School Library Journal Review
K-Gr 4-A highly imaginative and original picture book filled with stunning artwork. Unfortunately, the blending of fact and fantasy just does not work here. Melody meets her newly adopted cousin, Lonnie, at her Aunt Connie's house one summer. While playing, the youngsters discover 12 paintings in the attic, each of which depicts a famous African-American woman. What is unusual about the portraits is that they can speak. Rosa Parks, Fannie Lou Hamer, Mary McLeod Bethune, Zora Neale Hurston, and the others take turns telling their stories to the two astonished children. At this point, the story gets bogged down by too many pages of biographical information. Plot elements of a family dinner, Lonnie's adoption, and his unusual features could themselves serve as rich story lines for separate books. Beautifully illustrated in the artist's trademark folk style, the book has a profusion of bright and vibrant colors of bold reds, yellows, and blues and muted purples, mauves, and beiges. The human figures are large and blocklike, with rich brown skin color. In the final analysis, Ringgold has tried to do too much. Nonetheless, despite these failings, this offering provides information, has charm, and is visually powerful.- Carol Jones Collins, Montclair Kimberley Academy, NJ (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
Melody loves the annual family excursion to Aunt Connie's house: everyone gets to go swimming, share a fabulous dinner and see an exhibition of Aunt Connie's most recent art. This year there are surprises as well: a newly adopted cousin her own age (``I fell in love with him the first time I saw him'') and a series of paintings of famous African American women. From their frames on the wall, the pictured women tell of their devotion to civil rights (Rosa Parks and Fannie Lou Hamer), education (Mary McLeod Bethune), literature (Zora Neale Hurston) and other causes and professions. Ringgold's ( Tar Beach ) distinctive primitive style, with its thick strokes and resilient, varied colors, seems especially suited to portraying these women of exceptional substance and strength. The heart of the book--the pages in which the women tell their stories--is at once a magical and a ringing affirmation of their achievements. But the surrounding pages are less impressive. Neither the members of Melody's extended family nor the dinner itself ever seem real, much less ``extra special,'' and the book concludes on an odd, gratuitously sentimental note as the two children discuss their future as a married couple years hence. Ages 5-9. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
