Paradise Book Report

Bibliography: Steptoe, Javaka. Radiant Child: The Story of Young Artist Jean-Michel Basquiat . New York: Little Brown Books for Young Readers, 2016. ISBN: 9780316213882 Summary: In the heart of Brooklyn, a young boy dreams of becoming a famous artist. From morning to night, he scrawls messy drawings across scraps of paper, spilling his imagination onto the repurposed materials with serious focus and determination. Inspired by his Puertorican mother who draws with him and takes him to museums to see famous works like Picasso’s Guernica , young Jean-Michel Basquiat begins to channel his Haitian father’s jazz records and the energy and life of the city into his art. After a car accident leaves Jean-Michel in bed to recover, Jean-Michel’s mother gives him an anatomy book full of bones and skulls, which he learns to draw, giving him healing and comfort during a painful time. When his mother becomes mentally unwell, she must move out, and Jean-Michel’s heart is broken. Now a couch-sur...

Bibliography: Greenberg, Jan and Sandra Jordan. Christo and Jeanne-Claude: Through the Gates and Beyond . New York: Roaring Book Press, 2008. ISBN: 9781596430716 Summary: Can you imagine working on a piece of art for 26 years, only to show it to the public for a mere two weeks? Artist couple Christo and Jeane-Claude did exactly that with their installation entitled The Gates in New York’s Central Park. Twenty-three miles of shimmering saffron fabric panels fluttered from 7,503 aluminum frames to the delight and amazement of all who were lucky enough to witness them. Why would anyone go to all the trouble for such a temporary exhibition? Christo and Jeanne-Claude explain: “All of our projects have this fragile quality. They will be gone tomorrow. They have total freedom. That is why they cannot stay. Because freedom is the enemy of possession and possession is equal to permanence. We have to have freedom with no strings attached.” In fact, these massive installations are never ...

Bibliography:  Bartoletti, Susan Campbell. They Called Themselves the K.K.K.: The Birth of an American Terrorist Group . Boston: HMH Books, 2010. ISBN: 9780544225824 Plot Summary: “The Sergeant and Scorpion are ready, Some Shall Weep and Some Shall Pray. Meet at Skull For Feast of the Wolf and Dance of the Muffled Skeletons.” In the wake of the Civil War, newspapers across the South printed cryptic “coffin notices” such as this to strike fear into the hearts of newly freed slaves and their white allies. Their source? The secret terrorist organization named the Ku Klux Klan. Susan Campbell Bartoletti thoroughly documents the disturbing history of the Klan’s efforts to stop the progress of racial equality in the United States. Through primary sources such as letters, court transcripts, newspaper articles, slave narratives, maps, photographs, and numerous etchings and illustrations printed in Harper’s Weekly , Bartoletti reveals how the KKK used intimidation, violence, and sec...

Dreamers by Yuyi Morales Don't miss this gorgeous book. Morales, Yuyi. Dreamers . New York: Neal Porter Books, 2018. ISBN: 0823440559

Bibliography:  Acevedo, Elizabeth. The Poet X . New York: HarperCollins, 2018. ISBN: 9780062662804 Plot Summary: Xiomara Bastista, a Harlem sophomore growing up in the shadow of her strict Dominican mother and her virtually absent Dominican father, struggles to find her voice and her identity as her body and mind grapple with young adulthood. Her name means “warrior,” and unlike her saintlike twin brother, Xiomara finds herself in conflict with the expectations of her family, the Catholic church, and the leering gaze of a society which views her as a sexual object. She finds escape and expression, however private, in her notebook, and gradually begins to risk sharing her internal world of words with her lab partner Aman, a young man who shares his earbuds and a caring, unaggressive interest in Xiomara. When she joins a school slam poetry club at the recommendation of her English teacher, a fire of poetic liberation ignites inside her, desperate to give voice to her deepest pai...

Bibliography: Sidman, Joyce and Pamela Zagarenski. This is Just to Say: Poems of Apology and Forgiveness . Boston: HMH Books, 2007. ISBN: 0544105079 Plot Summary: When Mrs. Merz’s sixth grade class reads “This is Just to Say” by William Carlos Williams, they become inspired to compose their own collection of apology poems. The first half of the book features a mixture of humorous and heartbreaking apologies on topics ranging from dodgeball, stolen doughnuts, and broken windows, to grief at the loss of beloved pets, confessions of betrayal, and even a devastating apology to a father who had left his daughter behind. Each poem is dedicated to its wronged party: mothers, friends, brothers, teachers, and deceased animals, to name a few. The second half of the book features response poems, mostly from the apologies’ intended audience but sometimes from other writers when the offended individuals couldn’t (or wouldn’t) respond. Their replies vary as widely as the apologies themselves: h...

Bibliography: Singer, Marilyn and Kristi Valiant. Feel the Beat: Dance Poems that Zing from Salsa to Swing . New York: Dial Books, 2017. ISBN: 0803740212 Plot Summary: In this multicultural celebration of dance, Marilyn Singer captures the rhythm and style of fifteen dances from across the globe. The journey begins with “All Over the World, Dancing is Joy” / “Joy is Dancing, All Over the World,” a poem that reads both forward and backwards on facing pages. From there, a young boy does the cha-cha at a family birthday party, a kid watches his dad breakdance in the street to hip hop, and a sister gazes in awe at her twin dancing the foxtrot in a fancy dress. Characters merengue at an island party, flunk the square dancing class in the school gym, and Laura joins in the hora at Zach’s bar mitzvah. We watch Isabel “under a samba spell” at Carnival, join Grandpa Jack for a Texas two-step at Bucky Jones Pub, then “show some sass” in salsa dance class, and light up the streets with an ...