Measuring Up by Lily LaMotte & Ann Xu

Cici loves life in her small town in Taiwan. She especially loves going to the morning market every Saturday with A-ma, her grandmother. She often cooks with A-ma, surprising her mother with things like tsui-kiau. Then one day Cici learns that her family is moving to America, but her beloved A-ma will be staying behind in Taiwan. Cici want A-ma to come with them, but she explains to that it is difficult to get a Green card. A-ma makes Cici promise to wash the rice, and Cici makes A-ma promise she will come visit next year when she turns seventy, which is an auspicious birthday.

Cici and her family move to Seattle, Washington. On her first day of school Cici makes two new friends, red-haired Jenna and Emily. But Cici is humiliated at lunch when her lunch of Taiwanese food attracts the attention of her classmates. As their friendship grows, Cici struggles to fit and and worries about being accepted. She's invited over to Emily's home, along with Jenna. Cici has fun, but when she learns that this was supposed to be a sleepover, she runs into trouble trying to explain this strange American custom to her parents.

Cici misses her old friends in Taiwan but she especially misses her beloved A-ma.Cici and her dad try unsuccessfully to convince A-ma to visit as each holiday comes about; the Lunar New Year, the Moon Festival and the Lantern Festival. Cici knows she has to think of a way to bring A-ma to America. She tells A-ma that it is only three months until her seventieth birthday and that her father would be cheered by her visit. A-ma agrees to come but doesn't know how she will pay for the plane ticket. Cici tells her she will figure that part out and asks her to keep her visit a secret.

Cici's friends try to help, offering suggestions as to how she can raise the money. One day while walking home with Jenna, they spot a sign for a kids cooking contest, Platinum Jr. Chef. The winner will earn a one thousand dollar prize! Cici signs up.

Cici tells her mother about her plan and she is impressed but she warns Cici that her father will be worried if her grades begin to slip. Cici begins practicing cooking so she will be ready for the first round of competition which begins in two weeks.

Can she pull of a win, earn the prize and bring her beloved A-ma to America?

Discussion

Measuring Up tackles some of the sensitive issues many new immigrants encounter as they settle into life in a new country. There is the struggle to be accepted in their new country, while maintaining many of the traditions and beliefs of their home culture. And in the case of many young Asian immigrants like Cici, there is the burden of dealing with intense parental expectations.

LaMotte captures Cici's stress about making friends and fitting in. Cici is not happy about leaving her home and friends in Taiwan but she has no trouble making two new friends. She wants badly to fit in and so she quickly ditches her Taiwan lunches after being teased about her pickled cucumbers looking like worms. Her school mates demonstrate a lack of understanding and knowledge about other cultures. While at Emily's house, Emily believes Cici can't understand English very well and speaks slowly. Her American classmates who learn that she is in a cooking contest,  assume Cici is Chinese, not understanding that there are many different Asian cultures and view Chinese food as "takeout" food and not real food.

But Cici eventually discovers that she and her friends are not so different. When they visit her family home and see the family altar, Jenna explains how her mother lights candles for her Irish grandparents and Emily tells her mother keeps her grandfather's ashes in an urn on the mantlepiece.

Both Cici and Miranda, her partner in the cooking contest are struggling to cope with parental expectations. Miranda's father owns a restaurant and his expectation is that she will someday work there and take over. However, she confides to Cici her big secret, that she doesn't want "to be a great chef or run the restaurant." She tells Cici that "Cooking isn't my thing. It's my dad's" and that she really wants to be an artist like her mother and draw comic books. Cici is surprised because Miranda lives in a large home with a state of the art kitchen and doesn't have the pressure of having to get good marks like she does.Eventually Miranda does tell her father what she wants for herself.

Cici's parents' motto is "good grades, good college, good job, good life". Her parents expect her to get very high marks. When Cici confesses her plan about the cooking contest to her father, he tells her that studying is more important. "But it is important that you spend your time studying. You could eventually be the head of a research lab.You could be better than me. You see that right? It isn't worth a few days of celebration for something that could affect the rest of your life." Cici begins to wonder if she wants what her father for her or if wants of if she wants something very different. She envies Miranda's opportunity to take over her family's restaurant because she wants to be a chef and not head of a research lab.

Two weeks before the final round and instead of focusing on Cici's accomplishment of making it to the final round, her father is concerned about her studying for her math test. When Cici doesn't quite get her usual excellent mark on a math test, she lies to her parents and eventually her father learns about her mark. He insists that she quit the competition, explaining that she must work harder than American students to prove herself. However, Cici manages to convince her dad by telling him how much it means for her to win and bring A-ma to America. Eventually Cici's parents come to see her cooking as an accomplishment, but only after she wins the competition.

While some of the story feels a bit contrived, for example Cici and her friend stumbling last minute onto a cooking contest that offers such a significant (and convenient) prize, the issues tackled in this graphic novel are all too real. Many new immigrants must bridge two cultures while satisfying the expectations of parents and new friends - they must measure up on more than one front.This novel  not only succeeds in highlighting these issues but LaMotte has managed to create and develop a cast of characters that feel realistic and engaging.

Measuring Up is Lily LaMotte's debut graphic novel and here's hoping there will be more graphic novels by this promising author. The story is very much helped along by the lovely illustrations of Ann Xu. The digital illustrations were created by using ink on paper and Adobe Photoshop.

Book Details:

Measuring Up by Lily LaMotte & Ann Xu
HarperAlley      2020
205 pp.

The Oldest Student: How Mary Walker Learned To Read by Rita Lorraine Hubbard & Oge Mora

The Oldest Student tells the story of Mary Walker, born a slave in 1848 and her remarkable feat of learning to read when she was 116 years old.

When Mary was a young girl, working in the fields, she often gazed at the birds flying above and wondered what it was like to be free. At age eight, she knew there was no time for daydreaming on the Union Springs, Alabama where she was a child slave. Mary also knew that slaves were forbidden from learning to read or write. Mary decided that one day when she was free, she would learn to read.

Mary, her mother and her siblings eventually became free with the issuing of the Emancipation Proclamation. While many freed slaves left the  South, Mary's family stayed. she and her mother, brothers and sister shared a one-room cabin. Mary worked at many different jobs to help her mother support their family. 

One day Mary was given a Bible by a group of evangelists as she traveled along a road. She couldn't read the words inside, but owning the Bible became her inspiration for learning to read. It would take Mary many decades before her wish came true.

Discussion

The story of Mary Walker is a lesson in determination, resiliency and the importance of life-long learning. Although not much is known about Mary's life between the ages of fifteen and one-hundred-sixteen, author Rita Lorraine Hubbard has creatively fleshed out her life story in an engaging way. Once Mary learned to read, her life took on a more public aspect. Her accomplishment was honoured by Chattanooga's mayor, the press and even the US Department of Education.

Inside the front and back covers of The Oldest Student, Hubbard has included photographs of Mary Walker and also included is an Author's Note about Mary's life, featuring a few more interesting details. A Selected Bibliography can be found in the front matter of the picture book. The illustrations accompanying the text were rendered in acrylic paint, china marker, coloured pencil, patterned paper, and book clippings by artist Oge Mora. 

Book Details:

The Oldest Student. How Mary Walker Learned To Read by Rita Lorrain Hubbard
New York: Schwartz & Wade Books           2020

A Whale Of The Wild by Rosanne Parry

A Whale Of The Wild tells the story of a young orca who endures a catastrophic event to save what's left of her family.

Vega is part of the Warmward Kinship of Great Salmon Eaters that includes her Greatmother Siria,  her mother Arctura, her Uncle Rigel, her younger brother Deneb, and her cousin Aquila and Aquila's son Altair.  Mother is carrying Vega's sister, Capella, and will soon give birth. Her pod live in the Salish Sea where they depend on the salmon that migrate from the sea back to the mountain streams every year.

Vega,  Mother and Greatmother have been unsuccessfully searching the islands and inlets of the Salish Sea for Chinook salmon.Vega is young and she doesn't yet have the skills to be a good hunter like Mother or a master wayfarer like Greatmother.

When Vega catches a salmon, Mother invites her to lead the family as a wayfarer to The Gathering Place, where their kin meet up to hunt the salmon. Disaster almost ensues when Vega attempts to lead them across an open passage where they encounter a large boat. The noise from the boat drowns out their click stream and disorients Deneb and the rest of the pod. They are led to safety by Greatmother who has them dive deep to avoid the boat's growler (engine propellers).

This mistake devastates Vega who recklessly heads off on her own when Greatmother takes over. Aquila follows Vega, leaving behind her son Altair. She scolds Vega, telling her she must try harder, and that their family needs her. Vega follows Aquila as she leads them back to the Gathering Place.

On their journey there is an earthquake on the seafloor that scares the two orcas. Vega notes though, that above water everything seems the same.Finally they meet their family at the Gathering Place where they also hear the voices of other families as they make their way in from the ocean.

Deneb is thrilled that Vega has returned. That night he overhears Greatmother telling of a time long ago when the earth shakes and how the open ocean is a refuge but also a danger. Greatmother tells Vega that they will stay because they need to wait for the salmon but they also must listen too.

Mother gives birth to Capella, but she is still born. In her anguish, Vega steals the dead baby to take it to a graveyard of orcas called Blood Cove. Uncle Rigel sends Deneb to search along the shore for Vega, but when he's unable to find her, he continues on. But as Vega is returning through Deception Pass, another violent earthquake hits. Separated from her family and now in great danger, how will Vega manage to survive and meet up with those in her family?

Discussion

A Whale of the Wild tells the story of a young orca or killer whale who becomes separated from her family during an devastating earthquake and the subsequent tsunami. 

The main character of the story is Vega, a young orca who is on the threshold of learning the skills that will make her a wayfarer for her family. Parry employs anthropomorphism, giving her animal characters many human traits and emotions. For example, Vega is kind, impulsive and inquisitive. She questions everything and wants to learn. "When I was a youngling, I thought Greatmother knew the sea down to its last drop. I thought she and Mother and all the greatmothers of my kinship were the ones to call salmon out of the ocean. But the more I learn, the more questions I have."

Vega's journey to the Gathering Place after the earthquake and tsunami is not only a physical one to be reunited with her family, but it is also a journey that sees her grow more mature and confident in her abilities. After a brief time in the deep ocean, Vega successfully leads her brother Deneb and Aquila and Altair back to safety and to the Gathering Place.

Parry incorporates many interesting facts about orcas and other cetaceans, about the ecosystem of the Salish Sea and how human use of the land and water has impacted that ecosystem and the orcas. Vega remembers the stories Greatmother told of what the sea was like before when she sees the longboats of the local Indigenous people.

"The old stories tell of a time when all the boats in the Salish Sea were as quiet as these. In those days, boats did not bleed poison. No one tried to capture orcas. And the salmon ran so thick and strong that not a single orca of any kinship ever knew hunger. There were so many fish that rivers shone silver in the summer sun."

Greatmother told of how the Indigenous peoples and the orcas "...had a settled way between us. They hunted salmon in the rivers and coves, and we hunted them in the sea."

A Whale of the Wild tells an interesting story from the point of view of the orcas. At times it's confusing to figure out who is narrating as the story switches from Vega to Deneb and back again. However, readers who are interested in whales, orcas and dolphins will enjoy this novel as well as the beautiful illustrations by Lindsay Moore. Parry includes a large section on information about the Salish Sea ecosystem as well as a detailed map. There is also a list of resources for further study.

Salish Sea map credit: https://www.canadiangeographic.ca/article/salish-sea-change

More information about the Southern Resident Killer Whales.

Protecting the Core Habitat of the Southern Resident Killer Whales. 

 Book Details:

A Whale Of The Wild by Rosanne Parry
Greenwillow Books        2020
322 pp.

Masters of Silence by Kathy Kacer

Masters of Silence is the second novel in the Quartet series by Kathy Kacer. In this story, two young refugees from the Nazis are helped by Marcel Marceau to safety.

Fourteen-year-old Helen Rosenthal and her ten-year-old brother Henry, have journeyed from Germany to southern France with their mother in the hopes of finding safety with the nuns at a convent. Their home had been in Frankfurt, but as Jews, the city and the country had become increasingly unsafe. Mr. Rosenthal was seized by the Nazis a year earlier and they do not know his fate. After his seizure, Helen, Henry and their mother packed a few belongings and traveled to Kronberg where they were taken in by a Catholic family. Frau Weber was willing to keep their mother because she could be passed off as a servant. However, the presence of Helen and Henry would have been more difficult to explain even though their blond hair meant they did not look Jewish. 

After Frau Weber told their mother about a convent in southern France taking in Jewish children, the three set out on their journey. Now at the convent, Helen and Henry's mother hands over their identity documents and to their shock says goodbye. She tells them she is returning to Kronberg to wait for news of their father and that she loves them both. Henry cries loudly and Helen is so shocked all she can do is stare at her mother.

The two children are taken to their dorm rooms by the kindly Sister Cecile. The next morning Helen meets one of the girls in her room, Michelle who tells her that they are all in the same situation. Many have no idea where their parents are or have no parents at all.  Michelle explains the convent's routine, that they have church services, go on outings to town to shop and have visits from a clown who does shows. Michelle also warns Helen to watch out for Sister Agnes, who is very strict and seems to have a mean streak.

Helen and Henry go to meet Mere Superieure. She tells them to stop thinking about their parents and to focus on learning the rules of the convent. Mere Superieure explains that the convent houses Jewish children from all over Europe. Although the convent is a safe place for the children, Nazi soldiers are searching through the towns of southern France for Jews who are in hiding. Because of this, they must learn and obey the rules to keep everyone safe, and learn to get along with the other children. They are to pretend they are Catholic children who have been orphaned and they will attend church, learn Catholic prayers so they can pass as Catholic if questioned.   They must also change their names. Mere Superieure tells Helen and Henry they will now be called Claire and Andre Rochette.

After dismissing Henry, Mere Superieure tells Helen she is very concerned for Henry who has not spoken since his arrival. Helen pleads that he just needs time, but the nun warns that if he does not adjust this may become a problem. Henry continues to struggle, doesn't speak or interact with anyone, even Helen, and isn't eating well. Instead he spends time writing in a small notebook that Sister Cecile has given him.

Several days later, Sister Agnes takes Helen and Henry into town to purchase some new clothing. However, the trip almost ends in disaster when Henry wanders off and is spotted alone in a store by several Nazi soldiers. Henry doesn't answer the soldiers' questions, leaving Helen to rush over and give their names. Fortunately, Sister Agnes intervenes, but the three leave the store badly shaken.

This leads Mere Superieure to stop the visits to the town because they have never had the Nazis so close until now. Helen is so shaken, she is unable to sleep that night. While up to get a drink of water, she meets a Jewish boy, Albert Gotliev. Albert is from Vienna and has lost both his parents after they were taken by the Nazis. He was smuggled out of Austria along with a group of Jewish children. Albert tells Helen about the visits by a clown, Marcel Marceau, who normally visits the convent every week.

Meanwhile Henry continues to struggle, feeling both profoundly sad and scared over the absence of his parents. He refuses to get up one morning and starts a fight with another boy who suggests that Henry's father may be dead. The fight is broken up by Albert, who tries to talk to Henry.

However, things drastically change when the clown, Marcel Marceau arrives one day to give a show at the convent. Henry is mesmerized by his performance and stays behind afterwards. Marcel helps Henry deal with his feelings but more than that, he helps Henry find his voice and leads him and his sister to safety after the Nazis raid the convent.

Discussion

Masters of Silence is the second book in the Quartet series by Canadian children's author Kathy Kacer. The focus in this second series is on the World War II hero, Marcel Marceau who was responsible for saving the lives of Jews and Gentiles. He was born Marcel Mangel, in 1923, in Strasbourg, France to Charles Mangel, a kosher butcher and Anne Werzberg.

With the Nazi invasion of France imminent, the French government evacuated the population of Strasbourg to Perigord in southern France. The Jews of Strasbourg fled the incoming Nazis and Marcel's family fled to Limoges. Marcel was only sixteen at this time. He and his younger brother Andre joined the French Resistance.  He used the name Marcel Mangel and posing as a Scout Master, he helped evacuate a Jewish orphanage in France to the safety of neutral Switzerland.

When he was a young child, Marcel was fascinated by American silent movie star, Charlie Chaplin. After the war ended, Marcel studied at the School of Dramatic Art in Paris. By 1947, Marcel's career as a mime was firmly established with the success of a character, Bip the Clown whom he created. What most did not know at this time, was the important work Marcel had been a part of during the war.

Kacer has crafted a believable storyline to showcase Marcel Marceau's work with the French Resistance in saving Jewish children. The two main characters in the story, Helen and her younger brother Henry have just arrived at a Catholic convent in southern France. The story could have just centered on these two children and their journey into France but Kacer adds another layer to the story. Henry Rosenthal, is a young boy who is so traumatized by what he and his family have experienced that he has become mute. No one is really able to help Henry and he continues to withdraw into himself as well as act out by fighting with the other boys, until Marcel, affectionately called "the clown" by the children at the convent, arrives to do a show. Through Marcel's patient teaching of mime, Henry finds a safe way to express himself and is able to verbally communicate when a dangerous situation develops at the convent. From this point on he shows himself to be a very brave little fellow.

The novel also highlights how many of the of the French helped the Jewish people during the war. Ordinary French citizens like the nuns at the convent were taking very serious risks. While hidden Jews were sent to camps, French citizens hiding them were shot.Hiding an entire group of Jewish children in a convent under the guise of an orphanage would have been an incredible risk and required a great amount of courage. Kacer also portrays just how dangerous it was for Marcel and his young charges to journey to the Swiss border.

The title, Masters of Silence is a play on the name given to Marcel Marceau who was given the same title for his work as a mime. And of course, Henry turned out to also be a "master of silence" with his skill as a mime. 

Book Details:

Masters of Silence by Kathy Kacer
Toronto: Annick Press Ltd.     2019
263 pp.

Red, White, And Whole by Rajani LaRocca

Thirteen-year-old Reha is part of two worlds: one that is Indian and one that is not. She wants to chew gum, wear tight jeans, go to dances and have fun. But Amma tells her they are different from Americans. They "focus on what is important to succeed."

Reha and her parents live in New York where her father works as an engineer and her mother works in a hematology lab at a hospital. After giving birth to her, Reha's mother, whose name Punam means moon, couldn't have more children, so Reha is an only child. Her best friend is a girl named Sunita who comes from another Indian family. Sunita doesn't attend Reha's private school so they see each other on weekends. Rachel is Reha's best friend at school. She's smart and funny.

When Reha was eight-years-old, a trip to the emergency room made  her realize she wants to become a doctor. The only problem is that the sight of blood makes her queasy.

Reha struggles to fit into two worlds: the world at school which is very American and the world at home which is very Indian. Regular trips to India to visit family and relatives help ground her in her own culture, but make coping at school more difficult. 

When her school hosts a dance, Reha struggles to get permission to attend. Eventually, her parents relent, on the condition that Amma make her dress. Reha agrees even though she would rather buy something more fashionable from the mall. However, after the festival of Deepavali (Diwali), Amma begins to feel unwell. She has nosebleeds, is tired and cold, and spends a lot of time sleeping. Finally, Amma agrees to let Reha buy something from a store. At the dance, Reha has a wonderful time dancing to her favourite songs. She even sits outside holding hands with Pete, a classmate whom she has been studying with the past few weeks.

That night, Reha's life takes a dramatic turn when Amma is taken to the hospital. After many tests, Amma is diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia and she undergoes chemotherapy. Amma's illness fills Reha with guilt. She feels badly about being embarrassed of her parents, by worrying over fitting in at school, and so she decides to fight her guilt with duty and virtue: Reha will become the daughter her parents wish her to be by focusing on school. But when that isn't enough, Reha must deal with loss and find the courage to be the girl her mother always wanted her to be.

Discussion

Red, White, and Whole is set in New York, 1983. LaRocca manages to capture many of the cultural facets of that decade, listing songs that Reha and her friends listen to such as The Safety Dance and Time After Time and the Star Wars movies. Readers will likely recognize at least some of the cultural references, as many are still popular today. (Tip: no one from that generation called the first Star Wars movie a New Hope!) Contrasting with this is are several poems which tell the story of Savitri and Satyavan, a Hindu couple whose love seems doomed.

The novel explores the challenges first generation children of immigrants encounter while growing up in a new country. These children are often caught between the culture of their parent's homeland and the culture of their new home. The clash between old and new cultural and social norms, as well as family expectations can make life confusing and difficult.

In Red, White and Whole, Reha experiences all of this. Unlike her parents, Reha was born in America. However she feels trapped by her parents' expectations, especially those of her mother. "I'm caught between the life I want to lead and the one she thinks I should."  This is especially a problem for Reha who is an only child and who therefore is the sole focus of her parents. She notices this especially when visiting her friend Sunny's large family where things go unnoticed.

In the poem, Expectations, Reha lists some of the expectations on her; she is expected to focus on her studies, not to like boys and not expected to date. But Reha would love to follow her own heart but because she is the only child on her mother's side of the family, she is "the one who carries everyone's hope, everyone's expectations."

When Reha visits India, within her own family she feels like she fits in. But outside her family, even in India she is different, 

"...not just because of how I dress,

but because of how I talk, and walk,
and breathe. 

No matter where I go,
America or India,
I don't quite fit."

This makes life challenging for Reha who sees her friends going to dances and wearing clothes that are in fashion. Before asking permission to attend a school dance, Reha feels that she is "always halfway, caught between the life my parents want and the one I have to live." In a secret aerogramme addressed to her parents but not sent, Reha expresses her deepest wish, that her parents would tell her "You don't have to worry about living in two worlds. You live in only one world, and that is the world in which we love you. No matter what your choices are. We raised you, we trust you, and we love you."

However, after her mother's death, in an aerogramme her mother wrote to her before she died, Reha learns that her mother really did understand the challenges of dealing with two cultures. And that her resistance to Reha, was based on the fear that she might forget the values and culture of her heritage. But Reha's mother also encourages her, telling her she really does belong. "You, my girl, should take your gifts and your hard work and be whatever you want with them. Be a doctor, if you liek. Or be a poet, or an actress, or a mother who stays home with her children. Or all of these things together. Surround yourself with good people, and be happy."
It's a message all young people need to read and hear.

LaRocca highlights some of the ways Reha and her mother experience both discrimination and a lack of understanding. Her mother, who works in a lab, has been asked to stop wearing the Bindi, a coloured dot worn in the middle of the forehead by Hindu women to indicate they are married, because it makes her coworkers uncomfortable. Reha is asked if she speaks "Indian" and thinks, 

"I want to tell her that
people from India,
just the small sample of Indian people in her own city,
speak over a dozen languages.
We are Hindu, Muslim, Christian,
and other religions.
We are all different shades,
from dark brown to almost as pale as she is."

Yet the story and the characters do not get bogged down in focusing on racism or cultural insensitivity. When Reha's mother becomes ill, Reha receives support from many students in the school, who try to comfort her or show their concern for her.

Despite the somewhat sad storyline, LaRocca has managed to write an uplifting story about a young girl who has the courage to face the death of a beloved mother and the courage continue on, to be who she wants to be. In the final poem of the book, LaRocca leaves her young readers with this important message:

"I have one life.
That's all any of us gets.
And I know that I will make my way.
For all rivers lead to the same ocean,
we all look upon the same sky.
I will write my own story."

LaRocca, in her Author's Note at the back, points out that "...even when you feel torn apart, you can still be a whole person, ---not just despite the things you struggle with, but because of them."

Book Details:

Red,White and Whole by Rajani LaRocca
New York: Quill Tree Books     2021
217 pp.

The House By The Lake by Thomas Harding

This beautiful picture book tells the fascinating story of a real house, located in the village of Grob Glienicke, about fourteen kilometers west of Berlin. It was built by a German physician,  Dr. Alfred Alexander for his family. The book takes young readers through the various families that lived in the house, beginning with the family of "a kind doctor and his cheery wife who wanted to live with their four children away from the busy city." This " house held their dreams."

After a few years, the doctor's family was forced to leave when soldiers showed up. After a year empty, the house saw a new family arrive. The family was musical, the father played piano and the mother sang. Their two boys joined a youth group and spent time marching around the house. The metal gutters were given to make guns. War was coming and the father was told he needed to fight. This family fled and the house was once again empty.

More families would come to live in the house over the next many decades. The house would cut off by a large wall. It would be abandoned eventually, the floorboards and doors taken for firewood. Until one day a young man came to the house, saw that the house needed to be repaired. That man worked along with the villagers to clean and restore it until he was able to hang a picture of his great-grandparents above the fireplace.

Discussion

The House By The Lake is a picture book adaptation of Thomas Harding's hardcover of the same name. Harding is the great-grandson of Dr. Alfred Alexander, who built the house for his wife Henny and their four children in 1927.  In July of 2013, Thomas Harding returned to Germany, and was able to locate the lake house or Glienicke he had been told about all his life. 

Harding's ancestor, Alfred Alexander was a Jewish physician who was part of Berlin society in the 1920's. His hard work meant that he was able to build a small, nine room wooden house on the shore of a nearby lake for his family. The Alexander family was the first Jewish family to live in the village of Grob Glienicke. Summers were spent at the house, swimming in the lake and hosting parties. However, this idyllic time was soon to vanish with the rise of Nazism and the threat of another world war.  As Germany began to sink further into the mire of Nazism, the Alexander family's situation began to change. The various laws passed by the German state restricting the rights of Jewish citizens began to impact Alexander. His practice was affected and even some of the children were no longer able to attend school. 

However, Alfred refused to leave Germany as he believed the political situation would eventually improve. By 1936, the Gestapo were beginning to arrest prominent Jews like Alfred. At this time he was visiting a daughter who had just given birth, in London, England. A friend warned him that he was on a Gestapo list and so Alfred remained in London. Their remaining adult children left Germany, while Henny and Elise worked on selling the building where Alfred had his medical practice.

Henny and her daughter Elsie, who would become Thomas Harding's grandmother, closed up the lake house and gave the key to the family lawyer, Dr. Goldstrom. So began the next chapter in the history of the house by the lake. The Alexander family officially lost ownership of the house in 1939 when the Gestapo seized their assets. From this point on, the house would be occupied by four different families over the next sixty years.

While the picture book does not go into great deal about the history of the house, it does give young readers the basics of the story. The story of the house is not only one that is tied to five families throughout the 20th century, but it is also tied to the history of Germany and the Berlin and Potsdam area, spanning the period from the late 1920's to 1999 when the house became permanently vacant.

Accompanying the text are the mixed media illustrations of Britta Teckentrup. The illustrations capture the many moods of the events that occurred during the last eighty years of the house's existence. For example, illustrations showing happy, summer days at the house are filled with greens and blues, while the arrival of the Nazis is portrayed in black, grey and brown colours. Nazi war planes flying over the house and the coming of war feature black, orange and greys, symbolizing war, bombing and fire. The final illustration of the restored house is one of lovely summer colours.

The House by the Lake is a picture book that provides the opportunity to study the effects of war on a personal level, exploring how one family lost and regained a beloved family home, but also a chance to explore some important historical events of the twentieth century.
For more information, readers are directed to the Alexander Haus website: https://alexanderhaus.org/

Book Details:

The House by the Lake by Thomas Harding
Somerville, Massachusetts: Candlewick Press      2020

Britta Tecketrup illustration: https://twitter.com/BTeckentrup/status/1258771788722511876/photo/1

Dog Driven by Terry Lynn Johnson

Fourteen-year-old McKenna Barney is losing her vision. Her younger sister, eight-year-old Emma, is almost totally blind. Emma has Stargardt disease, a degenerative condition that affects the retina. Emma's symptoms began at age six, when she was finally diagnosed. Although she has 20/600 vision, which is far  worse than the legally blind criteria, Emma can see some things in her peripheral vision.

In the last few months, McKenna has noticed her vision is deteriorating too. At first she hoped she just needed glasses, but as her ability to see patterns failed, and she has started to lose sight in the center of her vision, McKenna knows she has the same disease as Emma.

One day after school, Emma excitedly tells her about a new dogsled race, the Great Superior Mail Run. She wants McKenna to enter it so that they can increase awareness of Stargardt disease and secure donations for research. She would be carrying letters written by Emma's classmates which would generate publicity and donations to research. McKenna's mom thinks this could work as McKenna has run the dogs this winter and they are in good shape.

The problem is that no one yet knows what is happening to McKenna's vision. She has told no one, not even her parents. The thought of running in a dogsled race with her poor vision is terrifying so McKenna attempts to refuse her sister's request. 

But when Emma balks, McKenna shares her secret with Emma, telling her that she is having trouble with her vision but refuses Emma's request to tell their parents. McKenna backtracks and tells Emma she will do the race. They make a deal that if McKenna's vision worsens, she will scratch the race and tell their parents. 

McKenna and her family prepare for the race, choosing the dogs that will race, preparing food for the dogs and getting equipment ready. After these preparations, her family drives north to Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario to meet up at Ermatinger House Museum, once a Hudson's Bay Company outpost. Inside McKenna is told how to get to the McNabb staging area, the dogs are checked out by veterinarian, and is told relevant information about the three hundred and fifty-four kilometer route of the race. She is also given her mail bag that she will carry during the race and deliver to White River, Ontario post office and sworn in as a temporary letter carrier.

McKenna enters the race focused on winning but as she starts out on the first stage of the race, she encounters another junior racer, Guy Desjardins whose family has a history of involvement as dog couriers in Northern Ontario. Guy's friendship will have a profound impact on McKenna's life, helping her to face her fears and challenge the path she and her family have taken in dealing with a life altering disability.

Discussion

Dog Driven is an exciting novel about a girl participating in a challenging dogsled race while also coping with significant vision loss and what that might mean for her future. McKenna is certain she has Stargardt disease, a condition her younger sister, Emma has. Stargardt disease is an inherited disease that affects the retina, resulting in vision loss during childhood and also the teen years. The macula, a small area located at the center of the retina, which is responsible for sensing light, progressively degenerates. There is currently no treatment for this form of macular degeneration.

In the novel, McKenna has begun to notice significant degeneration in her vision and the symptoms she is experiencing are similar to those her sister Emma experienced. McKenna has not told her parents because she has seen how they have responded to Emma's situation. Her mother does everything for Emma, refusing to let her use her cane and even feeding her. McKenna does not want to lose her autonomy and independence and is filled with fear as she watches how her mother treats Emma.

This overwhelming fear is expressed often throughout the novel. At the beginning of the novel McKenna thinks, "There is no denying it any longer. I have it. A hot bubble of fear and grief swells inside me. How can I live with this?" After telling Emma about her deteriorating vision, McKenna refuses her request to tell their parents. "I don't have a plan yet besides keeping it from my parents at all costs. I have to stay independent."  She reasons, "Now that I'm sure I've got Stargardt disease, I'm even more determined to keep it from Mom. If she knew, she'd force me to get tested. And as soon as I got diagnosed, she'd start treating me the way she treats my sister. And she treats Em like she's helpless." No matter what, McKenna doesn't want to end up in this situation, so she decides to run the race. If she's able to complete it, this will be proof to her parents that she has a life with low vision.

But it's evident that McKenna is experiencing intense grief over her situation. She's already lost so much over the last year. McKenna's attempts to hide her low vision are not just restricted to her family. She's isolated herself from family and friends. As her vision deteriorated and she lost the ability to see what was written on the board, she's had to sneak back into class to read the board and has made the rule never to read in front of anyone. Her grades began to slide but this was blamed on the stress of coping with Emma's illness. McKenna began to mistake other girls for her best friend Gabby and couldn't recognize any of her friends from a distance. Hiding her condition has meant McKenna has had to skip lunch with her friends, drop the afterschool committee, and stop spending time with her best friend Gabby who no longer calls her.

However, during the course of the race, McKenna meets two young mushers who change her thinking about how she is dealing with the onset of Stargardt's and her parents. The first is Guy Desjardins, a young musher whose great-great-grandfather was involved in delivering the mail by dog courier and who has a blind lead dog, Zesty. Guy quickly discovers that McKenna has issues with her vision. When McKenna tells him that she's been able to hide it from her parents by not spending time with them, Guy points out that she knows and that she can't hide this from herself. He is pointing out that she's not bein honest with herself and she can't hide her condition from herself. As McKenna's friendship with Guy develops, she comes to see how his lead dog's disability is a strength under certain conditions and has made her a good lead dog.

The second person is Harper Bowers whose father has won many dogsled races. McKenna is stunned to learn that Harper hates dogsledding. It's dirty, loud and scary to her. When McKenna asks Harper why she hasn't told her father how she feels, Harper tells her that she's forced to live up to her "parents' life-crushing expectations." McKenna urges her to confront her father about how she feels.  Harper does take McKenna's advice and tells her father she hates dogsledding. Her father's response is to tell her she can quit racing if she wins this race but after barely making it through the Cascades during a blizzard, Harper's father allows her to quit.

Her interactions with Guy and Harper give McKenna the courage to reveal her situation to her parents. While they are devastated, they do allow her to finish the race, especially when McKenna stands up for herself. She tells her parents, "We spend so much time worrying about what Em can't do anymore when we should be thinking about what she can do. What I can do...I'm not pretending anymore. It is harder for me now. It doesn't do any good to ignore that I have a vision impairment. Em and I both. And it's not going to go away. We have to learn to live with it. We all have to learn....We need help accepting this and learning how to live with it...."

Dog Driven is a novel that succeeds because the author knows her subject well. Johnson, who lives in Northern Ontario, owned and operated a dogsledding business for many years. She also taught the skill of dogsledding, has been a conservation officer with the MNR and she's also worked as a backcountry ranger. Her love and knowledge of dogs and dogsledding shows in this engaging short novel for younger readers. There's plenty of interesting details on dog care and dogsledding. Johnson provides a short Author's Note on the dogsled main couriers as well as the route described in the novel, and she grounds her readers with a detailed map of the race at the beginning of the novel. Readers who have an interest in the outdoors and animals will truly enjoy Dog Driven.

Book Details:

Dog Drive by Terry Lynn Johnson
New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt   2019
229 pp.