I GOT NEXT

With a pep talk from his shadow, a young black boy learns to wear his “game face” and give his all at the neighborhood basketball court.

The boy is at the barber shop when his shadow calls to him from outside, “It’s game day!” He arrives at the fenced-in basketball court, where other kids greet one another. His shadow tells him, “Time to put your game face on!” It takes a few tries—a smile, a frown, and finally, a mean mug. Now that the boy’s got his game face on, his shadow says, “show me what you know.” In rhythmic verse like a bouncing ball, the boy plays: “In. Out. / I cross ’em. / Ankles. / I break ’em.” The boy is all over the court, his face sometimes hard and sometimes not so sure. Finally, boy and shadow float below the hoop as the ball goes in. “We won!” After a bit more coaching (“Work hard.…Don’t quit”) and a promise to “never give up,” the boy brings his game face to the whole group of kids, declaring, “We. GOT. NEXT.” The inner-city neighborhood is lovingly portrayed, with soft watercolors creating swaths of concrete and sky, spare natural elements, and the black of the broken chain-link fence echoed in the black of the shadow that gets the boy psyched. A vibrant mural on the endpapers pays tribute to black leaders and community.

Important, beautiful, and full of heart.