Customer Reviews

My Name is Celia/Me llamo Celia (Bilingual): The Life of Celia Cruz/la vida de Celia Cruz (Americas Award for Children's and Young Adult Literature. Winner (Awards)) (Multilingual Edition)

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My Name is Celia: The Life of Celia Cruz is written by Monica Brown and illustrated by Rafael Lopez. The book is the recipient of a Pura Belpre' Illustrator Honor Award for outstanding work that portrays, affirms and celebrates the Latino cultural experience in an outstanding work of literature for children and youth.

The exciting and inspirational life of beloved Cuban-born salsa queen, Celia Cruz, is celebrated in the bilingual book My Name is Celia Me Llamo Celia: The Life of Celia Cruz.

Celia was born in Havana to a large family where their lives were intertwined and music was an important part of everyday life. Celia's papa wanted her to become a teacher but music filled her soul with happiness. She was encouraged by a teacher to "go out into the world and sing...." Celia experienced prejudice and fled her beloved country Cuba when the revolution began. From Cuba, Celia traveled the world sharing her love of music with the world.

Rafael Lopez' illustrations are vibrant, fluid combinations of color that beg to be studied. The scenes fill the page and stir emotions as you read the story and live it through his drawings.

Armchair Interviews says: My Name is Celia: The Life of Celia Cruz is a beautiful and educational addition to any child's library. We highly recommend it.

The debut title in Rising Moon's "Luna Rising" series of bilingual Latino storybook-biography series for young readers, My Name Is Celia: The Life Of Celia Cruz/Me llamo Celia: La vida de Celia Cruz is written by Monica Brown and colorfully illustrated by Rafael Lopez honoring Cuban-born salsa queen Celia Cruz. Tracing her life from her early childhood in Havana to her musical achievement and worldwide fame, My Name Is Celia tells her story in rhythmic verse, and the artwork practically leaps off the page from sheer enthusiasm. A bright and energetic picturebook that is just plain fun to read aloud.

Celia Cruz is brought to life for young children in this colorful book. Like the tropics from which she came, the book is full of vibrant illustrations. The story is put into simple terms for young readers or a teacher or parent to read. Since the illustrations are so vibrant and bold children will be enthralled by the unique features of the art work. Each biographical page is bilingual for reading in Spanish or English or both. The book describes her early family life in Cuba, her departure after the revolution, her musical group Sonora Mantacera, meeting her musician husband,her associations with other salsa greats like Tito Puente and Willie Colon, her relocation to Miami and the various honors and recognitions she achieved. This is a great little book for primary and middle school libraries as well as community libraries. Students whoose first language is Spanish can benefit from the bilingual book through middle school years. This is a fun book.

I bought this and a few other Luna Rising books for my students in Spanish one and two. The fact that they are bilingual makes them less intimidating. The illustrations are wonderful and they get a sort of mini biography of "la reina de música" Celia Cruz. This is the first bilingual book that I've read in which I was thoroughly captivated by both the written story and the illustrations. I love this book. I use this and other picture books to facilitate reading and language comprehension while at the same breaking away from the text book.

For native speakers it is not particularly difficult, as it is a children's book, but for non native learners the language used is a bit challenging at times. Which is where the bilingual part comes in really handy. It also helps for the intermediate learners, when illustrating that translation is not always 100 % word for word. Overall this book is great just to read in English or Spanish and as a teaching tool if you are up to the challenge. It is absolutely entertaining and educational all at once. It is a great addition to any home or classroom library.

I used this book as a closing activity for a boy who I tutored in Spanish. He read the English and I read the spanish, a few pages at a time, after each weekly lesson. He loved it, and so did I! Beautiful and colorful pictures, well-written text in both english and Spanish.

This book is much like Celia herself. I think especially for those of us trying to raise bilingual bi-cultural children this book is very important. I highly recommend it as a great book and introduction to la musica salsa. you can follow up wih that intro beautifully.

The bilingual My Name is Celia would be worth buying just for the illustrations by Rafael Lopez. As a teacher who works with Spanish-speaking students, the book provides information on Cuban culture as well as on Celia, a popular Latin artist. Having two languages allows Spanish-speaking students to learn English and in turn, allows English-speaking students to build their Spanish vocabulary. This book was popular with my students, and I would recommend it for any classroom, but particularly those with an enrollment that icnludes Spanish-speaking students.

This seems like a book that would only be appreciated by adults. I can see it being used as a teaching tool for children in the classroom or as a resource for children when writing a book report, but not as leisure reading. The book also seems to have a bit of an identity crisis: Is it a poetry book? Is it non-fiction? Is it biography? At times the language is lovely and poetic and at other times it is not lyrical. I also found a few grammatical problems with the Spanish. I wanted to like this book especially since it was recently recognized, and as an adult reader there are things I did like, but I don't see how it would appeal to children.