A year after becoming the first Black child to integrate William Frantz Elementary School, a young Ruby Bridges (b. 1954) approaches second grade with anticipation, the crowds and U.S. Marshals having now gone. “This school is filled with kids now,” Bridges exclaims, “and some of them even look like me!” Eager to reunite with Mrs. Henry, her first grade teacher during a year that was “one for the history books,” Bridges is crestfallen to discover not only that she’ll have a new classroom and teacher, but that Mrs. Henry has left the school entirely. A sudden turn at the book’s midpoint moves forward to 1995, when the two reunite in Bridges’s adulthood, a meeting 35 years in the making. Tran’s watercolor-style digital art recounts both eras with soft focus, while lengthy text dives into memory and resolution. An author’s note concludes. Ages 4–8. (Jan.)

Reviewed on 11/08/2024 | Details & Permalink

In this sensitively rendered biography of Maya Angelou (1928–2014), the Roops describe how, early in life, “Words whirled and stories spun in Maya’s head and off her lips.” After she experiences an attack at age eight, however, Angelou stops speaking to all but her brother Bailey, fearing that she’s to blame for her attacker’s death. Years later, Beulah Flowers, a customer at her mother’s store, loans the child some books and invites her to read them aloud, an act that offers Angelou “the key to unlock her voice, now finally free to rise up and inspire the world.” Denmon’s gossamer drawings of formerly caged birds foretell the figure’s literary journey, leading to a fanciful spread in which Angelou flies, floats, and glides along a sun-drenched tableau of words read from A Tale of Two Cities. Ages 4–8. (Jan.)

Reviewed on 11/08/2024 | Details & Permalink

“Listen to...” repeats Alexander and Palmer’s entrancing history of Black music. The account begins with an image of brown-skinned people dancing and drumming in “the motherland.” Page turns move the text forward in time, picturing people toiling in cotton fields (“Listen to the hymns”), singing in choir robes (“Listen to the Amazing Grace”), playing music near a railroad (“Listen to the deep blue-black moans”), and in another spectacular spread, performing (“Listen to the jazz”). Energetic text introduces doo-wop and rock, then funk and neo soul, including “the sonic innovators/ and the flamboyant inventors/ who rocked us around the clock.” Black musical greats populate dramatic, color-drenched muralistic pages, while street scenes commemorate the rise of hip-hop and rap, “the tough-times poetry of the streets talking.” And as the book winds down, music becomes the stuff of resistance, “the soundtrack of America... the sweet sound of a people/ surviving and thriving.” Extensive notes about each spread conclude. Ages 4–8. (Jan.)

Reviewed on 11/08/2024 | Details & Permalink

“The first time James Baldwin read a book, the words clung to him like glitter.” Harris and James home in on the emotional core of the author’s upbringing in this moving work about Baldwin (1924–1987). Beginning pages depict his early life—his doting mother, the abundant siblings under his care, his love of reading, and his preacher stepfather, who displayed fury “toward Jimmy’s books and all the things he saw burning in the world.” Sensate lines illuminate Baldwin’s childhood experience while underscoring what drives him (“In the library, Jimmy could hear the books singing to him, shouting ‘Hallelujah!’ as joyfully as the women banging tambourines at his stepfather’s church”). After experiencing a police assault, Baldwin realizes the healing power of words—and begins writing “to heal his heart.” Thickly stroked oil-on-board illustrations have a dreamlike quality as they emphasize the love of words as a cornerstone of Baldwin’s life. Back matter, which includes biographical information and creators’ notes, discusses Baldwin’s queer identity. Ages 4–8. (Jan.)

Reviewed on 11/08/2024 | Details & Permalink

“Dream a world, dream a time,/ and the story of a girl./ Dream Myra Viola Wilds/ dressmaker long ago.” Mellifluous verse from Johnson James chronicles the life of dressmaker and poet Wilds (1875–1935) from the Kentucky town “where dreams went unfulfilled” to a city where she eventually soars. There, Wilds becomes a dressmaker of formal frocks “fancy, frilly, even funny,/ looking sweet like flowery honey.” The close work damages her eyesight, but “Myra’s art could still be made,” her medium turning from dressmaking to poetry. In stunning saturated colorblock illustrations that foreground Wilds’s work and transformation, Ejaita plays with scale and proportion. Characters appear in colorful silhouettes. More about the figure, and two of her poems, is included. Ages 4–8. (Jan.)

Reviewed on 11/08/2024 | Details & Permalink

Reiteratively employing the refrain “And she was loved...,” this telling traces the life and work of Toni Morrison (1931–2019), from sidewalk chalk drawings made during her Lorain, Ohio, childhood to a legacy borne of “griot grit.” While managing single motherhood and nurturing Black writers’ dreams as a book editor, “you manage a scribbled story about a Black girl wishing for sapphire eyes, ” leading to further works, and eventually to awards including “Pulitzer./ Nobel./ Presidential Medal.” Reverent lines from Davis Pinkney use the language of “planting and tilling” throughout. Background washes by Minter, a study in radiant paintwork, overflow with white-outlined flowers that represent “Chloe Ardelia,” Morrison’s given name, which means “blooming floret.” More glowing tribute than straight biography, it’s a soulful paean to a beloved creator. Back matter includes creators’ notes, biographical details, and a timeline. Ages 4–8. (Jan.)

Reviewed on 11/08/2024 | Details & Permalink

Young narrator Agnes, plus Mama and Daddy, travel by bus from Birmingham, Ala., to Washington, D.C., in this dream-centered picture book tracing one family’s experience of the March on Washington. Upon arrival, the Black family visits the home of Frederick Douglass. When Agnes sees “people of every color” sharing a water fountain, Mama assures, “We are one today.” A visit to the Lincoln Memorial is followed by figures seen from Daddy’s shoulders: John Lewis, Josephine Baker, Mahalia Jackson, and Martin Luther King Jr. Following the event, people of all backgrounds together soak their tired feet in the reflection pond. Riding home, Agnes dreams that the whole world attends King’s speech, a moment that underlines the book’s themes of freedom for all. Moses provides a child’s-eye view of a pivotal historical event, while Mallett’s straightforward digital illustrations use bright colors to foreground the family’s day amid the large crowd, portrayed with various skin tones. An author’s note and figure biographies conclude. Ages 3–7. (Jan.)

Reviewed on 11/08/2024 | Details & Permalink

Lyrical text with prayer-like refrains joins impressionistic collage and multimedia images as Kusin Pritchard (Where Is Poppy?) and Alko (Sharing Shalom) recount the 1966 fire at New York City’s Jewish Theological Seminary Library. Founded in 1893, the Upper West Side library served as “a keeper of stories. A keeper of memories. A keeper of hope,” welcoming readers of many backgrounds and playing an essential role in Jewish culture: “When others tried to erase these stories and their tellers, the keeper welcomed the words that were safe nowhere else.” Seventy-some years later, flames erupt, and the blaze is shown sending black curls of smoke into the air alongside words and images, the scene seeming to draw parallels with the Holocaust. After firefighters wrap the library bookshelves in canvas, streams of water from firehoses course among the precious volumes (“Rushing water, keep our stories alive,” text implores). Urgency grips the city after the fire, and volunteers form a human chain to remove the books, one by one, while further recovery efforts involve a simple action: “thousands of hands” press the wet pages between paper towels, eventually saving 170,000 volumes. Readers are pulled into the desperate fight to save irreplaceable treasures throughout a work that emphasizes the keeping done not only by libraries but by communities and people, too—guardians of memory and meaning, preserving the past for future generations. Characters are portrayed with various skin tones. Back matter includes contextualizing information and an author’s note. Ages 4–8. Author’s agent: Ginger Knowlton, Curtis Brown. Illustrator’s agent: Marietta B. Zacker, Gallt and Zacker Literary. (Feb.)

Reviewed on 11/08/2024 | Details & Permalink

Siblings JieJie and DiDi are “left-behind children” living on their own in the desert landscape surrounding utopian Oasis City, in which their mother works tirelessly to save money so the kids can live there with her. After their mother misses their daily phone call— an occurrence that requires JieJie and Didi to brave sandstorms and the constantly shifting dunes on their trek to the desert’s lone pay phone—the children embark on an unexpected journey to the local dumping ground. While digging through Oasis City’s discarded, obsolete tech, they encounter a robot and activate its Mother mode, hoping it will help them navigate their parent’s sudden absence until her planned return for the annual moon festival. Soft lines and simple character designs by Guojing (The Only Child) emphasize JieJie and DiDi’s youthful vulnerability and optimism amid a somber landscape devastated by pollution and climate change. The delicate pencil shading evokes a powerful sense of tone and atmosphere, while large uncluttered panels inject a feeling of intimacy even in the vast desert. It’s an evocative and moving graphic novel tale of sacrifice and what it means to be a family. Ages 8–12. (Feb.)

Reviewed on 11/08/2024 | Details & Permalink

Debut creator Chang recounts a time of personal and familial tumult in this introspective graphic novel memoir. For the past five years, 12-year-old Taiwanese American aspiring artist Chang has been keeping a huge secret from her friends: her bàba moved back to Taiwan for work and the family—­including her mother and older sisters Em and Jess—has seen him infrequently since. Though the tween wants to enter a district-wide art competition, the theme of “What Family Means to Me” leaves her questioning what to draw. Upon their grandmother’s death, the siblings and Mom must travel to Taipei, where the youth reunites with her father. She also learns more about her mother’s resilience throughout the years, as well as the real reason surrounding Bàba’s departure. Chang cleverly denotes Taiwanese dialogue using dashes to represent aspects of conversation she doesn’t understand and smartly utilizes journal entries to display her youthful interiority. The sunny color palette and emotive facial expressions inject lightheartedness into the tween’s grappling with her parents’ secrets and her own shifting perspective. Readers will root for her growth as an artist and budding adolescent as she embraces the sometimes messy parts of life. Ages 8–12. Agent: Rebecca Sherman, Writers House. (Feb.)

Reviewed on 11/08/2024 | Details & Permalink