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15 Things Not to Do With a Baby #mixed #biracial #black #diversekidsbooks
Joining the group of successful “List” books is this title by Margaret McAllister, featuring an interracial family and focused on the older sister’s shenanigans with her new born baby sibling. Like most of the “list” stories, the appeal of this book is its humor. The script and illustrations combine in hilarity with lines like “Don’t give the baby to a kangaroo,” standing alone to make one laugh while the illustration accompanying a line as simple as “Don’t take the baby to school,” gifts the scene with humor. The opening page is a family image of mommy (who is white) and daddy (who is of African Descent), the older daughter and new baby together. There is no mention of the family being interracial and the daughter and baby carry the rest of the story with their fun antics.
Often, mixed heritage children of darker hue feel they have to constantly prove that they are mixed. This engaging title featuring dark brown biracial children serves as a positive, fun, and encouraging reflection of deep chocolate hued mixed kids on the page. This will quickly become a favorite bed time story for your child of any background, who will ask to read it over and over again.
Reviewer: Omilaju Miranda
Author: Margaret McAllister; Illustrator: Holly Sterling
Publisher: Frances Lincoln
Buy 15 Things Not to do with a Baby Now
Roc and Roe’s Twelve Days of Christmas by Nick Cannon and AG Ford #mixedkids #Diversekidsbooks
This holiday time picture book about Nick Cannon and Mariah Carey’s twins celebrating Christmas caught my four-year-old daughter’s eye in the late morning after breakfast. The book was sitting on my dining room table waiting for me to review it when my daughter opened the front cover and immediately focused on the photograph of the Cannon/Carey family on the end cover page. (more…)
Emma and Meesha my Boy: A Two Mom Story by Kaitlyn Taylor Considine #twomoms #Diversekidsbooks
Emma and Meesha my Boy by Kaitlyn Taylor Considine is a short rhyming story about a little girl named Emma, her two moms and their chubby cat. Emma, who looks delightfully naughty, learns how to interact and treat her cat properly with help from her Mommy and Mama. In the beginning Meesha my Boy, as Emma calls her cat, is traumatized with dress up, by brown paint, and being picked up but in the end Emma is cheered on by her moms as she pets him, feeds him and cares for him gently.
This book addresses the fact that Emma is part of a two mom family, but this is not the main topic of the book. The author approaches this topic as a matter of “just so you know”. The reader gets the clear message that having two moms is completely normal and nothing to really focus on. But a little girl and her cat—now, that’s a good story.
Recommendation: I highly recommend this book for readers 3-6 years old.
Reviewer: Amanda Setty
Publisher: TWOMOMBOOKS; Publication Date: 2005
Duck for Turkey Day by Jacqueline Jules #Vietnamese #DiverseKidsBooks #WeNeedDiverseBooks
Adults may find turkey dry and tasteless, but for Tuyet a turkey is symbolic of being the cultural majority, of fitting in, doing what one is supposed to do. Duck for Turkey Day follows a little Vietnamese American girl, Tuyet, who’s terribly upset her family is having duck for Thanksgiving. What follows is an engaging story of accepting of one’s heritage as well as general diversity.
Immigrants often have to negotiate how to preserve and honor their traditions while allowing their children to grow up American, and this book portrays a matter-of-fact immigrant family that plans on cooking some delicious duck regardless of what their little girl thinks. Some parents may give in to their Americanized kids and cook American food, but as Tuyet finds out, some of her classmates had noodles, enchiladas, or tofu turkey on “turkey day” as well. (more…)
Little Chanclas, by José Lozano #DiverseKidsBooks #Chicano #Hispanic #WeNeedDiverseBooks
Comfort Objects and Chicanismo
Lily Luján likes her chanclas, they fit her feet perfectly, they clack clack when she walks, and more importantly, they are part of her identity.
Little Chanclas, by José Lozano,celebrates the individuality of one little girl and her tireless clack clacking. Like most developing children, Lily has found something she loves, something that is comforting and uniquely hers; in early childhood development speak, that’s called a “Comfort Object”. Developing a dependency on a Comfort Object is pretty common among preschool-aged children and helps them cope with the changing world around them. Sometimes the Comfort Object is a blanket or a teddy bear, but for Lily it is her CHANCLAS. (more…)
The Girl Who Fell from the Sky by Heidi W. Durrow #DiverseKidsBooks #MixedRace #biracial
Nella Larsen’s 1929 novel Passing tells the moving story of a young black woman who decides to pass for white, and the story ends with the woman falling or being pushed out of a window to her death. Heidi Durrow has said that Larsen, who, like Durrow, is half black and half Danish, is one of her literary heroes, and the mother of the main character in Durrow’s 2011 bestseller The Girl Who Fell from the Sky is named Nella. Durrow’s Nella has a daughter, Rachel, who is half Danish and half black, and it is this girl, Rachel, whose story is related in The Girl Who Fell from the Sky. Hers is a story that offers homage to Nella Larsen’s work, as well as bears witness to an actual story that Durrow read about, a recent true story of a mother who fell, or jumped, from the top of a building while holding her children; only a daughter survived. (more…)
Poems in the Attic by Nikki Grimes and Elizabeth Zunon #WeNeedDiverseBooks #WeHaveDiverseBooks #DiverseKidsBooks #Blackpoetry #MilitaryKid
Poems in the Attic is the picture book story of a seven-year-old African American girl who, during a visit to her grandmother’s attic, finds a box of poetry that her mother wrote as a child. Her mother’s poems are full with the yearning for an Air Force father who is often away and the wonder of discovering new places as the family moves again and again when her dad returns from deployments.
Nikki Grimes, the author makes several bold, creative choices in the telling of this story. The protagonist is never named and the story has a polyphonic poetic narrative voice. The protagonist’s mother’s voice comes through on the right side of the pages in the Tanka poems the protagonist is reading and the protagonist’s voice is represented on the left side of the pages in free verse poetry. (more…)
Award Winning Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson
Jacqueline Woodson’s lyrical memoir, Brown Girl Dreaming, is memorable, and not only because it won the prestigious National Book Award in 2014, the 2015 NAACP Image award and is a 2015 Newberry Award Honor Book. At its roots, Brown Girl Dreaming feels distinctly American.
Woodson’s memoir speaks of a connection and separation with family as she reflects on her birth in Ohio, her early years in South Carolina, and her family’s move to New York City. Throughout the memoir she recalls the absence of her father, the strength of her grandparents’ love, and the disconnect of what makes a place “home” as she moves between the American North and South during the 1960s and 1970s.
Woodson’s narrative is linear: the book is organized into four parts and chronologically follows Woodson’s life from her birth to the later stages of her childhood. Told completely in poetic free verse, Woodson’s poetry is easily accessible, following more traditional modes of form and lineation. Each poem is powerful, yet they work cohesively to tell Woodson’s childhood stories of learning to love writing and herself.
Brown Girl Dreaming is not a story that will disappear lightly. Its themes are strikingly contemporary as Woodson’s young narrator lets the reader in on a journey that seeks to understand how race and faith shape a person’s childhood, family, and friendships. This book is one that walks quietly and affects deeply. In short: Brown Girl Dreaming is a book to return to, and a book that will continue to hold its head high for a long time.
Recommendation: Highly Recommended, Ages: 11+
Reviewed by Erin Koehler
Breadcrumbs by Anne Ursu
In Breadcrumbs, Anne Ursu has penned a lively, wistful tale that gets at so much of the poignancy that is being a 10-year-old. This is a moving story that offers a modern-day account of Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Snow Queen.” In Ursu’s version, Hazel, a ten-year-old Indian-American girl with white (adoptive) parents is best friends with Jack, the boy next door until Jack mysteriously changes. The adults around them chalk up this change to typical pre-teen turmoil: it’s not unusual for girl–boy friendships to become awkward. But the reader can feel Hazel’s sadness. It’s hard to grow up, it’s hard to change and watch others change. Hazel is caught between wanting to fit in and wanting to keep her special friendship with Jack the way it is. At its heart, this is a story about how we can hold onto our real selves even as we change along with our friends. (more…)
First Rain by Charlotte Herman
First Rain by Charlotte Herman and illustrated by Kathryn Mitter is a wonderful tale of personal growth through family love. When Abby and her parents move to Israel they are sad to have to leave Abby’s Grandma behind. As Abby finds out that Israel is an exciting new place, she tells her Grandma all about her new experiences through letters and telephone calls. Abby’s relationship with her Grandma is poignant without being emotionally heavy. Their love carries the reader through the text and Mitter’s bright illustrations. (more…)
Diverse Kids Books--Reviews 