Book

Early in the twentieth century, most Asian immigrants bound for America disembarked at a rocky island in San Francisco Bay. At the Angel Island Immigration Station, they were scrutinized, physically examined, interrogated, and confined behind barbed wire in crowded dormitories. Detainees often waited weeks or months to be processed. Those who passed inspection were allowed to enter the country known to many Chinese as Gold Mountain. Others, less fortunate, were sent back home or even died in detention.

In 1964, Mississippi civil rights groups banded together to fight Jim Crow laws in a state where only 6.4 percent of eligible black voters were registered. Testing a bold new strategy, they recruited students from across the United States. That summer these young volunteers defied segregation by living with local black hosts, opening Freedom Schools to educate disenfranchised adults and their children, and canvassing door-to-door to register voters.

When I was ten, one summer night,
The baby stars that leapt
Among the trees like dimes of light,
I cupped, and capped, and kept.

It takes only a few words, if they're the right words, to create a strong image. Whether listened to in the comfort of a cozy lap or read independently, the thirty-six very short poems in this collection show readers young and old that a few perfect words and pictures can make the world glow.

Sophie gets mad, climbs a tree to calm down, and is soon ready to come home to her loving family. "The text is...brief, for it is Bang's double-page illustrations, vibrating with saturated colors, that reveal the drama of the child's emotions." - School Library Journal, starred review. "Bang's strong, nonproscriptive acknowledgment of a feeling most children will recognize will be welcomed." - Booklist, starred review
Caldecott Honor Book 2000