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Michelle Obama

First Mom
by Carole Boston Weatherford
32p. 978-0-76145-640-7.
COPY ISBN
Gr 1—3—This companion book to Obama: Only in America (Marshall Cavendish, 2010) focuses on Michelle Obama's childhood and schooling as she grew up in Chicago, got an ivy-league education, and married Barack Obama. Readers will learn more about her home life and parents than about her role as a mom, despite the subtitle of this book. Barrett's oil paintings have a soft-focus, sepia cast, placing them in the past to capture Chicago, everyday events, and milestones from the First Lady's history. Each spread features text opposite a full-page or page-and-a-quarter image of her reading, playing piano, studying a chessboard opposite her brother, going to school, or having dinner with her family. Only the last three pictures include her daughters. "Why we look up to her is not because she is stunning and stylish at nearly six feet tall, but because she is a walking, talking American success story" concludes Weatherford. The broad focus and laudatory quality of this picture-book biography create an overview greatly enhanced by the illustrations, but young readers seeking information about the First Mom will find more in Deborah Hopkinson's First Family (HarperCollins, 2010).—Janet S. Thompson, Chicago Public Library
Weatherford (Obama: Only in America) here chronicles the First Lady's childhood and pre–Barack accomplishments, pointedly downplaying her White House days: "What Michelle vows is that she is a mother first and a First Lady second." It's a point well taken, but the text can be a little overdramatic. Barrett's sepia-heavy oils are disarmingly intimate, almost like personal photographs.
Reviewed by Janet S. Thompson , Nov 01, 2010

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