Tar Beach by Faith Ringgold (Crown, 1991).

There is an invisible line that stretches from Umbrella by Taro Yashima in my childhood to Tar Beach by Faith Ringgold in my early adulthood. 

I can fly— yes, fly. Me, Cassie Louise Lightfoot, only eight years old and in the third grade, and I can fly. That means I am free to go wherever I want for the rest of my life.

And those lines have a lot to do with how important this book was for me, even as an adult. Seeing Cassie fly through her world, claiming buildings as “hers,” was like an instruction manual for how I could approach my own empowerment as a woman of color in the U.S.

Something I wish for kids (of all ages) reading the book today. 

(Image Source: Explore 0-4)

My People by Langston Hughes, photographs by Charles R. Smith Jr. (Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2009). 

This picture book is a stunner. The photography by Charles R. Smith Jr. is soak-it-up-to-your-bones-to-your-soul beautiful. Find this book and see for yourself. 

Here’s what Smith said about his photos himself:

At just thirty-three words total, the poem is a study in simplicity, which is what attracted me to it in the first place. Langston wrote the poem to celebrate the pride he had for his black brothers and sisters in the late 1920s, when blacks were not acknowledged much in society…

…To me, the words celebrate black people of different shades and age, so I wanted to show skin color as bright as the sun and as dark as the night; I wanted to show the newness of a newborn smile and the wisdom of wrinkled skin. But more than anything, I simply wanted to show that like any other group of people, black people come in all shapes, sizes, shades, and ages, and that each of us is unique.

(Image source & additional interview: The Brown Bookshelf) 

Harvey Moon, Museum Boy (2008) by Pat Cummings.

So if you know anything about books that feature kids of color, you know that there are books that illuminate aspects of history or culture and then there are the books that are just stories about kids who happen to be African American/ Asian American/ Latino/ Native American/ etc. 

Harvey Moon, Museum Boy is of the latter group. Think of this book as a Night at the Museum re-mix featuring a young African American boy with a cute twist at the end. The ending even got a little chuckle out of my 8 year old daughter. 

Pat Cummings’ illustrations bring the action to life with funny details worked in. Read the book out loud to get the most out of the rhyming. 

Once Upon a Farm (2002) by Marie Bradby, illustrated by Ted Rand.

I picked up this book because I was excited to see a farm book with a Black family. Let’s face it, in kids books, this is a rarity. In fact, in kids books, there are more animals running farms than people of color. 

The book is like most farm books: kids doing chores, milking the cows, cleaning the barn. The family is seen tilling the land, building their house, and (in full disclosure) praying at the dinner table. 

But as the kids get older, the book takes a turn for the sad.
Excerpt below: 

A mall
a town
been spreading around.

…A rabbit
a farm
they’re all gone.

…I took a heart full—
things we didn’t sell—
how a stream sounds, the way rain clouds look, how sweet dirt smells. 

Marie Bradby has created a unique book that offers a poetic take on the loss of so many family farms, focusing in on one African American family’s connection to the land. 

After reading children’s book after children’s book, I thought I knew how they’re supposed to end. The ending of Once Upon a Farm caught me off guard with it’s sweet remembrance and it’s quiet mourning for what’s been lost. 

One Crazy Summer (2010) by Rita Williams-Garcia. 

I had the chance to hear Rita Williams-Garcia talk a few months back. She had so many insights into children’s fiction and books featuring kids of color that I left with my head swimming in new ideas. 

So of course I snapped up her latest book with a quickness. One Crazy Summer did not disappoint. Three sisters, Delphine, Vonetta and Fern, take a trip from Brooklyn to Oakland to see their mother in the summer of 1968. They’ve been raised by their father and grandmother since their mother left them seven years ago. The girls spend their days at a Black Panther summer camp, but the heart of the story lies in the slow fumbling toward a new understanding of their mother. 

Here’s a little snippet to whet your appetite:

“What do we call her?”

I’d gone over this with Vonetta and Fern many, many times. I told them long before Papa said we were going to meet her. I told them while we packed our suitcases. “Her name is Cecile. That’s what you call her. When people ask who she is, you say, ‘She is our mother.’”

Mother is a statement of fact. Cecile Johnson gave birth to us. We came out of Cecile Johnson. In the animal kingdom that makes her our mother. Every mammal on the planet has a mother, dead or alive. Ran off or stayed put. Cecile Johnson—mammal birth giver, alive, an abandoner—is our mother. A statement of fact.

Nappy Hair (1997) by Carolivia Herron, illustrated by Joe Cepeda. 

The call and response in this book is infectious. Uncle Mordecai sings the praises of little Brenda’s curly, twisty, willful, nappy hair at their backyard picnic. Joe Cepeda’s illustrations bring Brenda and her hair to life, bouncing and swirling right off the page. 

Excerpt:

Brenda, you sure do got some nappy hair on your head, don’t you?
Well.

It’s your hair, Brenda, take the cake,
Yep.

And come back and get the plate.
Don’t cha know.

It ain’t easy to come by that kind of hair.
No, it ain’t.

You just can’t blame Africa. It’s willful.
That’s what it is.

Peace, Locomotion (2009) by Jacqueline Woodson.

In this companion novel to Locomotion, Lonnie is now 12 and starting to feel more at home with his foster family. He has been separated from his sister, Lili, and has decided that he will be the “rememberer” of their family through daily letters to her. 

These two books are children’s lit gold. It really doesn’t get better than this. 

Excerpt:

Dear Lili,

Every day, the memories get a little bit more faded out of my head and I try to pull them back. It’s like they used to be all colorful and loud and everything. They’re getting grayer though. And sometimes even the ones that used to be loud get real, real quiet.

Lili, do you remember? There was a time when all of us were together. There was a time before the fire and nobody wanted to be my foster mama until Miss Edna came along. there was a time before your foster mama came and said, “I’ll take the little girl but I don’t want no boys.” You were the little girl, Lili. And you didn’t want to go. It was raining that day just like it’s raining now. And you held on to me and cried and cried. You kept saying, I want to be with my brother. 

Locomotion (2003) by Jacqueline Woodson.

This little book is filled to overflowing with beautiful poems. It’s written from the perspective of Lonnie Collins Motion, age 11, a book of his poetry started in Ms. Marcus’ class.  Lonnie lost both of his parents in a fire and now lives with Miss Edna. His little sister, Lili, lives with her new mama. 

This is a must read. Jacqueline Woodson is a children’s lit goddess as far as I’m concerned. She takes incredibly complicated emotions and presses them down to diamonds. It was hard to pick a short excerpt to share, so do yourself a favor and get your hands on this book. Now.

Excerpt:

Group Home Before Miss Edna’s House

The monsters that come at night don’t
breathe fire, have two heads or long claws.

…They come looking like regular boys
going through your drawers and pockets saying

You better not tell Counselor else I’ll beat you down.
The monsters that come at night snatch

the covers off your bed, take your
pillow and in the morning

steal your bacon when the cook’s back is turned 
call themselves The Throwaway Boys, say

You one of us now.
When the relatives stop coming

When you don’t know where your sister is anymore
When every sign around you says

Group Home Rules: Don’t
do this and don’t do that

until it sinks in one rainy Saturday afternoon
while you’re sitting at the Group Home window

reading a beat-up Group Home book,
wearing a Group Home hand-me-down shirt

hearing all the Group Home loudness, that
you are a Throwaway Boy.

And the news just sits in your stomach
hard and heavy as Group Home food. 

Odetta: The Queen of Folk (2010) conceived and illustrated by Stephen Alcorn, poem by Samantha Thornhill. 

“This is the story
of a girl
who plunged
headfirst
into the world,
a baby with a birdcage
in her throat.

What to name
this little ball
of star stuff
     and song
     and light
straight from God’s eye?

Odetta.
The perfect name
for a star this brown
and this bright!”

Read this book to your kids and then play some of Odetta’s music and be sure to sing along.