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As you know, I usually feature children's book on Shelf-employed , however, this book, like Temple Grandin's, How the Girl Who Loved Cows Embraced Autism and Changed the World , should be a "must-read" for teachers and librarians, and anyone who would like to hear "The Inner Voice of a Thirteen-Year Old Boy with Autism." Higashida, Naoki. 2013. T he Reason I Jump . New York: Random House. Translated by KA Yoshida and David Mitchell. With help from a computer and an alphabet grid, Naoki Higashida wrote a book that opens a window into the workings of a child's autistic mind. Written as a series of answers to simple questions such as: "Why do you ask the same question over and over?" "Why can't you have a proper conversation?" "Why do you move your arms and legs about in that awkward way?"    Naoki explains, to the best of his ability, why he (and others like him), do the things that they do.  Of course, not all people with...

Rusch, Elizabeth. 2013. Electrical Wizard: How Nikola Tesla Lit Up the World . Somerville, MA: Candlewick.  Ill. by Oliver Dominguez. While Thomas Edison was busy lighting up big American cities with his new invention, Nikola Tesla was pondering the current that made it possible.  While watching a college professor demonstrate a new electrical machine, Inspiration flashed. Nikola realized that the motor didn't need to be run by direct current.  Alternating current, like the kind created by the hand crank, could power the motor. Sticking with alternating current would be simpler than converting to direct current -- and it would eliminate that awful sparking. His professor scoffed, and when Nikola Tesla traveled to the United States to meet his hero, Thomas Edison scoffed, too.  Although he gave Tesla a job, Edison saw Tesla's alternating current (AC) idea as a direct competitor to the power grid he had already set up using direct current (DC).  The two men had a ...

Brown, Don. 2013. The Great American Dust Bowl . New York: Houghton Mifflin. In a slim (80-page), hardcover, graphic novel, Don Brown offers a compelling account of the causes, effects, and consequences of America's 19th century push into the Great Plains - first for ranching, then small farming enterprises, and finally, large-scale, motorized farming.  Years of drought combined with loss of prairie grassland that had sustained the American Indians and the wild buffalo herds, led to dust storms of epic proportions that lasted for a decade. Describing one storm, Brown writes, On May 3, 1934, whirlwinds lifted 350 million tons of dirt from the Montana and the Dakotas' prairie, gathered them into gritty clouds that reached fifteen thousand feet, a height equal to twelve stacked Empire State Buildings.  Enough dust to fill 1,500 modern supertankers blew East. Dust fell like snow over Chicago. Atlanta. Boston. Washington. Midday Manhattan darkened beneath a dusty gray haze. Cars sw...

Hopkins, H. Joseph. 2013. The Tree Lady: The True Story of How One Tree-Loving Woman Changed a City Forever . Ill. by Ji ll McElmurry . From her school, Kate could see City Park in the hills above town.  It was called a park, but it didn't look like one.  It was where people grazed cattle and dumped garbage.     Most San Diegans didn't think trees could ever grow there. But Kate did. With a recurring theme of "but Kate did," T he Tree Lady recounts how Kate Sessions (1857-1940), defied all expectations by enjoying the outdoors as a young girl, obtaining a science degree from a prestigious university (unheard of for a woman in 1881!), and resolutely turning a barren, desert park into a green and leafy oasis that remains a jewel of the City of San Diego to this day.  McElmurry's painted, double-spread illustrations get the colors just right and project an "old-timey" feeling that kids will immediately recognize. Katherine Olivia Sessions' story, The T...