DOROTHEA'S EYES: A Picture Book Biography and Giveaway

 I hope you are enjoying hearing about terrific curriculum resources as much as I am enjoying sharing them. It's a win-win! I learn about how to write an inspirational and informative nonfiction picture book, and you have a chance to win one! Today's selection, Dorothea's Eyes (Calkins Creek, 2016) features iconic photographer, Dorothea Lange, and is written by talented author, Barb Rosenstock with period-perfect illustrations by Gérard DuBois. In the text and illustrations, see if you notice something a little bit different about how this biography is written. (Note: The quotations in red are the way they appear in the book--that's not the answer!)

REVIEW

Dorothea Lange's grey-green eyes look at the world around her and sees "dimpled shadows scattering an orange peel. Swirled-pattern pricks in a walnut sewing table. Repeating rectangles of New Jersey row homes."

After her parents split up, her mother finds a job in a city library and Dorothea attends a school full of poor immigrants. She is Different and Lonely.

But, she is also Watchful. Curious. So, after school she,

spies into crowded tenements where fathers, home from peddling, read newspapers, and mothers wash dishes, clothes, and babies in rusty sinks--happy and sad mixed together. 

Dorothea pretends she's invisible all the time.

 

And all the time, Dorothea sees with her eyes and her heart.

As a teenager, she announces she is going to be a photographer. Despite her mother's resistance ("It...it isn't ladylike!") Dorothea gets work at photographer's studios and learns everything she can about cameras and darkrooms. 

She loves faces, but is restless to see places too. She sets off from New Jersey to travel around the world but stays in San Fransisco after her money is stolen. She starts her own portrait studio and becomes successful. She marries and has children. But, she keeps asking herself, 

        Am I using my eyes and my heart?

One day during the Depression she looks outside her window and sees men searching for work. She focuses on one man in particular:

 

                                Dorothea's heart won't let her stop.

White Angel Breadline, 1933 

Dorothy Lange Collection
Oakland Museum of California
https://artmuseum.princeton.edu/collections/objects/135245

Dorothea leaves her comfortable life and takes her camera on the road. She scans dirt lanes, peers down back paths, and squints up broken steps. Fathers stoop in fields, working for pennies. Mothers nurse sick children, lying thirsty in makeshift tents. Whole families in jalopies--blown out by the dust storms wracking the land.

 

Migrant Mother, 1936
Nipomo, California

"Of the 160,000 images taken by Lange and other photographers for the
Resettlement Administration, Migrant Mother has become the most iconic picture
of the Depression. Through an intimate portrait of the toll being exacted across the land, Lange 
gave a face to a suffering nation."
http://100photos.time.com/photos/dorothea-lange-migrant-mother


Her heart knows all about people the world ignores.

Dorothea doesn't just photograph the people she meets. She understands how ashamed and invisible they feel. For five years despite a leg that always hurts, she photographs people for the world to see. "The jobless. The hungry. The homeless."

Newspapers and magazines publish these pictures. Dorothea's eyes won't let the country look away. Her photographs help convince the government to provide parents with work, children with food, and families with safe, clean homes.

        The truth, seen with love, becomes Dorothea's art. 

BACK MATTER and CURRICULUM RESOURCE

As you may expect, the back matter is a rich collection of photographs, information on Lange, bibliography, and timeline. Click on these links for more resources: the Educator Guide and Barb's Pinterest Board.

Although this book is recommended for ages 8-12, I think high school students (and adults!) would also learn not only about a woman who followed her passion and made a difference in this country, but about the effects of the Depression. 

GIVEAWAY and ANSWER

Please leave a comment (with your email address if you are new to my blog) by 6PM June 9. Start following my blog and I'll put your name in twice. Continental U.S. addresses only. 

So, can you tell what is different about this biography? It might be hard from just a few quotes--but this historical picture book is written in present tense. Kudos to Barb Rosenstock for a creative way to write nonfiction!

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Congratulations to Dee Romito who won OCEAN SOUP on last week's blog.

JACOB RIIS'S CAMERA: Bringing Light to Tenement Children- A Picture Book Biography

Congratulations to my newest follower, Janet Frenck Sheets who won CAVE DADA PICKY EATER form last week's blog. Here's a hint to my faithful followers. When I offer to give you extra chances by sharing my blog on social media or becoming a new follower, take me up on it! Many times those people win! 

                                                                        ******

Picture book biographies fascinate me. In fact, I'm so intrigued by this genre that I'm writing one myself. I recently had my manuscript critiqued by awesome picture book author, Kirsten Larson, who helped me figure out my story's inciting incident, mid-point, and plot points. I had no idea that Save the Cat elements could be applied to nonfiction picture books!

With Kirsten's instruction fresh in my mind, I decided to analyze another wonderful curriculum resource published by Calkins Creek: Jacob Riis's Camera: Bringing Light to Tenement Children written by Alexis O' Neill and illustrated by Gary Kelley.

REVIEW

Before Jacob Riis became a ground-breaking photographer, he was a twelve-year-old boy who hated Rag Hall; a rat-infested dwelling in his town of Ribe, Denmark. And before he arrived in America in 1870 to make his fortune and win the rich mill owner's daughter hand in marriage, he became a carpenter.

Jacob soon discovered that "jobs for immigrants were hard to find, hard to keep." He worked whenever he found employment and slept wherever he could; in abandoned barns, field, and in dirty disease-infested homeless shelters.  "He vowed to put an end to them someday."

One evening, the principal of the telegraph school where he'd been taking a course found him penniless and alone. The principal recommended him for a job as a reporter. That inciting incident started Jacob on a path that would change his life forever.

Jacob became a reporter, an editor, and even owned his own newspaper. But then he started working for The New York Times as a police reporter. Every night when he walked home he passed New York City's worst slum, Mulberry Bend. 

Jacob wrote vivid articles about life in the tenements. Yet his words failed to ignite change. The appalling conditions did not improve. 

If only Jacob could show others what he saw in the slums--rooms packed with people, rooms dark both day and night. How could he shine light into those places?

Then one day, Jacob found the answer...

Here's the midpoint of the book: Jacob discovers Blitzlicht, a special flash powder which photographers used to light up dark places. He and two amateur photographers captured pictures of the dark tenements, but they tired of the job.

Jacob did not. He bought a small four-by-five-inch wooden box camera. Here is one of the verse poems scattered throughout the narrative depicting this plot point:

He practiced taking pictures. 

He practiced using flash powder. 

Twice, he set fire to dwellings. 

Once, he even set fire to himself. 

But he didn't give up.  

With words and pictures, Jacob finally found a way to make the Board of Health pay attention.

Jacob projected life-sized photographs of the slums to church groups, missions, and charities. Finally, the people of New York City started seeing the "plight of the city's poor who lived in squalor."

In 1890, Jacob published How the Other Half Lives. One of the men who read his book was the newly appointed president of the Police Board, Theodore Roosevelt. The two became life long friends and together they eradicated those slums. 

 

In place of these slums, Mulberry Bend Park opened. A place for children and families. A place

flooded with sunlight,  

feathered with soft grass, 

bubbling with children playing. 

I hope you'll notice the progression of plot points within these sample illustrations. Like Jacob himself, Gary Kelley transformed the dreary slums into places of light and color.

EXTRAS

For curriculum resources, including some of Jacob Riis's original photographs, see this page on Alexis O' Neil's website.  The nine pages of back matter include information about Jacob's life, his work, a timeline, a glossary, and an amazing list of his accomplishments. 

Here are two videos. The first includes Alexis' journey of writing this book and the many layers that went into it. The second is a presentation using photographs from How the Other Half Lives.

                                                     Book Talk by Alexis O' Neill

Riis's 'Layman Sermon"

No giveaway this week, I'm saving this book as a curriculum resource for my grandchildren. If you teach 3-6th grade, I think this book would help your students, children, or grandchildren see what poverty looks like--and what a determined person can do to bring about change. 

FREE LUNCH: An Audiobook Review

Congratulations to Connie Saunders for winning THROUGH THE WARDROBE from last week's blog. Here's a tip to win a book. Whenever Connie enters my giveaway, she ALWAYS shares it on social media. This earns her more chances to win a book--and it works!

"This book is for every kid. Whether they pay for their lunch or not."  FREE LUNCH by Rex Ogle. 

REVIEW

"Why can’t I get what I want at the grocery store?" Rex asks his mother. Unfortunately, he knows the answer.  It’s been like this all his life. He hates seeing all of the chips, candy, and ice cream that other kids eat that he doesn't; he hates watching his mother try to stretch every dollar and use food stamps; he hates his constantly empty stomach; he hates having cashiers looking at him like he might steal something because his clothes come from the thrift store. 

Told in first person POV, this nonfiction autobiography is Rex's own story growing up in a dysfunctional family. He's angry that his family--including Sam, his mother's stuttering live-in boyfriend; and Ford, his toddler half-brother that Rex takes care of--are all poor. 

And he hates the helplessness and fighting in their home that poverty creates. Rex wants to blame his mother for not working but he also realizes that without a job, "all of the love goes out of Mom." Over and over she tells him how hard it is for her to get a decent job and blames him for being ungrateful.

The ultimate humiliation is when Rex enters middle school and discovers that his mother registered him for the free lunch program. Every day he feels like a beggar while he waits for the lunch lady to check his name off the free lunch checklist.  

Ogle doesn't hold back from painting the realistic but ugly picture of his childhood. The family moves frequently as the adults look for jobs. The lack of money leads to tension, arguing, and fighting. His mother gives him a black eye on more than one occasion. Rex's clothes are stashed in cardboard boxes and he sleeps on the floor--along with the cockroaches. 

The one bright light in his life is his abuela, his Mexican grandmother. She is his cheerleader. "You are smart and handsome. Life is not always fair," she tells him. "I lived in a one-room house without indoor plumbing and dirt floor with my13 brothers and sisters. We made it work. You will too." 

As hungry, poor, and angry Rex is, he tries to control his emotions, to not be rude, and to not hit back. But his own anger makes him feel evil. He has to remind himself that "being poor is not a disease."

In the cauldron of poverty and abuse, Rex experiences problems at school and with his peers. Despite worrying about how he can keep his poverty a secret so that his friends won't turn on him he thinks, "School feels safer than home." 

But things get worse. His friends reject him. He wears a monster costume on Halloween and starts worrying that he is a monster-- just like Sam or his mother. His family moves to public housing which is the last straw. He lashes out and tells his mother, "I hate you." She slaps him. Hard. He is constantly on edge wondering when she will strike back him and how could their lives get worse. Would they be homeless? Would they starve? Would he die? 

He develops a friendship with Ethan, a boy who he sits with at lunch. Ethan's point-of-view -- that his life isn't as perfect as it seems even though he his parents have lots of money--is eye-opening. "Come on, no one has a perfect life!" Ethan says... "Money isn't everything. Trust me."  

Towards the end, his mother gets a good waitressing job and the family takes some steps towards healing. Sam goes out of his way to give Rex an unexpected Christmas gift and the book ends on a hopeful note.  

FREE LUNCH tells it like it was for young Rex Ogle. A few readers might object to some crude language. To me, it was a brutally honest book. As Rex says at one point, "I don’t trust the word free. Look what it’s cost me." 

The audiobook is narrated by Ramon de Ocampo, who performs all of the voices excellently. I was particularly impressed with how well he showed Sam's stuttering. 

In a Facebook exchange, Rex told me this was the hardest book he's ever written--until the one he's writing now which is the sequel. But he's "glad it's helping some kiddos out there."

This is not an easy read; there were times I had to stop listening. I would recommend that middle-grade students read or listen to it with their parents or teacher so they can discuss it together. Although Rex is entering sixth grade in the book, the tough content might indicate it is more for young adults. 

GIVEAWAY 

If you're interested in adding this book to your home or school library, please leave me a comment by 9 AM on June 26. The winner will receive an audio code and instructions on downloading the book. As always, if you decide to follow my blog or share this on social media, let me know what you do in the comments. PLEASE leave your email address if you are new to my blog. This giveaway is courtesy of Recorded Books.