in the British Isles. By the time the Roman army left Britain, four hundred years later, they were found everywhere on the island, likely brought across the English Channel by Roman ships.

As time marched on, the House Sparrow's ability to breed rapidly and in large numbers resulted in them being seen as a pest. Efforts in Europe to control their numbers were mostly unsuccessful. 

In the New World, the Americas and in Australia, there were still no House Sparrows. However, many new immigrants in America missed the song of the House Sparrow and it was finally successfully introduced in 1852. As with every other country, at first the House Sparrow was welcomed. But as its numbers increased drastically, it soon became a competitor for farmers and a nuisance in cities. This created a division in American society: some wanted to rid cities of the House Sparrow while others claimed their cheerful chirping and playful ways were beneficial. 

Despite a deliberate attempt to destroy House Sparrow nests and kill as many birds as possible, the population continued to grow. Until the beginning of the 20th century when the automobile began to replace horses. At this time, the Eurasian Tree Sparrow, a close relative of the House Sparrow, began to increase and become more widespread. In China there were so many Eurasian Tree Sparrows that in 1958 Chairman Mao declared a campaign to rid the country of the bird. Over one billion sparrows were killed. However, with the sparrows gone, insects destroyed China's crops and over the next three years, thirty million people starved. The drastic reduction in sparrows was a significant factor in the famine.

Despite this massive cull, by 1970 there were at least a billion of the House Sparrow and the Eurasian Tree Sparrow. Then the population of these two species began to decline drastically. It was listed as an endangered species. Scientist began to seek answers as to why the sparrows were not surviving. Part of that reason may be that we have changed how we live and the type of buildings we construct. Perhaps, like the canary in the coal mine, the decline of the house sparrow is indicative of some serious environmental issue. The House Sparrow is very adaptable and its population seems to now be recovering slightly.

Discussion

The Triumphant Tale of the House Sparrow details the story of the House Sparrow and its close relationship to humans through the centuries. The story is a fascinating one that most readers are unlikely to know much about. Acclaimed author, Jan Thornhill includes information about the House Sparrow's unusual behaviours, such as pushing the eggs and nestlings of other birds out of nest boxes as well as some of the bird's unique ability to adapt. For example, Thornhill writes, "It has learned to stay up after dark to catch insects attracted by artificial lights. It has discovered that it can control the parasites that trouble its young by adding nicotine-laden cigarette butts to its nests. It has even learned how to open doors." Accompanying each page of detailed text are digitally created illustrations by the author.

Thornhill has included a world map showing the distribution of the House Sparrow, a description of it's life cycle and a Glossary. There is also an interesting section titled, Wild Animals That Choose To Live With Us which features a list of animals who live in close proximity to humans and have developed some skills to help them do so. This picture book also contains a Resources section, and Selected References. The Triumphant Tale of the House Sparrow is a book for young readers interested in birds and the natural world.

Book Details:

The Triumphant Tale of the House Sparrow by Jan Thornhill
Toronto: Groundwood Books   2018

Harvey Holds His Own by Colleen Nelson

Harvey's back in a new adventure, after being returned home to his beloved Maggie. Now she's beginning seventh grade at St. Ambrose Academy along with her best friends Brianne and Lexi. Students attending St. Ambrose must earn twenty hours of volunteering by their winter break. The school list of volunteer opportunities includes Brayside Retirement Villa. Maggie's not sure that she could volunteer at Brayside, considering that was where Harvey, her West Highland terrier was found. Austin, the boy who found Harvey after he showed up at the front of Brayside, had taken him home, brought him back and forth to the villa but never really tried to find Harvey's owners. Still, Maggie liked Brayside and so she decides to volunteer there.

On Saturday, after meeting with Mary Rose Aguilar, the head nurse at Brayside, Maggie is given a tour of Brayside. She meets Mr. Singh who loves to motor around in his Cobra GT4 scooter and several of the other residents, many of whom remember and love Harvey. Maggie learns now to play cribbage and ends up playing the piano for some of the elderly residents. However, when she tells Brianne and Lexi that she has begun her volunteer hours at Brayside, she can sense her friends' disapproval.

Meanwhile, Austin continues to volunteer at Brayside, where his grandfather, Phillip has been the head custodian for seventeen years. At first Austin didn't like working at Brayside but as he got to know the residents his view changed. And he met Mr. Pickering who told Austin about his life growing up on a farm, his dog, General and his best friend Bertie. It was Harvey, the West Highland Terrier who brought them together.

Now the man occupying Mr. Pickering's old room is moving upstairs and a new person, Mrs. Josephine Fradette is moving in. Mrs. Fradette arrives in style, driving a red 1958 Chevrolet Bel Air. 

When Maggie returns the following Sunday, this time with Harvey, the dog remembers Austin, who seems overwhelmed to see Harvey. Maggie tells Austin that she will be spending time organizing the library and asks if she can leave Harvey with him.  Harvey immediately sets out to find Walt Pickering's old room but instead of finding his old, familiar friend, there is Mrs. Fradette, who is certainly different but friendly. Mrs. Fradette is trying to choose the photos for the collage that will go on the wall outside her room.

Maggie is organizing the library when Mary Rose checks in on her and asks her to help Mrs. Fradette with her unpacking. Maggie can immediately see that Mrs. Fradette is very different from the other Brayside residents. She seems more spry with her jet black hair. They quickly discover a connection as Mrs. Fradette tells Maggie she also attended St. Ambrose many years ago.  She reveals that she never finished seventh grade because the flood in 1950 closed all the schools. 

When Maggie asks what happened, Mrs. Fradette tells her the river came up to the steps of the school, and that the entire city shut down. People had to evacuate and many lost everything. Mrs. Fradette went to stay with her mother's family in Laurier, in northern Manitoba. As a young girl, Mrs. Fradette considered her time in Laurier as a "great adventure" that gave her the time to spend with her beloved grandpa, whom they called Pepere. Mrs. Fradette shows Maggie some photographs of the flood and tells her that her sister Yvonne and brother Michel along with their mother travelled by train to Laurier while her older brother Ronny and her father stayed behind to protect their house.

After her first visit with Mrs. Fradette, Maggie becomes more and more interested in volunteering at Brayside and in hearing Mrs. Fradette's story. At the same time she finds herself drifting away from her best friends Brianne and Lexi and beginning to look for new friends as she learns the value of true friendship. When Mrs. Weston attempts to get students interested in entering the historical essay contest, Maggie believes she just might have the perfect subject to write about.

Meanwhile Austin and Harvey discover a puppy abandoned in the garbage in an alley near Brayside. For the second time, Austin must give up a dog, this time to the shelter because his mother won't allow pets. But it is the discovery of a job posting for head custodian at Brayside, the leads Austin to focus on saving his grandpa's job. 

While all this is happening, Harvey begins to investigate an intruder in the backyard of Maggie's home. It is a female raccoon looking to winter in the shed and Harvey is having none of it. Determined to protect his Maggie, he stands his ground and confronts the raccoon and is badly injured. As she waits while Harvey is in surgery, Maggie draws on the lessons of courage, perseverance and the meaning of friendship that she's learned from Mrs. Fradette.

Discussion

Harvey Holds His Own is the second book about the spunky little West Highland terrier named Harvey. In this story, Maggie O'Neil and Austin reunite when they both do volunteer work as Brayside. In the first novel, it was the elderly Mr. Pickering who captured Austin's interest. In this novel, the eccentric Mrs. Josephine Fradette draws the interest of Maggie with her story about the 1950 Red River flood in Manitoba and her determination to become a car mechanic.

Most of the storyline involves the human characters, Austin and Maggie, both of whom are dealing with problems in their lives. Maggie's work at Brayside serves to accelerate the breakup of her friendship with Brianne and Lexi and teaches her the meaning of real friendship. This causes intense internal conflict because she wants to fit in at school with her friends, but finds herself changing as a result of her work at the retirement home. Maggie realizes that she never expected to find real friends at Brayside but that is what happens. When she's forced to choose between going to Tubby's with her friends or attending the party for Austin's grandpa, Maggie chooses the latter and is ridiculed by Brianne and Lexi. She begins to realize that maybe she's outgrowing her friends but instead of breaking the friendship she "stretches" it and reaches out to Sooyeon, the only other student in the class to enter the essay contest.   

A sign of Maggie's growing maturity is her ability to rethink how she views Austin and what happened when Harvey was lost. When Maggie first got Harvey back from Austin, she was furious that he hadn't tried to find Harvey's owners. But when Maggie returns to Brayside to do her volunteer hours and sees how Austin misses Harvey, she begins to soften. She "...wonders if maybe she judged him too harshly. Maybe Austin the Dognapper deserves a second chance."  And Austin is there for her when Harvey goes through surgery and begins to recover. "Of everyone in her life, he understood how much Harvey meant to her, because, she suspects, he means as much to Austin."

 Austin too notices the change in Maggie. "She's becoming like one of Mrs. Fradette's outfits, brighter and bolder. I'm not worried about Maggie using up her twenty volunteer hours anymore. She's here for the long haul." Mrs. Fradette provides an example for Maggie to make her own decisions. As her friendship with Brianne and Lexi seems to fall apart, Maggie realizes "She was used to going along with things, following Lexi's lead, but now..." Mrs. Fradette's act of defiance is the impetus for Maggie resisting peer pressure from Lexi to do whatever she suggests. This is a big step in her own personal growth.

The novel has plenty of heart-warming moments; when Mrs. Fradette is found at the train station with her pet deer by Pepere, Harvey's near death after his fight with the raccoon and Austin's surprise. Wanting to repay Austin for his friendship at such a painful time, Maggie manages to convince Austin's mother to let him adopt the abandoned puppy and arranges for friends at Brayside to pay for the adoption, vet costs and even a gift card. It's a touching moment, one friend giving back to another, but it also shows how much Maggie now thinks of Austin. He has been a steadfast friend.

Young readers will enjoy this unusual story that blends together many different themes seamlessly. Harvey, Austin and Maggie each tell the story from their third person perspective. Illustrator, Tara Anderson, seems to have captured Harvey perfectly in her lovely pencil sketches, despite never having met the author. A tribute to how well author Colleen Nelson has portrayed this delightful, spirited little Westie!

Book Details:

Harvey Holds His Own by Colleen Nelson
Toronto: Pajama Press    2020
282 pp.