MMGM- Off the Map and Kid Musicians

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Marvelous Middle Grade Monday
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Always in the Middle 

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Unleashing Readers

Hashimoto, Meika. Off the Map

November 12, 2024 by Scholastic Press

E ARC provided by Edelweiss Plus

Marlo is excited to go on a backwoods adventure in the Yukon with her mom to start off her summer vacation. The end of the school year has been rough, after her father left to go "find himself" and her best friend, Amos, stopped talking to her for reasons she doesn't understand. When Marlo and her mom get packed up to go on their advenutre, along with her dog, Cheerio, Marlo is not happy to find that Amos and his father have been invited along. At first, she's in the canoe with Amos' dad, Terry, who is a novice at paddling, but eventually ends up with Amos. When the two get separated from the parents, they run into trouble. Taking a wrong turn, they get swept over some falls, and have to try to dry out their equipment and set up for the night. Amos suffers from hypothermia, and Marlo has to build a fire to get him warm, but leaves the axe by the river and it gets swept away. They trek off away from the canoe, and find it crushed by a tree when they get back. Cheerio comes face to face with a porcupine but escapes unscathed, and Marlo slices open her foot on rocks in the river. There's a storm, as well as the requisite bear attack. Food runs low, and the two dispair of being found after a helicopter flies over and doesn't spot them. On top of all of this, there is some friend drama. Marlo feels that Amos' treatment of her is similar to her dad abandoning her, so is freezing him out. At the same time, Amos feels that Marlo is the one who stepped away from their friendship. Amos' tells her that he has a crush on her, and the two are able to discuss their feelings, unpack them, and remain friends. Eventually, they make their way back to the main river, and are rescued. 

Strengths: Survival tales all tend to be somewhat similar (there's almost ALWAYS a bear attack!), but there are never enough of these books for my readers. Off the Map does have some facets that set it apart. The bear attack, for instance, is the best one I've read. There's a bear horn and pepper spray involved, and Cheerio gets mixed up in it. Everyone survives unscathed, however. Whew. This interweaves the emotional drama with the survival quite nicely, and is well paced and a good length. Marlo and Amos' falling out has some surprising but realistic elements, and it's on trend with current thinking that they were able to discuss what happened and still remain friends. Marlo's feeling that what happened with Amos parallels what happened with her father is well explained, and shows how parental problems can affect middle grade children on many different levels. The cover has lots of good elements in it that will appeal to middle grade readers; make sure that there are plenty of copies of this in your Scholastic book fair. 
Weaknesses: Marlo's mom is a professional river guide who's spent years in the Yukon wilderness, and yet she lets her daughter go off without her own satnav phone? And they bring their dog? Of course, there wouldn't be a story is Amos and Marlo stayed with the parents, but they seemed a bit I'll prepared for the emergencies that might come up in such a journey. Did love that Marlo and Amos had to pay for the damaged canoe by earning money, but was it really their fault? Young readers will not have these reactions. 
What I really think: There are just never enough survival stories for my students, so I will definitely purchase this, and it will make a nice display with Bledsoe's Running Wild, and Behren's Alone in the Woods, Downings' Just Keep Walking, Greci's The Wild Lands, Goebel's Backcountry, and Philbrick's Wild River. Very new titles also include Smith's Stranded, Russell's It Came from the Trees, and what I still think is essentially a survival tale, Neri's Safe Passage. 

Stevens, Robin and Steinfeld, Allison (illustrations)

Kid Musicians: True Tales of Childhood from Entertainer, Songwriters, and Stars

November 12, 2024 by Quirk Books

Copy provided by the Publisher

Think of the Quirk Kid books as a sort of Readers Digest condensed book collection of biographies. In just ten to twelve pages, which includes bright and colorful illustrations, we get a great overview of a variety of musical celebrities. There are four general categories with four people each, and while most are from the last forty years or so, there are some outliers. 

The "Pop Superstars" include Cher, Beyonce, Harry Styles, and Taylor Swift, so this will draw in a lot of young readers who are Swifties! It was interesting to read about Styles, since I found out he is the age of my children, but the book didn't give me much information about his interesting style. 

"Jazz Clubs and Concert Halls" gives us older musicians like Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Yo-Yo Ma, and Glenn Gould, of who I had never heard. Born in 1932, Gould was considered one the most famous classical pianists. 

The musicians of my era get a shout out with "Songwriting and Music Making" with such Boomer favorites as Paul McCartney, Joni Mitchell, Bob Marley, and Dolly Parton. I was glad to see Mitchell included, since she is such a brilliant writer, and is still singing despite health challenges, but I would have chosen John Lennon or George Harrison to represent the Beatles; after all, they are unfortunately dead, and Sir Paul is still going strong. 

Finally, "Rhythm and Blues and the Motown Sound" is represented by Diana Ross, Stevie Wonder, Prince, and Mariah Carey. Wonder's story is especially suited to this series, since his career started when he was quite young. 

This series of collective biographies reminds me of the Childhood of Famous Americans series, with which I was obsessed in the fourth grade. It's helpful to young readers to see the childhood daily life and challenges of people who became big stars.  I really appreciate that this has a bibliography as well as a good index; I'm seeing more and more nonfiction books that lack these crucial elements. 

It's tough to balance the mix of different types of music and different eras of performers, but Kid Musicians delivers a well orchestrated interlude of stories about performers that will be music to young readers' ears.