"The Cree of North America," by Deborah B. Robinson, is a fascinating look at the Native American people known as the Cree. The book combines an easy-to-read text with many full-color photographs. Also included are maps, a glossary, an index, many sidebar articles, and other supplementary features.

Topics covered include the Cree language, their environment, plants and animals in their areas, early Cree history, traditional arts and crafts, and more. Robinson doesn't shy away from controversial subjects; for example, she discusses the impact of the anti-fur movement on the Cree, for whom hunting and trapping have been important economic activities.

This juvenile biography uses the story of Jackie Robinson to demonstrate the value of determination. Deborah Woodworth begins with a story of young Jackie Robinson sitting at a lunch counter until he is finally served and follows his life and career until he helped start the Freedom National Bank in New York City, which was owned and operated by blacks. This book covers not only Robinson's baseball career, but his time his success in college sports and his time in the U.S. Army, including the court-martial episode. Each episode covered is specifically related to the idea of determination. The illustrations by Robin Lawrie are certainly adequate, although a few do tend to be a bit too cartoonish (but I was impressed that in the picture of the 1947 Brooklyn Dodgers team is accurate in that one guy in the back row is not looking at the camera). The back of the book includes a Study Guide that asks some basic questions and then provides the answers on the next page. This book will provide a decent introduction for young readers in Robinson's life and if we are talking about determination you could not possibly have a better example in terms of 20th century America.

Other titles in this series look at Sitting Bull for bravery, Clara Barton for compassion, Marie Curie for curiosity, Martin Luther King, Jr. for Dreams, Mahatma Gandhi for forgiveness, Elizabeth Barrett Browning for love, and Thomas Alva Edison for perseverance. I think it is not entirely coincidental that only one of these eight volumes uses a white male as the role model.