![]() However, they were happy to have him on their baseball team. He was intellectually gifted and was one of only a few Jewish students at Princeton, where Jews were prohibited from joining social clubs. Moe Berg was a decent defensive catcher who struggled at the plate in the 1920s and ’30’s-it’s his post-baseball career that fascinates. Particularly notable are three two-page spreads depicting the dog contemplating and then stealing a doughnut.Ī touching, playful, and satisfying tale of a silver-screen wonder dog. Rohmann’s expressive illustrations beautifully capture Strongheart’s personality their integration into the book’s design is striking. An author’s note explains the facts behind the story. Like a silent movie plot, Fleming’s narrative is full of adventure, romance, and suspense. Strongheart is vindicated when it’s discovered Sofie’s parents orchestrated her disappearance for an extortion scheme. The climax of the story is a dramatic courtroom trial in which Strongheart stands accused of attacking and killing 6-year-old Sofie Bedard, but boys from an orphanage produce Sofie in court at the last moment. Strongheart has an off-screen romance with his leading lady in the appropriately titled The Love Master, resulting in a litter of puppies. Renamed Strongheart, Trimble’s find becomes an instant superstar with the release of his first film, The Silent Call, in 1921. In the silent-film era of the 1920s, director Larry Trimble decides his next big movie star will be a dog and in Berlin finds what he is looking for: a thoroughly trained, 3-year-old, male German shepherd with a fierce disposition named Etzel. Japanese landscape paintings bordered with stylized patterns combine smoothly with Krampien’s bold, emotive illustrations, heightening the overall ambience and tone of the story.Ī terrifically told story with striking design and illustrations that will empower its readers.īefore Rin Tin Tin and Lassie there was Strongheart, the first canine movie star, whose real-life career serves as the basis of this fast-paced, dramatic story from Fleming and Rohmann. Kyi’s bracing text (based on some real historical figures, as revealed in an epilogue) gives a vivid sense of detail and danger, although it’s too bad the illustrated map of 16th-century feudal Japan does not clearly mark the locations referenced in the story. She recruits and trains a network of female ninjas to spy for him. When her husband is killed in battle, Chiyome-whose choices as a widow are either taking care of other women’s children or retreating to a spiritual life-convinces her uncle-in-law to take advantage of her ninja skills. After years of training, she becomes a ninja only to be married off to Mochizuki Moritoki, the nephew of a powerful daimyo. ![]() Her arduous preparation includes dangling from a cliff as well as more subtle skills, such as hensojutsu, the art of disguise. Chiyome’s great-grandfather was a famous ninja, and she is training to be one too. Mochizuki Chiyome lives in the Koga region of feudal Japan, where constant warfare between warlords called daimyos creates the need for both samurais and ninjas. A lengthy picture book about a female ninja in 16th-century Japan.
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