Talkin' About Bessie: The Story of Aviator Elizabeth Coleman (Coretta Scott King Author Honor Books)

Bessie Coleman. Bessie Coleman. Well, Bessie Coleman, the "Queen of the Air", was the first African-American to obtain a pilot's license, and the first American of any race or gender to get an international pilot's license. (This was necessary because black aviators wouldn't teach a woman, and white flight schools wouldn't take a black student, so what was she to do but go overseas?) And she did it a few years before Earheart as well.I had picked up another book about her, Nobody Owns the Sky, but that book was so abysmally bad that I gave it away as soon as I could. It's told in a trite, cloying rhyme. Ugh. So I thought I'd try this book instead.This book is very well-written. You can really get a feel for Bessie's personality, and she's not portrayed as a saintly individual we should all admire because she did everything right. No, she fought to earn every penny as a child picking cotton (even resorting to tampering with the scale if she could get away with it), and she ran away from hard drudgery as fast and as soon as she could, becoming a pilot in part to avoid having to spend any more of her life doing other people's laundry or buffing their nails. She worked hard only as much as she needed to, and not as a goal in and of itself. (And it's just as well. If she'd applied herself to picking cotton or doing laundry instead of learning to fly to get away from that life, well, we would have no book to read.)The story isn't told straight-out, but through the fictionalized reminiscences of people who might have gathered to talk about her. As such, many of the memories are told in non-standard dialect. I don't know how accurate this dialect is. The author is clear at the front of the book that this story is not made of quotations or interviews, it's just a convenient and inviting way to share her information that she got through research.The one thing I'm annoyed about with this book is that it's absolutely not suited for any form of read-aloud at all, and I'm still doing that with my nieces. It's too long. However, I expected that when I bought it.

great book, buy one for you and one for a young reader in your family

The book was shared in a group of ladies who wanted to know more about African American History.Their was a lot of really personable information in the writing that made Elizabeth Bessie Coleman come to life in the minds of the listeners.

Am I missing something? Is the Coretta Scott King award given ONLY to books written in free verse? No, I know that's an exaggeration. Seriously, telling a story using vernacular speech is one thing, but telling EVERY interesting children's story for a so-called Black audience in free verse is a bit... stifling to the creativity of children. Also confining and unvaried.Note to authors and publishers: We are parents and we want our children to learn to write paragraphs. Publishing more good examples for our children would be welcome. Please?There is little to no historical basis for the stream-of-consciousness dialog captured in this book as pretend-eulogies, as mentioned in the book's notes section. This is Nikki Grimes' ideas of how Bessie would be remembered. That's ok, I suppose, but it tends to be more about what Nikki Grimes finds admirable than what a regular parent would want their child to emulate.Persistent, determined, story-spinner -- yes, but also dishonest, grumbling, and allergic to elbow grease.And always with the free verse.The illustrations are excellent -- I was disappointed with the non-biographical biography.vocabulary includes: acquaintances, prosperity, sly, tallied, hoarding, sacrifices, tidbit, scorch...

Meet Elizabeth Coleman--the first African American woman to fly a plane. Coleman's story is told in a series of "interviews" starting from her childhood right up to her death. Her family talks about her education, her determination, and her unfailing dream to be more than just a field hand. Reporters talk about her as a pilot, and friends and fans talk about her courage and determination. In a time when skin color was a huge dividing line, Coleman managed to rise above it all, literally, in a plane. Her story is fascinating, and the style Nikki Grimes uses is readable, unique, and fitting for the tale. E.B. Lewis's pictures capture various aspects of Coleman's life--including details that the words opposite the picture don't mention. There is a note at the beginning of the book, and a note at the end, explaining more about Bessie Coleman and her life in the early 1900s. There also is a bibliography provided. This book won the Coretta Scott King award for 2003.

Aviator Bessie Coleman was the first African American woman to obtain a pilot's license. When taking into account the time this occurred, in the early part of the twentieth century, Ms. Coleman's accomplishment truly resonates.The fictionalized account of Bessie's rise to glory is told by alternating voices of family and friends to those with whom she had a passing acquaintance. Most voices used an illiterate vernacular style that I found annoying ("She was jus' a chile then, spendin' happy days waterin' roses...")Bessie seemed to have many negative qualities. She was dishonest about weighing cotton, putting extra weight on the scale. She was reportedly "allergic to elbow grease and manual labor." Yet her days were described as "endlessly tiresome". I am undecided as to whether this was good or bad - at least the author was attempting a true portrait. But I don't think that, had I known her, I would have gotten along with Bessie.I did not understand why Bessie had to "pinch pennies to rent books from the library wagon". Did they force African Americans to pay to use the public library then?