Cooper’s Lesson is an inspiring story about identity and intergenerational friendship, featuring a young biracial boy, written in both English and Korean. Cooper has had about enough of being half and half. And he’s really had enough of Mr. Lee, the owner of his neighborhood grocery store, speaking to him in Korean even though Cooper can’t keep up. Frustrated, he often wonders why things have to be so complicated. Why can’t he just be one race or the other? But one moment in Mr. Lee’s store changes everything. Soon Cooper realizes that the things that make up a person are never simple — whether one talks about them in English or Korean. Richly hued oil paintings and tender vivid prose combine to bring the characters to life.
Author: Rebecca Ballenger
Yoon and the Jade Bracelet
Yoon wants a jump rope for her birthday so she can play with the other girls in the school yard. Instead, Yoon’s mother gives her a Korean storybook about a silly girl who is tricked by a tiger. Yoon also receives a jade bracelet that once belonged to her grandmother. The next day at school, a girl offers to teach Yoon how to jump rope, but for a price — she wants to borrow the jade bracelet. When Yoon tries to get her bracelet back, the girl swears it belongs to her. Yoon must use the lessons learned in her storybook and her “Shining Wisdom” to retrieve the precious keepsake.
In this third book featuring Yoon, lush impressionistic dreamscapes evoke a simple and timeless message: it is possible to trick a tiger.
Take a closer look at Yoon and the Jade Bracelet as examined in WOW Review.
Glass Slipper, Gold Sandal
Once upon a time, in Mexico… in Ireland… in Zimbabwe… there lived a girl who worked all day in the rice fields… then spent the night by the hearth, sleeping among the cinders.
Her name is Ashpet, Sootface, Cendrillon… Cinderella. Her story has been passed down the centuries and across continents. In this anthology, Paul Fleischman crafts its many versions into one hymn to the rich variety and the enduring constants of our cultures.
Featured in WOW Review Volume X, Issue 3.
Dragonwings
Moon shadow is eight years old when he sails from China to join his father, Windrider, in America. Windrider lives in San Francisco and makes his living doing laundry. Father and son have never met, but Moon Shadow grows to love and respect his father and to believe in his wonderful dream. And Windrider, with Moon Shadow’s help, is willing to endure the mockery of the other Chinese, the poverty, the separation from his wife and country — even the great earthquake — to make his dream come true.
Series: Golden Mountain Chronicles
Awards:
Newbery Honor Book
Chu Ju’s House
When a girl is born to Chu Ju’s family, it is quickly determined that the baby must be sent away. After all, the law states that a family may have only two children, and tradition dictates that every family should have a boy. To make room for one, this girl will have to go. Fourteen-year-old Chu Ju knows she cannot allow this to happen to her sister. Understanding that one girl must leave, she sets out in the middle of the night, vowing not to return.
Red Scarf Girl: A Memoir of the Cultural Revolution
When China’s Communist Party detained Ji-li’s father, the 12-year-old was faced with the most difficult choice of her life. She could denounce her father and break with her family, or she could refuse to testify and sacrifice her future in her beloved Communist Party.
Ruby’s Wish
Ruby is unlike most little girls in old China. Instead of aspiring to get married, Ruby is determined to attend university when she grows up, just like the boys in her family. Based upon the inspirational story of the author’s grandmother and accompanied by richly detailed illustrations, this is an engaging portrait of a young girl who strives for more and a family who rewards her hard work and courage.
Zulema and the Witch Owl/Zulema y la Bruja Lechuza
When Grandma Sabina comes to live with the family, the first thing Zulema says to her is, ”You sure look old and ugly.” Grandma Sabina warns her granddaughter about the Witch Owl who prowls the night looking for mean children, but Zulema laughs defiantly at such a preposterous tale. In this story about the consequences of being mean to others, Zulema learns something about herself and possibly her grandmother too.
Creepy Creatures and Other Cucuys
Creepy Creatures and Other Cucuys presents the author’s retellings of fifteen traditional tales heard during his childhood in southern Texas.
Juan y el Chupacabras/Juan and the Chupacabras
Young Juan and his cousin Luz savor Abuelo’s hair-raising stories. He tells the children of defeating terrifying fiends like the Chupacabras and La Llorona. The children cling to every word as he describes his brave stand-off with the Chupacabras, a terrifying beast with wings, claws and sharp fangs. But yet they wonder if there’s more to his strange story than meets the eye. Plucky Luz hatches a plan to either disprove Abuelo’s tale or hunt down the menacing monster and put an end to it once and for all. Armed with a bag of marbles dipped in holy water and a sling shot, the children venture into a cornfield one moonless night in search of the truth.