Books like The Naming

Three worlds in one book! There’s the not-so-important world of the Ancelstierre, roughly Edwardian or early-20th-Century-ish, and there’s the Old Kingdom, basically medieval, where Charter Magic wars with Free Magic (and how well Nix thinks through the workings of his forms of magic).

But the third world is the one that takes the cake! An underworld of the dead, with its different levels, gates, and sills. Sabriel discovers her own special inheritance and powers—OK, that’s standard fantasy fare, except that Sabriel’s powers are those of an abhorsen. It’s the Abhorsen’s role to make sure that the dead stay dead, and journey on down into the deeper levels of death. Of course, the dead who keep coming back are the ones who drive the narrative!

Echo North combined several familiar-to-me folk tales, and introduced me to the tale of Tam Lin. I loved the blending of known and original—especially the mirror room, where stories layered upon stories and acquaintances took on completely new qualities. The sewing together of a fracturing magical house also fascinated me. I was never sure about the intentions of certain people until the end, and despite guessing wrong, I was delighted by what really was happening.

The plot, intrigue, and world-building in this series opener are pitch-perfect, but I'd be lying if I didn't say it was Katsa and Po's relationship that hooked me.

I loved their individual strengths and the way they strengthen each other. I love that their relationship is unorthodox and the way it's built on equality and respect. And I love that when Bitterblue comes into their lives, it brings a new dimension to all three characters.

This is the first in a series.

Anna writes cozy romantic fantasies that feel like getting a hug from your best friend.

A Cinderella retelling (we love a retelling!) in which our main character, Selah, has to travel the world to find a husband to save her family’s legacy, this book will have you giggling and gasping all the way to the end. And don’t worry – there is a sequel, The Boundless, and it’s just as good.

Did I save the best for last? I may have (although I recommend all of these books). This book appeals to me on so many levels. First, it tells the story of an important woman of history who was dauntless in her mission to help others to safety and freedom. Second, the dreamy, lyrical narrative is so different from how so many picture book biographies are written, yet incredibly effective. Third, the art is amazing – especially in its depiction of Harriet as an old woman when her strength was still so evident. And fourth, the story is told in reverse chronology. What a great decision! I use this book often when I teach about nonfiction picture book writing because of this creative approach. Hands down. I love this book.

I love that the author introduced me to Robert Smalls, whose story has rarely been told. An enslaved man in South Carolina, he stole a Confederate ship and sailed to freedom, later becoming a member of the US Congress.

I was angry that I had never known about Smalls, and this book has turned me into an evangelist for him. The author’s choice to tell his story in the first person was a risky move, but it paid off beautifully, allowing me to enter deeply into the life of a truly great man.

This inspired, award-winning study looks at how black and white households were reshaped in Virginia after the Civil War. It’s full of captivating stories: Black parents trying to wrest their children away from former enslavers; once-privileged White families having to send their boys or girls into the job market to compensate for the loss of enslaved laborers; or officials coping with masses of orphaned children. It also shows the different ways that adults used ideas of childhood for political ends, as well as how children themselves fared in the aftermath of war.

Like the thousands of other readers who’d been haunted by Harriet Jacobs’ 1861 autobiography Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl when it resurfaced during the civil rights era, I had questions. Were the horrific events of her enslavement and escape really true? Did Jacobs herself write the book, or was it the work of the white abolitionist she identified as her “editor”? In this biography, we’re given answers based on the documentary evidence Jean Yellin unearthed over 30 years of research. We learn that Jacobs’ stranger-than-fiction slavery narrative is factually accurate and that it was the work of Jacobs herself. In our present age of exploded myths, there’s something breathtaking about that discovery, and about Yellin’s masterful rendition of the life of an icon of Black female resistance.

A masterful recreation from fragmentary evidence of the life and zeitgeist of an extraordinary individual, Sweet’s microhistorical biography demonstrates how an individual life can illuminate the culture of the African-Portuguese diaspora in Africa, South America, and Europe during the eighteenth-century.

Sweet’s subject is a very uncommon representative of the common man or woman. Like other slaves, Álvares repeatedly resurrected himself by creating networks of kinship and community through a combination of resistance, accommodation, and appropriation.

His reputed power to heal soon caused him as much trouble in Brazil as it did in Africa.

Sweet argues that the similarities between Roman Catholic and African theologies account for why Álvares so quickly (and apparently sincerely) embraced baptism, communion, and confirmation in the Church, without rejecting his African beliefs and practices.

Lea VanderVelde’s biography of Mrs. Dred Scott captures the environments in which Harriet Scott lived her life and filed her suit for freedom in 1846 (it took 11 years before the Scotts’ legal case was decided by the U.S. Supreme Court). Harriet Scott filed separately from her husband because she believed she could establish her freedom, thereby ensuring the freedom of her two daughters, whose condition followed that of the mother. An illiterate enslaved woman, Harriet Scott left virtually no documents. VanderVelde provides rich context in which to situate and explain Scott’s life and freedom struggle, vividly recreating her world. This informative book is well worth reading.