Series: A Fly on the Wall History
Author: Thomas Kingsley Troupe
Illustrator: Jomike Tejido
Publisher: Capstone
Publication Date: January 2017
Age Range: Ages 6 - 7
Lexile Measure: 590 to 610L
Awards: NA
Upcoming titles: January 2018
This series employs a unique feature. Maggie and Horace are the proverbial "flies on the wall" who are present at several key moments in the history of the United States. The events covered include some that are rarely covered for this age range, such as, Paul Revere's Ride, Birth of the Star-Spangled Banner, and Titanic's Tragic Journey. Each title is richly illustrated in suitably muted tones.
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| The Wright Brothers |
| Paul Revere |
 |
| Voyage to America |
Each title has 32 pages and presents the event in a way that is appropriate for the target audience. They do not try to tell the entire story, but rather highlight a specific time during the event. For example, Harriet Tubman's Escape covers only the time from her first attempt to escape with her younger brothers to her actual escape using the Underground Railroad. The last three pages cover her free years, explaining how she got a job and went on to help more than 100 other slaves find freedom.
Each title concludes with a:
- Timeline
- Glossary
- Questions to Think About
- Read More
- Internet Sites
- Index
This series would have been more useful with an Author's Notes section explaining his sources and where he was "creative" in his retelling of these historical events. I think this series would be useful in most libraries that serve younger children. They serve as a great introduction to historical events not usually written about for this young audience.
That said, I know that we are supposed to be reviewing the "best of the best" in children's nonfiction. The "flie on the wall" became a distraction from the story for me. First of all, they were large, cartoon characters.
They carried on a continuous conversation adding additional tidbits among their comic banter, which sometimes took up as much as one-third of the page. Most of the illustrations already included an additional, contributing fact, and the ones offered by the flies were not pertinent to the story being told.
I also could not find any professional reviews for these books which doesn't always mean that they aren't quality texts, but does cause me to pause and wonder why.
Blog Reviews
http://vanmeterlibraryvoice.blogspot.com/2017/05/a-fly-on-wall-shares-4-stories-from.html
Companion Titles:
David A. Adler's Picture Book Biographies such as:
- Harriet Tubman
- Harriet Beecher Stowe
- Robert E. Lee
- Abraham Lincoln
- Sojourner Truth
- Paul Revere
- Thomas Jefferson
- James and Dolly Madison
- Patrick Henry
The If You Lived...series
- ...If You Sailed on the Mayflower
- If You Lived When There was Slavery in America
- If You Lived at the Time of the Civil War
Paul Revere's Ride by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
The You Wouldn't Want to...series such as:
- You Wouldn't Want to Sail on the Mayflower
- You Wouldn't want to be an American Colonist
- You Wouldn't Want to be a Civil War Soldier
Jean Fritz's books such as:
- And then What Happened, Paul Revere?
- Can't You Make them Behave, King George?
And for really interested and competent students, there are always the Who Was... and What Was...series.
Interestingly enough, I found two other sets of books that share book series' name. I wouldn't recommend either one:
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