Mama does the Mambo
By Katherine Leiner and Illustrated by Edel Rodriguez
I have to start off by saying that I loved this story, everything about it. It had a beautiful a heartwarming plot, a girl’s father dies and her mother has no one to dance with anymore. This little girl wants her mother to dance again so she goes about trying to find her a suitable dance partner and the best partner ends up being the little girl. I thought that it was very touching that despite this girl’s sadness she wanted her mother to be happy again. The language used in the book is also very descriptive. There are vivid descriptions of how her parents the way her parents move when they danced, how they looked at each other, and the way their clothes moved when they danced. By being so descriptive it helps the reader create a visual image in their minds. This would be a great book to use when teaching a lesson on visualization.
Besides the text the illustrations were also great. The colors used for the illustration were very bright and rich, lots of reds, yellows, and oranges. By using these colors the author made the illustrations warm and tropical. This indicated to the reader that this story was taking place somewhere near the equator, where the weather was warm. I think that it is great when the reader can get clues about where the story takes place without reading the text. Later in the book I found out that this story actually takes place in Cuba so the illustrator did a great job conveying the tropical environment.