Peggy Caravantes

With determination and audacity, Josephine Baker exploited her comic and musical abilities to become a worldwide icon of the Jazz Age. The Many Faces of Josephine Baker: Dancer, Singer, Activist, Spy provides the first in-depth portrait of this remarkable woman for young adults. Digging beneath the sensationalism usually associated with Baker and her uninhibited dancing, author Peggy Caravantes follows Baker's remarkable life from her childhood in the depths of poverty, to her comedic rise in vaudeville, to fame in Europe, outspoken participation in the US Civil Rights Movement, espionage work for the French Resistance during World War II, and adoption of 12 children, each from a different nationality, ethnicity, or religious group—her "rainbow tribe." Also included are informative sidebars on relevant topics such as the 1917 East St. Louis riot, Pullman railway porters, the Charleston, and more; lush photographs; an appendix updating readers on the lives of the rainbow tribe; and source notes and a bibliography, making this a must-have resource for any student, Baker fan, or history buff. Peggy Caravantes is a former English and history teacher, middle school principal, and deputy school superintendent. She is the author of 16 books for middle grades and young adult readers, including Petticoat Spies: Six Women Spies of the Civil War and American Hero: The Audie Murphy Story. Her YA biographies have been selected for the California Titles for Young Adults, Tri-State Books of Note, and the Top Forty Young Adult Nonfiction Books lists. She lives in San Antonio, Texas.

Dancer, Singer, Activist, Spy

The Many Faces of Josephine Baker

"Details the life of Cleopatra from differing perspectives"--

Powerful Leader Or Ruthless Pharaoh?

Cleopatra

While Twain was best known for his humor and wit, Caravantes shows in this enjoyable biography that his life was marked by tragedy, financial worries, and artistic difficulties. The text is solid and sheds new light on this well-known subject. The portrayal will make readers want to experience Twain's writing directly.

The Story of Mark Twain

A Great and Sublime Fool

This book relays the factual details of the orphan trains that sent East Coast orphans to be with families in the Midwest and West. The narrative provides multiple accounts of the event, and readers learn details from the point of view of an orphan child heading to the Midwest, a Midwestern family awaiting a child, and a New York City child welfare worker. This book offers opportunities to compare and contrast various perspectives in the text while gathering and analyzing information about an historical event.

A History Perspectives Book

The Orphan Trains

The first and only young adult book about Ada Blackjack and her remarkable, true-life survival story In 1921, four men ventured into the Arctic for a top-secret expedition—an attempt to claim the remote, uninhabited Wrangel Island in northern Siberia for Canada. With the men was a 23-year-old Inuit woman named Ada Blackjack, who had signed on as a cook and seamstress to earn money to care for her sick son, left at home. Conditions soon turned dire for the team when, after rations ran out, they were unable to kill enough game to survive. Three of the men tried to cross the frozen Chukchi Sea for help but were never seen again, leaving Ada with one remaining, ill team member whom she cared for but who soon died of scurvy. Determined to be reunited with her son, Ada learned to survive alone in the icy world by trapping foxes, catching seals, and avoiding polar bears. She taught herself to shoot a shotgun and a rifle. After Ada was finally rescued in August 1923, after two years total on the island, she became an instant celebrity, with newspapers calling her a real "female Robinson Crusoe." The first and only young adult book about Ada Blackjack and her remarkable story, Marooned in the Arctic includes sidebars on relevant topics of interest to teens, such as the uses of cats on sailing ships, the phenomenon known as Arctic hysteria, and various aspects of Inuit culture and beliefs.

The True Story of Ada Blackjack, the "Female Robinson Crusoe"

Marooned in the Arctic

Details the life of Charles Dickens and discusses how his upbringing and surroundings led him to write novels depicting the working class, often involving child laborers, in nineteenth-century England.

The Story of Charles Dickens

Best of Times

Explore the controversial life of Cleopatra. Engaging yet authoritative text and historically accurate images bring the biography of this fascinating pharoah to life. Infographics, sidebars, and fact boxes help add to readers' understanding of Cleopatra and the time in which she lived.

Presents the life and career of the eighteenth century New England essayist, poet, and lecturer who advocated a philosophy of self-reliance and individualism and was an important figure in the American Transcendental Movement.

Peggy Caravantes

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