Alex Is Reading...Picture Books With Characters of Color!

 Interior art from ONE FAMILY.

This one's not apropos of any single book I'm reading this week, but instead is a short answer to one very frequent customer request: PICTURE BOOKS WITH CHARACTERS WHO ARE NOT WHITE. There is plenty of wonderful stuff out there that fits this bill, but it can be hard to find, especially when all you can see is the skinny spines on our (very) full shelves. For next time you're in, here is a list of books from the classic to the shiny and new.

16 Picture Books with Main Characters of Color

 

The New Small Person by Lauren Child--Not all new siblings are welcome...ESPECIALLY NOT THIS ONE. Absolutely delightful book about how to turn unwanted family additions into your closest friends and allies.

Keats's Neighborhood by Ezra Jack Keats--This volume collects twelve classic picture books by Ezra Jack Keats, showing the everyday lives of young children (usually Black) living in the city.

A Chair for My Mother by Vera B. Williams--It's a colorful, heartful classic that I really can't recommend enough. A working class family suffers setbacks but, ever loving, manage to save the money to buy a beautiful easy chair for their hard-working mother.

The Rain Stomper by Addie Boswell, illustrated by Eric Velasquez--Jazmin the baton twirler is disappointed when the parade is rained out, but she starts a parade of her own, joyfully stomping the rain in time to the thunder. The whole neighborhood joins in.

Dim Sum for Everyone by Grace Lin--A simple, delicious book about a family out for dim sum.

Stone Soup by John J. Muth--The traditional story of sneakily getting a stingy community to share their way into a delicious meal for everyone, as carried out by Buddhist monks. Gorgeous watercolors and a great readaloud text.

My Pen by Christopher Myers--This lovely book about the freedom and power of imagination rides along on Myers's intricate ink drawings, and is based on his experiences as a young black artist.

Float by Daniel Miyares--Float came out this month, and it's a beautiful, contemplative addition to the library of picture books about imagination. Like My Pen, it features a young child who follows their creativity through adventures of their own making. 

We All Went on Safari by Laurie Krebs and Julie Cairns--A bright and rhythmic counting book filled with Maasai characters, wild animals, and counting in Swahili.

Oh No! Or How My Science Project Destroyed the World by Mac Barnett, illustrated by Dan Santat--What is NOT to like about a book where a young girl scientist makes a killer robot that has psychic power over dogs? Caldecott winner Santat's illustrations are delightful, and there's a surprise under the dust jacket...

 Last Stop on Market Street by Matt de la Peña, illustrated by Christian Robinson--A little boy and his grandmother travel farther and farther outside the "nice" parts of town, but the nicest things are waiting for them at the end of their story.

Bigmama's by Donald Crews--When the family heads down to Bigmama's for the summer, it's a joyful, loving celebration of family and good times.

Firebird by Misty Copeland, illustrated by Christopher Myers--The award-winning picture book story of ballerina  Misty Copeland, illustrated with vibrant pantings by Myers.

Mimi and Ling and Tariq and Mika by Annalien Wehrmeijer, illustrated by Deborah Van de Liejgraaf--This series of board books features children around the world with their pets. It also features in-book finger puppets of those pets, so little readers can play along.

The Twelve Dancing Princesses by Rachel Isadora--A dynamic retelling of the fairytale that moves the story to Africa, with Isadora's trademark style.

5 Ensemble Picture Books with Characters of Color 

These books feature broader ideas more than they do stories, and part of their broadness is in their inclusion of racial, ethnic, gender, age and family diversity.

10 Little Fingers and 10 Little Toes by Mem Fox, illustrated by Helen Oxenbury

 One Family by George Shannon, illustrated by Blanch Gomez

Love Always Everywhere by Sarah Massini

Peace Is an Offering by Annette LeBox, illustrated by Stephanie Graegin

More, More, More Said the Baby by Vera B. Williams


We usually have these books on our shelves, and you can follow the links to find them online. (And do you have favorite picture books featuring characters of color? Let other people know in the comments!)

Happy reading!

Alex Is Reading...TOMBOY

I feel like I've gotten really behind on my comics reading lately, but this one has been on my radar for awhile, and I FINALLY sat down with it this week. TOMBOY by Liz Prince is a graphic memoir of Liz's search for gender identity in a culture that frequently subscribes to only two distinct boxes: Girly Girl and Guy Stuff. Funny, lively, and unafraid of being a little bit complicated, Tomboy is a great book for anyone who questions (or wants to question) the rules of gender. We have it shelved in adult Graphica, but it's appropriate for middle school and up.

And, by the way, this is not the only book about gender-nonconformity that we have for young readers. Here are a few others if you're looking for kids' books that put the T in LGBT.


FIVE TRANSGENDER BOOKS FOR KIDS AND YOUNG ADULTS

1. I Am Jazz by Jessie Herthel and Jazz Jennings is the picture-book story of one of the most recognized transgender youth in America--Jazz Jennings, whose parents supported her early-childhood transition. This is a good introduction to what it means to be transgender for very young readers. You can find it on our picture book wall and in the kids' Life Experiences section.

2. Gracefully Grayson by Ami Polonsky is a sweet, smart, sensitively written new midgrade novel about a transgender gradeschooler who is just starting to understand her own gender. Supported by school theater and a community of loving teachers and friends, Grayson takes the first brave steps into visible life as the girl she is. This is an AWESOME book.

3. Beautiful Music for Ugly Children by Kirstin Cronin-Mills is a young adult novel about a trans highschooler who (for now) only publicly lives his male identity on the air of his radio show.

4. and 5. Some Assembly Required by Arin Andrews and Rethinking Normal by Katie Rain Hill are memoirs of transition by a young man and woman, respectively. They can both be found in the biography section of our nonfiction wall.


Happy reading!

Ocean's Eleven Meets High School Musical. (In middle school.)

What would you do if your student council election was rigged?

Let me rephrase that: what would you do if your student council election were rigged in favor of someone really spoiled, and you kinda sorta maybe wanted to be more than friends with the person who really deserved to win, and you were Jackson Greene, master caper-puller-offer?

You'd pull off a caper, that's what you'd do.

This book has a great ensemble cast. It's well-plotted. It's funny. And it has fallen into the hands of the #WeNeedDiverseBooks movement, which has set out to prove that a book with a diverse cast on the cover can sell and that it is in the industry's interest to publish more such books.

We're competing with lots of other independent bookstores in The Great Greene Challenge. Do I especially care if we end up being the store that sells the most copies in the first month? Nah. Do I think it's awesome that we're all motivating each other to help make the book a bestseller? Heck yes.

Know a reader somewhere around middle school age? Have we got a book for you!

#WeNeedDiverseBooks. (We have some. We need more.)

I'm writing this before the #WeNeedDiverseBooks campaign officially begins, and the hashtag is already trending on Twitter. People from all walks of the reading life are posting reasons we need more books for kids and teens that reflect the way our world really looks, and I couldn't be prouder of how it's catching on.

It's a fact of life as a brick-and-mortar store that we exist in one spot, and our demographics reflect that spot. But if you picture Brookline as an area where everyone looks, talks, and thinks alike, I urge you to look and listen to the people around you next time you walk through our doors. This is a place where a recent Chinese immigrant might ask where the bar mitzvah cards are. It's a place where you'll probably hear three or four languages in the course of a day. It's a place where I've seen firsthand that some things, especially some things about kids, are universal: a smile and a "she's so cute!" works across a language barrier, and parents from everywhere know that babies need books safe for chewing. It's also a place where adults use the YA section along with other sections as a resource for LGBT fiction, and where many parents light up when you tell them that a chapter book takes place in "Africa, amazing Africa!" Mommy, Mama, and Me sells here. So does Buenas Noches, Gorila. So does The Snowy Day, to customers of all colors and, for whatever reason, in all seasons. (I'm not complaining.) Where the Mountain Meets the Moon is rocking out. So is Out of My Mind. By and large, our customers recognize that there are people of all kinds in the world and welcome opportunities to share that truth with their kids.

A major goal of the #WeNeedDiverseBooks campaign is to combat the pervasive belief that "the market" won't support books with more diversity. I'm definitely not pretending that we - that I - don't have room to grow in the literature we read and produce and sell, but I hope we can serve as a small example of how #WeNeedDiverseBooks, because somebody bought the last copy on the shelf and it's time to restock.