Wednesday 15 January 2020

Rebel Girls books

A fascinating biography of a famous female mountain climber.

The Rebel Girls know how to match illustrations and story, and though this is far longer than their normal story it still works well here. I'd never heard of Junko before and I was really interested in it - although the way that both she and her husband kept insisting they weren't typical Japanese people kept tripping me up! I loved the little touches of Japanese culture woven into the story as well, but I was surprised there was no glossary - the children reading this will probably not know what a lot of it is.

Overall a great read.


From the world of Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls comes the historical novel based on the life of Junko Tabei, the first female climber to summit Mount Everest.

Junko is bad at athletics. Really bad. Other students laugh because they think she is small and weak. Then her teacher takes the class on a trip to a mountain. It’s bigger than any Junko’s ever seen, but she is determined to make it to the top. Ganbatte, her teacher tells her. Do your best.

After that first trip, Junko becomes a mountaineer in body and spirit. She climbs snowy mountains, rocky mountains, and even faraway mountains outside of her home country of Japan. She joins clubs and befriends fellow climbers who love the mountains as much as she does. Then, Junko does something that’s never been done before… she becomes the first woman to climb the tallest mountain in the world.






A fascinating read about a woman who literally changed the world.

I love the match between pictures and words, although the pictures didn't come through very well in the Kindle version. It's enough to know that they'll be lovely in the finished version. The story was very interesting, and I really enjoyed learning about the Green Belt movement. The exercises at the end were great, too.


A brilliant read.




From the world of Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls comes the historical novel based on the life of Dr. Wangari Maathai, the Nobel Peace Prize-winning activist from Kenya.

Wangari lives in a magical place in rural Kenya where the soil is rich for planting, the trees abundant, and the nearby pond full of mysterious creatures. She drinks from cool, clean streams and plays beneath her favorite fig tree under her mother’s watchful gaze.

Then Wangari grows up and goes away to school, and things start changing at home. Farmers chop down the trees. Landslides bury the stream. The pond dries up. The soil becomes overworked, dry, and unusable for planting. And people go hungry. Dr. Wangari Maathai has a simple solution to all of these problems: plant trees.



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