I AM MOZART, TOO | Kirkus Reviews

A memorable, lyrical reverse-chronological stroll by means of the lifetime of an American icon.

In free verse, Cline-Ransome narrates the lifetime of Harriet Tubman, beginning and ending with a prepare journey Tubman takes as an previous lady. “However earlier than wrinkles fashioned / and her eyes failed,” Tubman might stroll tirelessly beneath a starlit sky. Cline-Ransome then describes the array of roles Tubman performed all through her life, together with suffragist, abolitionist, Union spy, and conductor on the Underground Railroad. By framing the story round a literal prepare journey, the Ransomes juxtapose the privilege of touring by rail towards Harriet’s earlier modes of journey, when she repeatedly ran for her life. Racism nonetheless abounds, nevertheless, for she rides in a segregated prepare. Whereas the textual content introduces readers to the main points of Tubman’s life, Ransome’s use of watercolor—such a placing departure from his oil illustrations in lots of his different image books—reveals Tubman’s humanity, dedication, drive, and hope. Ransome’s lavishly detailed and expansive double-page spreads situate younger readers in every time and place because the textual content takes them additional into the previous.

An image e book greater than worthy of sharing the shelf with Alan Schroeder and Jerry Pinkney’s Minty (1996) and Carole Boston Weatherford and Kadir Nelson’s Moses (2006).

(Image e book/biography. 5-8)