{"id":4170,"date":"2016-10-09T00:01:06","date_gmt":"2016-10-09T06:01:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/?p=4170"},"modified":"2016-10-15T20:24:31","modified_gmt":"2016-10-16T02:24:31","slug":"7-imps-7-kicks-504-featuring-juana-medina","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/?p=4170","title":{"rendered":"7-Imp\u2019s 7 Kicks #504: Featuring Juana Medina"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nHere’s a quick post to tell you about Juana Medina’s<\/a><\/strong> newest book, Juana & Lucas<\/em><\/a><\/strong>, on shelves now from Candlewick Press. I read this one at the tail end of this summer—and I read it out loud to my girls—and we enjoyed every moment of it. It’s the story, divided into 11 illustrated and entertaining chapters, of young Juana, who lives in Bogot\u00e1, Colombia. She likes drawing; her Mami, her T\u00eda Cris (her “favorite aunt. OF. ALL. AUNTS.”), and her Abue; her friend, Juli; a superhero character named Astroman; Brussels sprouts; the city where she lives, where “everyone<\/em> speaks ESPA\u00d1OL<\/em>!”; reading; and her “furry amigo, Lucas.” He is “the smartest and most amazing perro<\/em> every born,” Juana tells readers. “I can’t think of a better friend than Lucas.” Juana doesn’t<\/em> like her school uniform and Felipe and Santiago, who laugh at her on the bus. But most of all, she doesn’t like learning English: “I’m certain I don’t either need or want to learn the English,” she says. “I’ve got trouble enough already with learning math.” The worst part of it all? The “TH” sound tickles her tongue and she is “positively terrible” at pronouncing it. <\/p>\n

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But then one day her Abue tells her that, after she learns English, she can go to Spaceland in Orlando, Florida, U.S. of A. “At Spaceland they only speak English,” he tells her. “No one speaks Spanish. Not even Astroman.” Juana is now more committed to the challenge that is learning this complicated language. <\/p>\n

This may be the story of a girl living in South America, but it rings with universal truths to which all children can relate — the young Juana loves her family and friends (and dog), and she even likes some things about school. Her spunk is charming and relatable, and readers who pick up the story will also learn a bit about South America, as well as some Spanish; Medina seamlessly incorporates Spanish terms into the book. She also plays with font size throughout the book to accentuate enthusiasms, and she singles out several of her “likes” and “loves” with double page spreads that break down in an almost diagram-like way precisely<\/em> why she loves what she does.
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\nAnd, as the Kirkus<\/em> review<\/strong> notes<\/a>, the “real gift of this book comes from presenting a different point of reference to American children who hear only stories of poverty and need coming out of South America.” I hope there are sequels planned. Good stuff. <\/p>\n

Bonus: Here’s<\/a><\/strong> a Kirkus Q&A with Medina about the book. (“Exploring storytelling in a second language and trying to tell a sort-of-memory in ways that would be somehow compelling to somebody else was a hard thing for me, first, because English is not my first language. I tried to be very observant of children and how they tell stories and what is important to them, to retain some sort of authentic voice without…becoming didactic, with the bilingual aspect, or overly enthusiastic or silly\u2014just genuinely told through the dramatic lens of a second-, third-grader who is going through this intense experience.”)<\/p>\n

JUANA AND LUCAS. Copyright \u00a9 2016 by Juana Medina. Reproduced by permission of the publisher, Candlewick Press, Somerville, MA.<\/em><\/p>\n

Note for any new readers: 7-Imp\u2019s 7 Kicks is a weekly meeting ground for taking some time to reflect on Seven(ish) Exceptionally Fabulous, Beautiful, Interesting, Hilarious, or Otherwise Positive Noteworthy Things from the past week, whether book-related or not, that happened to you. New kickers are always welcome.<\/p>\n

* * * Jules’ Kicks * * *<\/strong><\/font>
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I’m going to do that thing this week that may or may not be annoying to my readers, where I say that it’s so beautiful outside on this crisp Fall day (the day I’m typing this) that all my kicks, one to seven, are This Beautiful Fall Day. And now I’m going to try to go back outside. <\/p>\n

I do hope that, in the wake of Hurricane Matthew (and even this never-ending election season), everyone is okay. It is terribly sad the destruction in Haiti. <\/p>\n

Do tell me: What are YOUR<\/font><\/strong> kicks this week? There are some weeks when we need them more than others, yes? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Click to enlarge spread)   Here’s a quick post to tell you about Juana Medina’s newest book, Juana & Lucas, on shelves now from Candlewick Press. I read this one at the tail end of this summer—and I read it out loud to my girls—and we enjoyed every moment of it. It’s the story, divided […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4170","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-seven-good-things-before-monday"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4170","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4170"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4170\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4170"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4170"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4170"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}