Bound To Stay Bound

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Bulletin for the Center... - 02/01/2011 Brothers Michael and Derek are none too pleased that their grandmother kicks off their vacation by confiscating their electronics and heading them off to a museum at Harpers Ferry, but things pick up when the docent, Mr. Portufoy, brings out some authentic weaponry and uniforms to try on. As Derek boasts about his gaming prowess, Mr. Portufoy offers to send them on “a real game”; armed with a watch and orders to come back to the building before sunset, the boys exit into an 1862 version of the street and find themselves working as gofers for none other than Civil War photographer Mathew Brady. At first the boys are impressed with the high-quality effects of the game, but by the time they reach the battlefield at Sharpsburg after the Battle of Antietam, they begin to suspect that this may be the real thing and they won’t be getting back to their grandmother at all. Plenty of young gamers will recognize themselves in the saber-rattling brothers (“I had a video game about the battle of Gettysburg. . . . I blew away four hundred soldiers all by myself”) who don’t really have a clue about the devastation of war. That message is, however, overshadowed by the reality-or-reenactment dilemma, meetings with Brady and President Lincoln, and the boys’ appearance in an iconic photograph of Lincoln with General McClellan that hangs on the museum wall. For a straightforward picture-book treatment of Civil War reenactments, children may well prefer Ted Lewin’s Red Legs (BCCB 5/01), but adults interested in putting the brakes on youngsters’ bloody-minded video-game bravado will gravitate to this title for its unambiguous message. EB - Copyright 2011 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois.

Booklist - 02/01/2011 With the publication of this picture book, Polacco has written—along with Pink and Say (1994) and January’s Sparrow (2009)—a Civil War trilogy of sorts for young elementary-school readers. This time around, the author frames a portrayal of battle and loss at Antietam within a tale of time travel. Michael and Derek are video game–loving boys who are a bit skeptical of their grandmother’s effort to introduce them to history. But when Grandmother’s museum-director friend allows the boys to dress up as Union soldiers, complete with guns, the pair warms to learning about the important fight that inspired Lincoln to write the Emancipation Proclamation. Is the adventure they have only a very true-to-life reenactment? Or were the two actually transported to the past by the mysterious director? Either way, they gain a real appreciation for the war’s human cost. Polacco’s easily recognizable style, with its loose pencil-and-marker draftsmanship, isn’t always the perfect match for the serious tone of her prose, but she is certainly to be lauded for this unique effort to bring history alive. - Copyright 2011 Booklist.

School Library Journal - 03/01/2011 Gr 4–6—Is it a game, or is it real? Michael and Derek casually take a lighthearted step through a Harper's Ferry museum door into the year 1862 and experience the horrors of war at the battlefield of Antietam only days after the fighting. Dressed as Union soldiers and equipped with only a pocket watch to remind them of their obligation to return to the present, the two boys are called to assist Matthew Brady's photographer, Alexander Gardner, in the field. As they gradually become convinced of their actual insertion into history, a carriage ride with President Lincoln takes them to a pasture of broken stalks and scenes of death expanding page by page to greater destruction at a battleground later called "The Cornfield." Polacco's third visit to the Civil War era provides a full-page visual encapsulation of the battlefield and its physical and emotional devastation through a somber palette in her pencil/marker drawings and the changing expressions on faces of the boys. The book also provides an opportunity to see the perspective of Lincoln from the battlefield only a short time before he issues the Emancipation Proclamation; time is telescoped in the book as the boys are perfectly placed to offer assurances of America's future greatness to the despairing leader and see firsthand the tragedy and effects of the battle. A thoughtful tribute and addition to picture-book historical fiction for older children.—Mary Elam, Learning Media Services, Plano ISD, TX - Copyright 2011 Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and/or School Library Journal used with permission.

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