Review by Booklist Review
Florence Merriam Bailey was drawn to birds as a child, feeling that they had "something important to tell her" if only she listened. Listen she did, growing into a careful ornithologist and tireless advocate for her avian acquaintances. When they called to her from atop expensive hats decorated with their stuffed bodies and feathers, she worked to end that lucrative millinery trend. When they were hunted for lab specimens, she challenged scientists to study them in the wild and turned her observations into one of the first field guides to American species. The birds called to Florence, and Florence called to the public to make the world a better place for her feathered friends. D'Aquino's text is delicate and poetic, the striking artwork unusually rendered in hand-painted paper collage, oil pastel, and pencil, featuring glorious texture and delightfully detailed notebook pages, tools, and birds. Back matter fleshes out Florence's accomplishments and encourages readers to continue to protect birds in the present day. A beautiful and unusual introduction to a fascinating life--and an important call to action.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Pioneering nature activist Florence Merriam Bailey (1863--1948) takes center stage in this picture book about a woman who "grew up surrounded by trees," developing a special fascination with birds. With her astronomer mother as a model of scientific prowess, Bailey paid special attention to the birds' songs; "She had the feeling/ they/ had/ something/ important/ to/ tell/ her." When a trip to "the big city" reveals a cruel fashion statement--hats covered with birds and feathers--Bailey determines to make a difference, collecting information and writing books, including an early field guide, and teaching people how to bird-watch ("Shhhhhhh! Listen. What are they saying?"). Though D'Aquino's compassionate narrative elides clear mention of how Bailey's actions resulted in a world that "became safer for the birds, and more beautiful for us all," hand-painted collage, oil pastel, and pencil illustrations place the paper-white protagonist amid stylized scenes that emphasize the personal nature of the figure's work. Back matter includes an author's note and recommendations for helping birds. Ages 5--8. (Oct.)
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Review by School Library Journal Review
K-Gr 2--This accessible look at one woman's lifetime dedication to scientific study and efforts to protect American birds introduces Florence Merriam Bailey. Spare text on vividly illustrated double-page spreads tells the story of this pioneering 19th-century ornithologist as she grows from a nature-loving girl to an activist/protector adult. Her early love of nature and birds matured to a call to action when she was horrified at women's fashionable hats adorned with feathers and even stuffed dead birds. She devoted her life to observing and listening to birds in their habitats and wrote one of the first field guides on recognizing birds by their songs and calls. The pastel torn paper collages creatively illustrate her life--depicting a bird's-eye glimpse from the treetops of the small girl, a dark night sky with owls and constellations, and the tools she used to study and record her scientific work. A summary of her life is appended as are resources for further information on birds. VERDICT Recommend to boost library collections' biographies of scientific women for young readers.--Frances E. Millhouser, formerly at Fairfax County P.L., VA
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Review by Horn Book Review
Raised in the mid-1800s by an outdoorsy father and astronomer mother ("It was quite unusual for a woman to study science in those days"), Florence Merriam Bailey grew up "surrounded by trees" and drawn to the birds that flew among them. As an adult, her compassion compelled her to launch protests against the killing of birds for fashion, sport, or study, all the while becoming a leading ornithologist herself. Appealingly textured mixed-media collage illustrations place a maturing Florence against vast double-page spreads of sky, forest, and city; the playful use of perspective depicts her as a small but steady presence among grander ecosystems. This is a bright and accessible introduction to a woman whose quiet advocacy left a lasting impact, complete with easy suggestions for budding birders and environmentalists to follow in Bailey's observant footsteps. An author's note and resource list are appended. (c) Copyright 2023. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
D'Aquino distills the life of ornithologist and activist Florence Merriam Bailey. The narrative highlights salient moments in Bailey's childhood: a summerlong camping trip with her father and brother; learning about stars and planets with her astronomer mother. Through elision and metaphor, D'Aquino links bird song to Bailey's awakening consciousness: "She had the feeling they had something important to tell her." Bailey's activism was sharpened by the global decimation of bird species to supply the Euro-American millinery trade's insatiable appetite for the bodies and plumage of birds. "People thought wearing birds on hats looked beautiful. To Bailey, those hats were the ugliest things she had ever seen." Modernist collage illustrations contrast grayscale with bright color to emphasize nature's paramount beauty and importance. Thus, two fashionable women, portrayed in black-and-white garb against a painted gray background, wear elaborate hats composed of colorful plumage and bird corpses. (D'Aquino sidesteps patriarchy's profiteering role in the trend, for which women alone were pilloried.) Bailey's tools for quiet observation of live birds--a camera, notebook, pencils, binoculars, and ears--are depicted; 10 common birds accompany their phonetic song-snippets. Other spreads distort perspective, stylize form, and celebrate the collage medium for itself, with torn-paper confetti representing leaves and clouds. Bailey herself is a paper-white cutout in patterned blue-and-white clothing, visually linked to birds and sky. A good introduction to an important pathfinder among women naturalists. (biographical note, birds in crisis, resources) (Informational picture book. 5-8) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
