By The Cover: Tangerine – Plano Library Learns

Different books | Matching looks

Got the summer blues? Need an immune boost or emotional pick me up? Hang tight – because today we’ve got some vibrant, juicy, vitamin-rich finds!

Welcome to “By The Cover”- are you interested in color theory/history AND trying new genres? Different books and materials, with similar aesthetics? Then this is the side of the blog for you! While we aren’t actually advocating for judging a book solely by its cover, we are proposing that choosing a theme is a new way to explore different genres and branch out within the collection. Plus, it’s fun!

Today’s color theme is TANGERINE! A fruit. A color. An ICON.

First, a little fruit history…
Yarden’s website notes that Tangerines, “first traveled to North Africa via the Silk Road trade route and were sent to other parts of the world through the Moroccan seaport of Tangiers where they got the name Tangerine. The Tangerine tree first arrived in the United States in the mid-nineteenth century when an Italian diplomat planted the trees in the consulate garden in New Orleans. From New Orleans, the tangerine fruit tree was taken to Florida where it became a top commercial citrus crop.”

Color wise – according to Canva, “tangerine is a saturated, bold orange hue that aptly describes the exterior of the delicious fruit [and] like most other orange hues, tangerine is associated with energy, youth, and happiness.”

Let’s take a look at some of the cheery and playful Tangerine titles we have in our collection
Disclaimer *I will be ranking these materials on how well they fit the “By The Cover” category – but not on actual content, cause let’s face it – they all look good!*

The Boy with the Butterfly Mind
By Victoria Williamson

100/10 – Beautiful multi-toned tangerines, +90 for butterflies

A straight-talking but uplifting story about a boy living with ADHD and the sparks that fly when he moves in with his perfectionist step-sister… Read more

Poemhood, Our Black Revival: History, Folklore & The Black Experience: A Young Adult Poetry Anthology
By Amber McBride

9/10 – A bit too yellow/mango, floral oranges and complementary colors are AMAZING

Featuring contributions from an award-winning, bestselling group of Black voices, past and present, this powerful poetry anthology elicits vital conversations about race, belonging, history and faith to highlight Black joy and pain. Read more

I Am Young
By M. Dean

5/10 – Tangerine – this is a very COLORFUL cover, beautiful warm flowers
10/10 – Looks like a fabulous read

This story is told in dual perspective by Miriam (a second-generation Iranian immigrant living in Edinburgh with her family) and George (a visitor from Wales). Their relationship throughout the decades mirrors the Beatles’s. In the other stories in this book, thematically bound by relationship flux and the impact of culture, Dean experiments beautifully with style and storytelling devices. Read more

Wild Thing: The Short, Spellbinding Life of Jimi Hendrix
By Philip Norman

20/10 – it’s giving… ORANGE HAZE!

Over fifty years after his death, Jimi Hendrix (1942-1970) is celebrated as the greatest rock guitarist of all time. But before he was setting guitars and the world aflame, James Marshall Hendrix was a shy kid in Seattle… Read more

Pandora’s Box: How Guts, Guile, and Greed Upended TV
By Peter Biskind

8/10 – Bit too neon orange, love the font

Biskind’s saga about the rise and fall of prestige television explains, in punchy, propulsive prose, how we went from Tony Soprano to Ted Lasso. Read more

Pandora's Box: How Guts, Guile, and Greed Upended TV

Rise: From Caged Bird to Poet of the People, Maya Angelou
By Bethany Hegedus

30/10- Gorgeous orange tones, great movement and texture, beautiful aesthetic

A biography of African American writer, performer, and activist Maya Angelou, who turned a childhood of trauma and emotional pain to become one of the most inspiring voices of our lifetime. Read more

For Good Measure: The Ways We Say How Much, How Far, How Heavy, How Big, How Old
By Ken Robbins

7/10 – Not totally tangerine, but it does have a literal orange

The mile gets its name from the term mille passus, which means “a thousand paces.” The abbreviation for pound (lb.) comes from the Latin libra pondo. Feet, pounds, quarts, miles: these are words we use every day. But where did they originate, and what do they actually mean? Read more

For Good Measure: The Ways We Say How Much, How Far, How Heavy, How Big, How Old

Kung Fu Panda [DVD]

9/10 – This gradient is a knockout!

Po works in his family’s noodle shop while dreaming the day away about becoming a Kung Fu master. His dreams soon become reality when he is unexpectedly chosen to join the world of Kung Fu and study alongside his idols. Read more

AND

Kung Fu Panda 2 [DVD]

10/10 – Also a knockout, +1 for Tigress

Po is now living his dream as The Dragon Warrior, protecting the Valley of Peace alongside his friends and fellow kung fu masters, The Furious Five. But Po’s new life of awesomeness is threatened… Read more

People of the Book
By Geraldine Brooks

1,000,000/10 – Tangerine + deep orange + BEAUTIFUL lilac contrast + butterfly. Enough said. (I will not be accepting feedback on my scale at this time)

In 1996, Hanna Heath, an Australian rare-book expert, is offered the job of a lifetime: analysis and conservation of the famed Sarajevo Haggadah, which has been rescued from Serb shelling during the Bosnian war. Priceless and beautiful, the book is one of the earliest Jewish volumes ever to be illuminated with images. When Hanna, a caustic loner with a passion for her work, discovers a series of tiny artifacts in its ancient binding–an insect wing fragment, wine stains, salt crystals, a white hair–she begins to unlock the book’s mysteries. Read more

Rise Up With a Song: The True Story of Ethel Smyth, Suffragette Composer
By Diane Worthey

6/10 – Not completely tangerine, whimsical warm tones on cover, +1 for the musically inclined dog

The first-ever picture book about Ethel Smyth, the world-famous composer and suffragette! “Brave women in history are examples that help us to be brave in the present. Learning about Ethel Smyth will be life-changing right now.” –Gloria Steinem Read more

Rise Up With a Song: The True Story of Ethel Smyth, Suffragette Composer

Frog and Toad Together
By Arnold Lobel

7.5/10 – TOADally tangerine!

Five further adventures of two best friends as they share cookies, plant a garden and test their bravery. Read more

On Bowie
By Rob Sheffield

4/10 – Electric orange here, but really just an accent on this cover

Explores the crucial moments of the famed musician’s career, from his glam-rock breakthrough to his last album, and discusses the legacy he left behind. Read more

Blood Orange Night: My Journey to the Edge of Madness
By Melissa Bond

100/10 – This use of color and contrast is BONITA!

Brain on Fire meets High Achiever in this “page-turner memoir chronicling a woman’s accidental descent into prescription benzodiazepine dependence–and the life-threatening impacts of long-term use–that chills to the bone. Read more

Arent & Pyke: Interiors Beyond the Primary Palette
By Juliette Arent

2/10 – Really just one tangerine line
10/10 – Interior design VISION

To Arent & Pyke, the objects that tell stories, the colors that call to the senses, and the materials that evoke certain moods all play a vital role in the design of a home. Known for their focus on the psychology of space, the design duo maintains that a well-designed home can enrich your life. Their masterful approach to color and materials results in optimistic, meaningful interiors. Read more

Arent & Pyke: Interiors Beyond the Primary Palette

Side Life
By Steve Toutonghi

3,000/10 – I would hang this as artwork in my house!

When Vin finds himself down on his luck, he takes a job house-sitting a Seattle mansion whose owner has gone missing. There he discovers a secret basement lab with an array of computers and three large caskets. Read more

Standing on her Shoulders: A Celebration of Women
By Monica Clark-Robinson

10/10 – Orange + complementary colors
10/10 – Celebrating women!

A stunning love letter to the important women who shape us — from our own mothers and grandmothers to the legends who paved the way for girls and women everywhere. Read more

Standing on her Shoulders: A Celebration of Women

Pete the Cat’s Wacky Taco Tuesday
By Kimberly & James Dean

11/10 – Pretty groovy cover, +1 for Taco Tuesday

Pete the Cat and his family are making tacos in this storybook by New York Times bestselling authors…Read more

Monarch Butterfly
By Gail Gibbons

5/10 – half and half tangerine, love the butterfly though..

The life cycle of the monarch butterfly begins when it is a tiny egg clinging to a leaf. In time, it goes through a transformation called metamorphosis to become a butterfly, and in the fall, it can migrate almost 100 miles each day. In this book, follow the story of one monarch butterfly… Read more

The Priory of the Orange Tree
By Samantha Shannon

1,000,001/10 – This may be one of the most beautiful covers I have EVER seen! +1 for dragons

A world divided. A queendom without an heir. An ancient enemy awakens. The House of Berethnet has ruled Inys for a thousand years. Still unwed, Queen Sabran the Ninth must conceive a daughter to protect her realm from destruction – but assassins are getting closer to her door. Read more

Tiger Days: A Book of Feelings
By M. H. Clark

7/10 – a bit coral colored, love the stripes!

Some days I feel so WILD and BRAVE and some days I feel small. THERE ARE SO MANY WAYS TO BE when you’re as BIG inside as me. Read more

Life of Pi [DVD]

10/10 – This tangerine really speaks to me – those eyes peer into my soul

A young Pi Patel, overcoming a cataclysmic shipwreck, finds himself stranded on a lifeboat with the only survivor, a ferocious Bengal tiger named Richard Parker. Read more

A Beautifully Foolish Endeavor
By Hank Green

10/10 – LOVE the blue and red with this one

Who has the right to change the world forever?
How will we live online?
How do we find comfort in an increasingly isolated world?
The Carls disappeared the same way they appeared, in an instant. Read more