Independent Reading Level: Kindergarten-3rd Grade
Awards: N/A

This book is about Diana Hopkins, a little girl who help with the White Houses victory garden. These gardens were President Roosevelt's way to provide food for the civilian's and the troops. Diana lived in n the White House. Diana tries so hard in the book to help do her part during the war. She tried many things but did not work or usually caused some sort of trouble. While the president was talking with her father, who was his adviser, about the gardens she know this was her chance to help. She asked if she could help and president Roosevelt loved the idea. Her garden was an inspiration and was on the front cover of the news paper. Diana was happy to do her part. This is historical fiction because even though Diana is was a real person who did help with the victory gardens, we do not know if she did play in the dumbwaiter or put the pins in the cushions in all the rooms or the activities she did around the White House. ( )

Another spectacularly great picture book that also tells a true story!! ( )

“Diana’s White House Garden” is by Elisa Carbon and it is Illustrated by Jen Hill. It is a book about the daughter of President Roosevelt’s chief advisor Harry Hopkins desire to help the nation with their war efforts. Her name was Diana and she wanted to help with the war effort so she tried many things around the white house and got in trouble for all of them. Yet one day when she was sitting in the oval office hearing her father and the President talk about their plans of everyone in the nation needing to have victory gardens so more goods could go to the war effort she wanted to help. So she started a victory garden at the White House and she worked hard to take care of it. As she was gardening it many other people in the White House like the gardener and Ms. Roosevelt taught her how to take care of a garden and helped her with it so that it could become a good one. Then one day news reporters came and talked to her while her garden was growing, and then after that everyone in the nation wanted to create a victory garden as well to help with the war effort. At the end of the story she finally was able to eat the vegetables that grew in the garden and she was able to help the nation in the war effort at the same time.

Diana Hopkins, whose father was an adviser to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, lived in the White House during World War II. There she got into plenty of mischief - putting a measles sign on her father's office door, placing tacks on all of the chairs set out for Eleanor Roosevelt's tea - while also dreaming of being a hero for her country. When President Roosevelt suggested that the country grow Victory Gardens, in order to raise produce for domestic consumption - Diana became the White House's Victory Gardener. Her efforts were publicized in the press, becoming an inspiration to her fellow Americans, both young and old, who were also growing Victory Gardens...

I enjoyed Diana's White House Garden, which presents an engaging story of one little girl's involvement in the larger events of World War II. Personal stories are often a wonderfully accessible entry into history for young readers, and a child's personal story is particularly effective in this respect. Children will enjoy learning about a mischievous young girl's life in the White House, her relationship with the famous Roosevelts, and her celebrated activity in the Victory Gardens campaign. The artwork, created with a combination of pencil, gouache and digital elements, captures the look of the 1940s, from the clothing to the White House interiors. Both author and illustrator have included a brief afterword giving more information, although it would have been nice if a list for further reading had been included. Recommended to anyone looking for picture-book biographies and/or works of history for younger children. ( )