Everyone Poops by Taro Gomi, translated by Amanda Mayer Stinchecum (Kane/ Miller, 1993). 

Well, everyone does it — elephants, mice, fish, birds, hippos, deer, cats, zebras… And kids of a certain age are fascinated by it. So why not get the classic book of its genre? 

(Image source)

Waiting for Mama by Lee Tae-Jun, illustrated by Kim Dong-Seong, translated from Korean to English by Eun Hee Chun (NorthSouth Books, 2007; original text, 1938)

A small child, his nose red from cold, walks to the streetcar station.

He’s looking for his mama. Streetcar after streetcar come and go with no mama. So the young boy waits some more.

Kim Dong-Seong created nostalgic sepia-tinted artwork for this book that draws you in right away. Waiting for Mama is set in Korea in 1938 — when the original story first appeared in newspapers — with old fashioned shops, traditional dress, women carrying packages on their heads. 

The last page has no words, only a picture of the child and his mother walking home together in the falling snow. I automatically interpreted this to be a happy Hollywood ending, but then I stumbled on an Amazon review that went much deeper. 

At this time the Korean peninsula had already been occupied by Imperial Japan for over 30 years with no ending in sight (a rebellion had been put down brutally in 1919). Since 1905, the Japanese invaders were eager to erase any form of Korean traditions and assimilate the people to become second class Japanese. The Koreans had to take Japanese names and perform the Shinto rites. Korean was forbidden as an official language. Moreover, in 1938, Japanese began to compel Korean men to work in the factories located on the Japanese mainland and women as “comfort women” in military brothels.

The Korean intellectuals invented folk songs (e.g. Ommaya Nunaya - Mom Sis) and children stories in order to to circumvent censorship and demonstrate subtly the will of the people to sustain any hardship.

Seen in this light, the ending of the story is not so clear: Has Mom finally arrived to pick up her boy or is it just the boy`s dream? - Anyway, in Korean thinking snow is a symbol of hope.

(Image Source: Goodreads)

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)

Gilberto and the Wind was inspired by a young boy she met in La Jolla, California. After asking his mother if he could model for her illustrations, Ets spent many hours with the family, coming to know them quite well.

Via the Children’s Literature Network

Chirchir is Singing by Kelly Cunnane, illustrated by Jude Daly (Schartz and Wade, 2011)

Chirchir is one of the charming-est girls to jump off a picture book page in a long while. Kelly Cunnane and Jude Daly work seamlessly to bring Chirchir and her family to life, transporting a young reader far away to the Kenyan highlands. 

Warblers and cuckoos swing
    in the bottlebrush tree,
and Chirchir is singing.

Drop,
plop
the bucket in.
Wiggle it… jiggle it… Let it fill…
Then hand over hand,
up comes
maji, maji — water!

She helps Mama lower the bucket
into the winking silver circle
of the well. 

Even with set-back after set-back Chirchir keeps looking for some way to help out with her family’s daily chores, singing the whole way. I have to say that I was especially charmed by the artwork depicting typical Kalenjin family life, with chickens roaming in and around open houses and monkeys laughing from the rooftops.

Idyllic? Yes. But isn’t that one of the reasons we love children’s picture books in the first place? 

(Image source: Goodreads)

Pele: King of Soccer/ El rey del futbol by Monica Brown, illustrated by Rudy Gutierrez (HarperCollins, 2009). 

As a little boy, Pele played soccer in the streets of Tres Coracoes in Brazil, sometimes with an empty stomach and a grapefruit or newspaper ball. He went on to be one of the most famous and gifted soccer players in history with a career total of 1,281 goals and three World Cup championships. 

This book brings his story to life with beautiful artwork and a lot of focus on his amazing soccer skills. 

(Image source: Monica Brown’s website)

Oh No, Gotta Go #2 by Susan Middleton Elya, illustrated by Lynne Avril (G.P. Putnam and Sons, 2007).

This is a very funny follow-up to Oh No, Gotta Go. I had the wonderful opportunity to meet Susan Middleton Elya at a writer’s conference a few months back and even got this book autographed for my kids. 

Our little protagonist mastered the potty back in the first book and now is off on a picnic with her parents. Her parents ask her many times if she needs to go, but she assures them that she’s fine until…

…my insides were gurgling and grumbling.
I wasn’t hungry, but something was rumbling.

Mama and Papa were in deep conversation.
I pedaled along with that funny sensation.

I didn’t drink jugo or pink limonada.
I didn’t drink agua. I didn’t drink nada.

But then I remembered the thing I forgot.

There’s more than one reason to sit on the pot.

I find Elya’s rhymes so charming and the subject of poop, treated in this light-hearted way, just gets me chuckling.  Perhaps there are people who don’t appreciate any poop humor (No Captain Underpants for you!) or who might want a more “pure” bilingual book (Keep the Spanish side Spanish and the English side English). But those guys are missing out on a whole lot of fun in this book. Check it out, it’s irresistible. 

(Image source: susanelya.com)

Crouching Tiger by Ying Chang Compestine, illustrated by Yan Nascimbene (Candlewick, 2011). 

Vinson’s grandpa has come to visit from China and it turns out that he’s a serious marital artist. Vinson wants to learn kung fu, but Grandpa only teaches him tai chi standing meditation. 

As the week passed, I felt cheated. Maybe Grandpa didn’t know real kung fu.

“Grandpa, my arms are worn out!” I complained.

“If your arms feel heavy, that shows you need more practice, Ming Da.”

Although he spoke English perfectly well with Dad, Grandpa always talked to me in Chinese.

“My name is Vinson, Grandpa.”

“Your Chinese name is Ming Da. You are Chinese as well as American,” he said firmly.

Chinese New Year’s comes and Grandpa takes Ming Da to the parade, giving him a new red silk jacket to wear. Grandpa surprises Ming Da and lets him be the cabbage boy for the Lion dancers, telling him to swing the cabbage just out of reach of the lions. The story closes as the two are walking home after the parade with Ming Da promising to keep practicing his martial arts. 

(Image source: Ying Chang Compestine’s website)

Grandma’s Records by Eric Velasquez (Walker and Company, 2001).

Eric’s grandmother loves music and has her record player spinning all summer long with the sounds of salsa and merengue. She has lots of stories about growing up in Puerto Rico, too. But when her special record is on, Eric’s grandma puts her hand over her heart and remembers Eric’s grandpa and the time they spent together in Santurce, her hometown. Before the story is over Eric and his grandma have left the record player back at the apartment and headed out to a live show. And Eric grows up to share all kinds of music and memories with his grandmother. 

This is an exceptional inter-generational story that weaves together culture and memory so naturally. Check out his website for more illustrations from the book and a very cute picture of the real Eric dancing with his grandma. 

(Cover image source: Goodreads)

Grace for President by Kelly DiPucchio, illustrated by LeUyen Pham (Hyperion, 2008).

The story begins like so:

One Monday morning in September, Mrs. Barrington rolled out a big poster with all of the presidents’ pictures on it. Grace Campbell could not believe her eyes. 

Where are the GIRLS?

When Grace finds out there has never been a woman president, she decides to run for president herself. No one else in her class is interested in running. Grace thinks she has the election in the bag.

But there’s a hitch. The other class nominates Thomas Cobb as their presidential candidate, as in Thomas Cobb the spelling bee champ, science fair blue ribbon winner, and captain of the soccer team. 

So Grace kicks her campaign into gear. Each kid in their grade gets to be a whole state with all the electoral votes that state gets. 270 electoral votes becomes the winning target. 

Each week, the teachers set aside time for the candidates to meet with their constituents. Polls were taken. Voters were making their choices.

Thomas was sneaky. He figured out early on that the boys held slightly more electoral votes than the girls so while Grace was working her butt off, he was doing his usual things. He thought he had the election in the bag. 

On the day of the election the voting was down to the wire. Only Wyoming, represented by a boy named Sam, was left. Sam’s three electoral votes would choose the winner. And Sam chose the best person for the job… Grace! 

And someday, for all our young girl readers, a woman president will be fact, not fiction. 

(Top image source: Kelly DiPucchio’s website)