Books for Children
in Troubling Times
Compiled by Nancy Schimmel
Contents
Carr, Jan. Dark Day, Light Night; illustrated by James Ransome. Hyperion, 1995. Manda's Aunt Ruby helps her to deal with some angry feelings by making lists of all the things that they like in the world.
Carson, Jo. You Hold Me and I'll Hold You, illustrated by Annie Cannon. Orchard Books, 1992. When a great-aunt dies, a young child finds comfort in being held and in holding, too.
Cosby, Bill. The Meanest Thing to Say; illustrated by Varnette P. Honeywood. Scholastic, 1997. When a new boy in his second grade class tries to get the other students to play a game that involves saying the meanest things possible to one another, Little Bill shows him a better way to make friends. Reader.
De Paola, Tomie. The Knight and the Dragon. Putnam, 1980. A knight who has never fought a dragon and an equally inexperienced dragon prepare to meet each other in battle.
Fox, Mem. Tough Boris; illustrated by Kathryn Brown. Harcourt Brace, 1994. Although he is a very tough pirate, Boris von der Borch cries when his parrot dies.
Hamanaka, Sheila. Peace Crane. Morrow Junior Books, 1995. After learning about the Peace Crane, created by Sadako, a survivor of the bombing of Hiroshima, a young African American girl wishes it would carry her away from the violence of her own world.
Heide, Florence Parry. The Day of Ahmed's Secret by Florence Parry Heide & Judith Heide Gilliland, illustrated by Ted Lewin. Lothrop, Lee & Shepard, 1990. All day long Ahmed carries his secret with him as he goes about his business, until he can share it with his family at night. He has learned to write his name, which we see in flowing Arabic script.
Heide, Florence Parry. Sami and the Time of the Troubles by Florence Parry Heide & Judith Heide Gilliland, illustrated by Ted Lewin. Clarion Books, 1992. A ten-year-old Lebanese boy goes to school, helps his mother with chores, plays with his friends, and lives with his family in a basement shelter when bombings occur and fighting begins on his street.
Hoose, Phil and Hannah. Hey, Little Ant. Tricycle Press , 1998. (800) 841-2665 www.tenspeed.com (also available as a recording, see www.heylittleant.com). As a child's shoe hovers above a tiny ant, child and ant have a dialogue: to squish or not to squish? Can each see the other's point of view, and the commonality, connectedness and value of all living things?
Leaf, Munro. The Story of Ferdinand; illustrated by Robert Lawson. Viking, 1936. Ferdinand likes to sit quietly and smell the flowers, but one day he gets stung by a bee and his snorting and stomping convince everyone (except Ferdinand) that he is the fiercest of bulls.
Mochizuki, Ken. Baseball Saved Us; illustrated by Dom Lee. Lee & Low, 1993. A Japanese American boy learns to play baseball when he and his family are forced to live in an internment camp during World War II, and his ability to play helps him after the war is over.
Naylor, Phyllis Reynolds. King of the Playground; illustrated by Nola Langner Malone. Atheneum, 1991. Kevin learns to deal with a bossy contemporary at the neighborhood playground.
Pomerantz, Charlotte. The Princess and the Admiral. Drawings by Tony Chen. Addison-Wesley, 1974. When a fleet of warships attacks the Tiny Kingdom on the eve of its celebration of a hundred years of peace, the princess uses the tides to salvage the kingdom's record and celebration.
Uchida, Yoshiko. The Bracelet; illustrated by Joanna Yardley. Philomel, 1993. Emi, a Japanese American in the second grade, is sent with her family to an internment camp during World War II. The loss of the bracelet her best friend has given her proves that she does not need a physical reminder of that friendship.
Williams, Vera B. A Chair for My Mother. Greenwillow, 1982. A child, her waitress mother, and her grandmother save dimes to buy a comfortable armchair after all their furniture is lost in a fire.
Zolotow, Charlotte. The Quarreling Book; pictures by Arnold Lobel. Harper & Row, 1963. A chain of quarrels turns around into a chain of kindnesses.
Sarah Pirtle. An Outbreak of Peace. This book is out of print but may be available in libraries. It is about children as peace activists.
Uchida, Yoshiko. Journey to Topaz; A story of the Japanese-American evacuation. Scribner, 1971. After the Pearl Harbor attack an eleven-year-old Japanese-American girl and her family are forced to go to an aliens camp in Utah.
Walter, Virginia. Making up Megaboy. Delacorte Press, 1998. When thirteen-year-old Robbie shoots an old man in a liquor store, everyone who knows the quiet, withdrawn youth struggles to understand this act of seemingly random violence.
Aliki. Feelings. Greenwillow, 1984. Pictures, dialogs, poems, and stories portray various emotions we all feel: jealousy, sadness, fear, anger, joy, love, and others.
Birdseye, Debbie Holsclaw. Under Our Skin: Kids talk about race, by Debbie Holsclaw Birdseye and Tom Birdseye; photographs by Robert Crum. Holiday House, 1997. Six young people discuss their feelings about their own ethnic backgrounds and about their experiences with people of different races.
Coerr, Eleanor. Sadako; illustrated by Ed Young. Putnam, 1993. Hospitalized with the dreaded atom bomb disease, leukemia, a child in Hiroshima finds hope in racing against time to fold one thousand paper cranes, because an old legend said that by doing so a sick person will become healthy. By the same author for older children, Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes, Dell, 1977.
Cohn, Janice. The Christmas Menorahs: How a town fought hate; illustrations by Bill Farnsworth. A. Whitman, 1995. Describes how people in Billings, Montana joined together to fight a series of hate crimes against a Jewish family.
McMahon, Patricia. One Belfast Boy; photographs by Alan O'Connor. Houghton Mifflin, 1999. Describes the life of Liam Leatham, a young Catholic boy, and his family as he prepares for a boxing match that he sees as the first step out of violence-plagued Belfast. Terkel, Susan Neiburg. People Power: A look at nonviolent action and defense. Lodestar, 1996. Covers the definition, principles, and methods of nonviolence, including civil disobedience.
Tunnell, Michael O. The Children of Topaz: The story of a Japanese-American internment camp: based on a classroom diary, by Michael O. Tunnell and George W. Chilcoat. Holiday House, 1996. The diary of a third-grade class of Japanese-American children being held with their families in an internment camp during World War II.
Hickox, Rebecca. The Golden Sandal : a Middle Eastern Cinderella; illustrated by Will Hillenbrand. Holiday House, 1998. An Iraqi version of the Cinderella story in which a kind and beautiful girl who is mistreated by her stepmother and stepsister finds a husband with the help of a magic fish.
Freedman, Florence B. Brothers : A Hebrew legend; illustrations by Robert Andrew Parker. Harper & Row, 1985. Hard times on adjoining farms bring about parallel acts of kindness and a celebration of "how good it is for brothers to live together in friendship."
Shepard, Aaron. Forty Fortunes: A tale of Iran; illustrated by Alisher Dianov. Clarion Books, 1999. A well-intentioned fortune-telling peasant unwittingly tricks a band of local thieves into returning the king's stolen treasure.
Shepard, Aaron. The Gifts of Wali Dad: a tale of India and Pakistan, retold by Aaron Shepard; pictures by Daniel San Souci. Atheneum, 1995. An Indian/Pakistani folktale in which an impoverished grass-cutter finds that gifts can be a mixed blessing.
Brown, Marcia. Stone Soup, An old tale; told and pictured by Marcia Brown. Scribner, 1947. When three hungry soldiers come to a town where all the food has been hidden, they set out to make soup of water and stones, and all the town enjoys a feast.
Day, Nancy Raines. The Lion's Whiskers : An Ethiopian folktale; illustrated by Ann Grifalconi.Scholastic, 1995. In this tale from the Amhara people of Ethiopia, a patient woman uses her experience with a wild lion to win the love of her new stepson.
Peace Tales: World folktales to talk about, compiled by Margaret Read. MacDonald. Linnet Books, 1992. A collection of folktales from cultures around the world, reflecting different aspects of war and peace.
Brett, Doris. Annie Stories: A special kind of storytelling. Workman; 1988. Guide for parents to make up stories to help their children deal with fears and problems.
Links and more books at www.ala.org/alsc (American Library Association) and www.weeklyreader.com/america
More folktales at http://www.healingstory.org/crisis
