Hurray for Election Day! Vote for Our Future by Margaret McNamara

Every two years on the Tuesday after the first Monday of November, Stanton Elementon School closes for the day!

Why? For repairs? Nope.

For a holiday? Nuh-Uh!

For a vacation? No Way! Stanton Elementary School closes for...

ELECTION DAY!

On that special day the school becomes a POLLING PLACE where people come to vote for the lawmakers who make the rules for the country.

"We should all vote!" said LaToya.

"We have to wait until we are eighteen!" said Lizzy. "We have to live with adults' choices! So what can WE do?"

So the kids do research. They read books and go on-line. They visit the local election office and pick up forms and voting guides.

"We should spread the word!" the kids say.

And spread the word they do, in Margaret McNamara's lively story of voter participation, in her new Vote for Our Future! (Schwartz and Wade, 2020). The kids fan out over the community, ready to contend with all the reasons grown-ups give for not voting. They knock on doors and remind citizens of the coming election and the issues on the ballot. They tell the naysayers  about early voting and absentee and by-mail voting. They say that all votes count equally and together voters can make the kind of changes they want to see happen in their own futures.

This energizing book with its perky partisans details many of the terms--such as "polls" and "early voting"--that young citzens should know, and points out that indeed votes do bring changes.

"Spot on!" says Booklist.

Mud-Slinging! Vote for ME! by Ben Clanton

Well, what's so great about YOU?

I'm a super cute elephant!

How can you not vote for someone as adorable as me?

Political speeches are prone to bragging, and Elephant is not above a bit of braggadocio from the podium.

So Donkey tries a bit of bribery:

If you'll vote for me, I'll give you a sucker!

So Elephant ups the ante:

If you pick me, I'll give you PEANUTS!

So the political competitors pivot to some name-calling!

STINKY Poop Scooper!

NINCOMPOOP!

This campaign degenerates into a bit of traditional MUDSLINGING!

SLOP!

PLOP!

It's politics as usual, in Ben Clanton's Vote for Me! (Tundra Books), which offers a satiric look at campaigns and elections which prepares youngsters for some of the usual political palaver in the election scene. Ironically, Clanton gives the clandestine candidate Mouse the win this time, in a silly, sarcastic look at the traditional candidates, but this tongue-in-cheek look at elections make a good jumping-off-point for school and home discussions of the important political scene.

Other top-selling comic offerings by author-illustrator Ben Clanton include Narwhal: Unicorn of the Sea (A Narwhal and Jelly Book 1), and sequels, Rot, the Cutest in the World! and It Came in the Mail. (read my reviews here).