Rainbow Revolutions: Power, Pride, and Protest in the Fight for Queer Rights

Lawson’s ambitious narrative stumbles in its attempt to concisely convey the complex, sprawling, multinational history of LGBTQ activism. After opening with the Stonewall Riots (“People started to get scared. And then they got angry”), brief chapters jump back in time to trace a history from 19th-century German writer Karl Ulrichs to 1920s cabaret and Nazi persecution, before emphasizing the stories of U.S. activists and LGBTQ culture, including the Mattachine Society’s “Sip-In,” the New York City ballroom scene, and ACT UP. Lawson is adroit at offering capsule histories of key ideas and moments, but the choppy structure and unacknowledged centering of the U.S., U.K., and Europe are limitations. Knight’s fashionably stylized digital illustrations employ spattered textures, clean lines, and a muted palette. Includes a timeline, a glossary, and an index. Ages 11–up. (May)