Stirring and informative.
From the creators of Black Boy, Black Boy (2022) comes a similar ode for Black girls.
A youngster sits on her bed, where an adult companion does her hair for the day ahead. The accompanying text strikes an encouraging note: “Dear girl, Black girl, / rise up, it’s time / It’s a new day and a / chance to shine.” The girl’s bed is covered with a multicolored fabric quilt—a nod to the quilting tradition in African American culture—while her walls are decorated with posters of inspiring quotations by famous Black women. The quilt serves as a visual leitmotif as the girl is told to “shape your own history like / these amazing queens.” “Dear girl, / Black girl, / what do you see?” her guardian asks. In rhyming sentences, the authors introduce and summarize the courageous actions of nine contemporary and historical Black women, including Vice President Kamala Harris. Bright digital illustrations of the subjects complement the brief, explanatory text. Refreshingly, the book takes a global perspective. Potentially less familiar people from outside the United States are featured alongside U.S. figures: South African musician Miriam Makeba, Sierra Leonean Creole educational advocate Adelaide Casely-Hayford, and Canadian civil rights activist and businesswoman Viola Desmond. Together, Kamanda, Redmond, and Quartey have created an upbeat reminder of the great potential inherent in Black girls everywhere.
Stirring and informative. (biographical notes about the people mentioned) (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9781728271149
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks eXplore
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
A mixed bag.
An alphabetical tour of emotions.
This British import mixes words that many young kids will know, such as brave, kind, and mad (the last defined in the American sense, as angry), with less-familiar ones such as overwhelmed and vulnerable. It even features at least one word that may be new to adults: “X is for Xenial….Xenial is being welcoming to strangers.” Compounding the difficulty here, the visual image of a Black kid dressed as a magician hugging a rabbit they’ve pulled out of a hat does not exactly illustrate xeniality (xenialness?). Other illustrations do a better job of helping readers understand the words being introduced. The illustrations feature racially diverse children and are usually paired in each double-page spread: “A is for Anxious. Anxious is feeling really worried about something. / B is for Brave. Brave is being nervous about something and doing it anyway.” On the A page, a brown-skinned kid cowers from the dragon that encircles their bed, as in a nightmare. Across the gutter on the B page, the ferociously scowling child confronts the now-intimidated monster. Kids will get an immediate sense of those two words. Animals, real and imaginary, often play a role in the pictures. The book will be best shared one on one or in very small groups, when children can really spend time examining the pictures and talking about their own impression of what is happening in each picture. (This book was reviewed digitally.)
A mixed bag. (word list) (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: Sept. 14, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-593-20519-8
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2021
Recommended as an exemplary instructional tool for how not to “do diversity.”
Whose America? The title pages are telling. As is the cover art.
In this read-aloud, the cover image of a sea of smiling faces in many skin hues suggests plurality (we/our) rather than the singular possessive “my.” Within, colorful spreads evoking early childhood drawings and self-portraits accompany text that poses as first-person narratives, as though real children were rendering their individual experiences. One-dimensional depictions of motives and methods of immigration to “America” result in dichotomies—here/there, then/now—that oversimplify differences and perpetuate stereotypes: Tae speaks of eating rice and kimchee in South Korea versus pizza in New York; Samaira from India informs readers: “I wear a bindi on my forehead.” And does a white child (Anna) asserting “All my family lives here….We have been here a long time” belong in this story centering children who have recently “come to live in America”? Notable absences of Native American and African American descendants—whose families have been here even longer than Swedish American Anna’s—underscore a thematic inconsistency, raising the question as to whose America this picture book, in fact, showcases. These simplistic, reductive representations undo otherwise bold attempts to promote empathy and inclusion. The well-known excerpt from Emma Lazarus’ “The New Colossus” that acts as inscription on the Statue of Liberty closes the text.
Recommended as an exemplary instructional tool for how not to “do diversity.” (Picture book. 5-7)Pub Date: June 1, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-8050-9012-3
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: March 28, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2020
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