Knock, Knock: My Dad's Dream for Me by Daniel Beaty

This past Monday was a huge day in kidlit circles. Not only was it the first annual Multicultural Children's Book Day (see the list of diverse titles linked up here) but also Monday was the day the ALA Youth Media Awards were announced. This is kind of like the Super Bowl for us kidlit geeks - the day we wait all year for, when we find out at last who won the biggest children's lit awards given by librarians. It's always fun to find out which titles I've read and loved, which winners are surprises, and which just caught me by surprise.

Overall I was pretty thrilled with this year's list, especially the fact that Brian Floca's Locomotive won the Caldecott. (Honestly that was not even one I thought about, since the Caldecott is rarely given for nonfiction, but it was probably Sprout's favorite book of the entire year.) And I was happy to see a title we recently read, Daniel Beaty's Knock Knock: My Dad's Dream for Me, awarded a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award for Bryan Collier's incredible art.

Full disclosure: this is an honest book about a very tough situation, and it may not be for every kid. Certainly I'd say approach with caution when reading this one with a child who has been through early trauma, particularly the abrupt loss of a parent. It's a great book for discussing those events - but just know going in that there *will* be discussion from any kid, and maybe some upset from a wee one who's had early trauma. But while the subject matter is difficult -- Beaty writes from the point of view of a young boy whose father, like Beaty's one, drops out of his life one day -- I think Knock Knock absolutely has a place and a use with the appropriate audience. I applaud Beaty's willingness to tackle tough topics, and do so thoughtfully and sensitively.

Beaty's own story influenced the plot here; his father was incarcerated when the author was just three years old, and Beaty didn't get to see his dad for many years. That's an incredible burden for a young boy whose father is the center of his life, and that's what we see in Knock Knock: the daddy who has been such a fixture for the main character is one day absent, and he doesn't come back, though our hero waits and hopes. Beaty describes the loss the boy feels in concrete terms -- it's the scrambled eggs Daddy makes, and the absence of a return knock in their familiar game. One day the boy writes his father a letter, leaving it on his desk, and after a while a return missive comes. It's a heartbreaking answer, one that acknowledges the pain the boy feels but also relates the dreams the father has for his son, his hopes and wishes for the boy he knows he'll not see in the same way again.

Knock Knock is very beautifully written, and readers can feel Beaty's emotions through every line. This is an author who has lived this truth, and created something marvelous to help other children through the same sort of event. And the images by Bryan Collier are, as you might expect, amazing. Collier blends collage with his own watercolors to create pictures that are deep and introspective, even haunting. The character's expressions display their feelings, and kids who have experienced loss will recognize the look in our hero's eyes as he waits for his father. Toward the end of the story, as we read the father's letter to his son, Collier gives us a glimpse of the boy's future - we see him growing up, learning a career, and building a family of his own. Throughout, though, we know the father has never truly left his son, but is there in spirit and in thought.

Knock Knock absolutely deserves the attention it received and has earned its place in ALA award history. Read this one before you share it with your kiddos, but don't shy away just because the subject matter is hard - this is a title that will speak to kids who have been through a similar event, and create empathy and understanding for children who haven't yet had this kind of loss.

Knock, Knock: My Dad's Dream for Me by Daniel Beaty, published by Little, Brown
Ages 5-7
Source: Library
First lines: "Every morning, I play a game with my father. He goes KNOCK KNOCK on my door, and I pretend to be asleep till he gets right next to the bed."
Recommended

Independence Day!

Happy Fourth of July everyone! It's early here still, and our plans for the day aren't really firmed up (much depends on the temperament of the little guy who woke up at 5 a.m.). But the sun is out, the birds are chirping and it's a lovely day for family and fun.

And books, of course - what's a holiday without books? Although we spend a lot of time celebrating Sprout's Ethiopian heritage through literature, it's also important for us that we teach him about his new homeland and its history. We want him to understand that our country was made great by hundreds of Americans who came here as immigrants, just as he did when we adopted him. This is truly a land of possibility!

This year I made it a point to seek out some titles with multicultural emphasis for Sprout. In Jan Spivey Gilchrist's My America, poetic verses laud not only the natural beauty of our country, but also the diversity found in our population. Each pages contains only a few words or phrases, made more impactful by the colorful, emotive illustrations done by Gilchrist and Coretta Scott King Honor winner Ashley Bryan. The pictures range from triumphant -- a bevy of multicolored birds soaring in the sky -- to contemplative -- a young girl in profile, braids fluttering in the breeze. On the last spread, Americans from a variety of ethnic backgrounds display their cultural heritage but are united by their entertwined hands, emphasizing that our greatest strength is in our diversity. A beautiful, simple book perfect for even the youngest children.

National Ambassador for Young People's Literature Walter Dean Myers offers "a tribute from the heart" in his book We Are America, illustrated by his son Christopher Myers. In his author's note, Myers explained how he was moved to write the book in the wake of September 11, when he felt he needed to make a deeper connection with the history of his country. "No words here have been penned lightly, no flag waved mindlessly." Myers writes. "This is simply my truest feelings for my country, my tribute to America." And it is a gorgeous tribute, comprised of Myers' free verse poems and Christopher Myers' stunning paintings. The entire range of the American experience is spoken to here, from that of immigrants coming to our shores to wars fought and freedoms gained. Though he doesn't gloss over the difficult points in our history, Myers finds much to celebrate in the hope, the possibility, that is America.

I've written about this before, but it bears repeating. Perhaps the most striking and emotional book I've read in years is Kadir Nelson's Heart and Soul: The Story of America and African Americans. Nelson's goal in writing this book was to tie the history of African Americans -- a history of injustice, suffering and division -- to the history of our nation, to explain how the experience of African Americans is truly the "heart and soul" of our country. This is an unflinching examination of our history, the struggle for equality and acceptance for all Americans. Nelson's was no easy task: finding a way to condense hundreds of years of experience into a cohesive and relatable narrative. But he accomplishes it amazingly well, presenting a book that does not shy from the difficult points yet also stresses the hope that imbued so many to fight for themselves and their children. You will be moved to tears at many points, whether from the poignancy of Nelson's first-person narrative or from his deeply beautiful portraits. This is a book that belongs on the shelf of every American, regardless of your culture or ethnicity.

As you celebrate our nation today, remember that it is a country made up of immigrants from all corners of the globe. Our diversity makes us not a melting pot but a patchwork, more beautiful for the unique contributions of each person who calls this land home. Happy Independence Day!

Audio Review - One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams-Garcia

If you're looking for quality reading choices for yourself or your kiddo, checking out awards lists is a great place to start. Last semester I took a children's lit class and one of the assignments was reading one title from each of ten different awards lists. For those of you who think it begins and ends with Caldecott and Newbery, guess again. There are a TON of fantastic awards programs in kidlit, recognizing everything from novels to nonfiction to picture books and lots more in between. (A great comprehensive source for kidlit awards is the list maintained by the Cooperative Children's Book Center, found here.)

As part of that assignment I chose to listen to the audio version of One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams-Garcia. Williams-Garcia is herself the recipient of numerous awards, including the PEN/Norma Klein Award, and One Crazy Summer has been honored multiple times: Newbery Honor book, Coretta Scott King Winner, Scott O'Dell Award Winner, ALA Notable Recording for 2010. But as we all know, award-winning books can be critically acclaimed and still fall curiously flat in the real world.

Luckily, that's not the case for One Crazy Summer. This is a novel that delivers.

Premise: It's the summer of 1968. Delphine and her sisters Vonetta and Fern are on their way to Oakland, California to spend the summer with their mother Cecile, who ran out on the girls when Fern was just a baby. At eleven, Delphine remembers enough of their mother to be afraid about what they are in for. And when they first head home with Cecile, nothing is as she thought it would be. Now transformed as the poet Nzila, Cecile seems more interested in social change and protests than in reacquanting herself with her girls. And the Black Panther Day Camp where she parks her daughters is not at all what Delphine had in mind. Revolution? No thanks. As Vonetta puts it, "We didn't come for the revolution. We came for breakfast."

And that in a nutshell embodies all there is to love about Summer. Williams-Garcia manages to paint a story about very personal relationships on the grand stage of civil rights, social protest and upheaval that characterized Oakland in the 1960's. Even as we watch Delphine, Vonetta and little Fern try to navigate this strange new world, and their stranger mother, we see the shifting racial climate and the tensions that were produced. The girls come from a world where assimilation is the goal, and their grandmother cautions against making themselves a "grand Negro spectacle". Oakland, though, is all about standing up and speaking out, fighting for your rights and being proud of yourself. And the struggle being played out on the larger scale is personified in the girls' own struggle to reconcile the two ideologies within themselves.

So, big social themes, and lots of great historical detail. But none of that would be worth a bit without the characters. Oh, what great characters Williams-Garcia brings us! From distant and often frightening Cecile, to worrier Delphine, to look-at-me showoff Vonetta, and obstinate little Fern, these are characters you just can't forget. While Delphine slowly awakens to the prejudice and injustice that surrounds her, so too will readers. More importantly, kids will recognize bits of themselves and their friends in these children, who are just about as real as kids can get. As they see the girls living in the balance, making new friends and considering new ideas, readers will be moved to learn more about this tumultuous time -- and isn't that the mark of a great historical novel?

I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the fantastic narration of the audio by Sisi Aisha Johnson. Listen, this woman is a masterful reader, and she will hook you from the first line. Johnson becomes each of the girls in turn, bringing out layers of their personalities that I might otherwise have missed. Even the most minor characters, like Crazy Kelvin and Mean Lady Ming, have their own distinct turn of phrase, and Johnson doesn't miss a trick. Kids who might be on the fence about reading a historical could easily be persuaded to give this a try on audio, and I wouldn't be surprised if they are as sad to see it end as I was.

Bottom line: An excellent historical novel with characters as fresh as if they lived today. And an audio worth a second (or third!) listen to boot.

One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams-Garcia, published by HarperCollins (audio read by Sisi Aisha Johnson)

Coretta Scott King Winner, 2010

Ages 9 up

Source: Library

Sample quote: "It wasn't at all the way the television showed militants -- that's what they called the Black Panthers. Militants, who from the newspapers were angry fist wavers with their mouths wide-open and their rifles ready for shooting. They never showed anyone like Sister Mukumbu or Sister Pat, passing out toast and teaching in classrooms."

Highly recommended