[CALIBK12] Richie's Picks: HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON: DREAMS TAKING FLIGHT

[BudNotBuddy at aol.com]

Richie's Picks: HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON:  DREAMS TAKING FLIGHT by Kathleen 
Krull, illustrated by Amy June Bates, September  2008, 40p., ISBN: 
978-1-4169-7129-0
 
"In her thirty-five years of public service, Senator Hillary  Rodham Clinton 
has never given up on her fight for the American people...and no  matter how 
this primary ends, Senator Clinton has shattered myths and broken  barriers and 
changed the America in which my daughters and your daughters will  come of 
age and for that we are grateful to her."
-- Senator Barack Obama speaking in Iowa, 20 May,  2008
 
I have a lovely, seventeen-year-old daughter who, in her  younger years, we 
nicknamed Tenacious.  I can tell you from experience  that, on a day-to-day 
basis, it can sometimes be a bit challenging  to live with such an offspring.  
But there is no doubt in my mind  that, as a general principle, the more 
tenacity that exists in the world's  women, the more safe and sane a planet we all 
end up with.
 
"Once there was a girl who wanted to fly.  She  dreamed of zooming in a 
spaceship up through the clouds into outer space,  learning new things about Earth.
"She wrote to the national space agency to  volunteer.  But it was 1961, and 
some paths were still closed to  women, such as the job of astronaut." 
 
I'd flown down to Los Angeles on Thursday morning for  this year's Book Expo 
America.  While the DNC's Rules Committee  was in the midst of meeting in 
Denver  Saturday, hoping to come to an agreement on seating the Florida and  
Michigan delegations at the upcoming Democratic national convention, I was  amidst 
publisher friends, bookseller friends, librarian friends, a  breathtaking 
assemblage of top authors and illustrators, and millions of new  books on display.
 
"She liked to lead.  In high school she was elected vice  president of her 
junior class.  But when she ran for president, she  lost.  One of the boys she 
ran against said she was 'really stupid if she  thought a girl could be elected 
president.'"
 
My ongoing obsession with the US presidential campaign  which, for me, began 
three years ago this month -- when I  experienced Senator Obama delivering an 
electrifying keynote address  at the American Library Association's annual 
convention in Chicago  -- came roaring back into my consciousness Saturday 
morning.   Amidst those miles of books and friends at Book Expo, I encountered a  
loose-paged copy of the upcoming picture book, HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON:  DREAMS 
TAKING FLIGHT by Kathleen Krull and Amy June Bates.  
 
And by some double-whammy quirk of fate, Kathleen  Krull stopped by the Simon 
& Schuster booth and said hi to me as I was  sitting on the booth's carpeted 
floor, totally immersed in her  wonderfully moving book about Hillary.  
 
"She decided to apply to law school.  A lawyer really  could change the world 
-- or at least the lives of the neediest people, by  making laws work for 
them.
"A professor at one law school told her, 'We don't need any  more women.'  
She chose another school."
 
Kathleen sounded a mite bit wistful as she noted  that she'd been expecting 
Hillary to have been doing better at this point in the  primary season.  
 
But there is quite a silver lining to be found in this  situation.
 
"She gave birth to her own daughter and began whispering  encouragement."
 
There is no doubt that as the presidential campaign moves  on from the 
primary campaign into the general election campaign, there will  be a grand 
assortment of hastily published books on Hillary Rodham  Clinton -- both those for 
children and those for adults -- that will  be consigned to bookstore bargain 
bins and the cheapo tables at the  big-box retailers.  Had Senator Clinton 
prevailed in the primaries, these  are the books amidst which HILLARY RODHAM 
CLINTON: DREAMS TAKING FLIGHT would  have been unfairly lost.
 
"Bit by bit she sailed up through the clouds.  Not afraid  to fly, daring to 
compete, she decided to run for the highest office in the  land.  Was the land 
ready?  No matter -- she was propelling her way  into history.  Making a 
difference.  
"Sooner or later, we will have a woman president and it will  be because of 
every girl who has wanted to fly."
 
 
HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON: DREAMS TAKING FLIGHT is the book  on the subject of 
Hillary Rodham Clinton that you want to  read now, after the conclusion of the 
primaries, the book which does  not in any sense depend on Hillary's winning 
to be  of tremendous value.  It is a story that has me thinking back to  my 
beginning reader days of the mid-1960s, when I would  read through the employment 
offers in Newsday and note the separate job listings (at lower levels of  
compensation) for women doing the same job as men.  It is a  story that has me 
recalling so many of the similarly  outrageous examples of sexual discrimination 
that I learned  of through reading Karen Blumental's exceptional book about 
Title IX,  LET ME PLAY.  
 
HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON: DREAMS TAKING FLIGHT is  an exciting and inspiring 
book that I hope to see popping up in  libraries and classrooms everywhere so 
that all of our young people come  to know and understand the tenacity of this 
brilliant, barrier-breaking,  American hero.
 

Richie  Partington, MLIS
Richie's Picks http://richiespicks.com
Moderator,  http://groups.yahoo.com/group/middle_school_lit/
BudNotBuddy at aol.com
http://www.myspace.com/richiespicks





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