Dream Your Truth

Nearly three quarters of an hour before sunset, it lifts from the opposite horizon.  Like a luminescent globe it shimmers through the branches of the evergreen trees.  It looks enormous.  It is breathtaking.

When the air is crisp and clear and there is no wind, the moonrise, two days before it's full, beckons to you.  You pause and not for the first time (and hopefully not for the last time) start to think of all the individual beings who are seeing this same moon at the same time.  You wonder what they are thinking and doing.  imagine (Candlewick Press, September 25, 2018) written by U. S. Poet Laureate (2015-2017) Juan Felipe Herrera with illustrations by Caldecott Honor Book winner (Nana in the City) Lauren Castillo is a poetic reflection on Juan Felipe Herrera's memories.  His words and the artwork of Lauren Castillo will send your spirit soaring.

IF I PICKED chamomile flowers
as a child
in the windy fields and whispered
to their fuzzy faces

imagine

We shadow this child through words as he wanders in a garden or plays along a creek.  As he watches and waves to friends, we ride with him in the back of his father's truck.  Beneath stars and among shadows we sleep with him outside. 

When he helps his mother with their poultry, walks to another village to bring back a bucket of water, or goes to school in a new community, we are there with this child.  Slowing, patiently with practice, he learns another language; Spanish to English and English to Spanish.  As a wordsmith in the making this boy gathers pens and uses language to write stories.

We applaud his bravery in singing before a class in this school.  We cheer as he pens poems walking home from school.  We are grateful as he turns poems into songs.  We feel his joy when his treasured poems and songs become a book.

He begins, as a child, to turn each moment into a sensory experience.  He tucks memories away to savor later.  He follows his dreams working them into a wondrous reality.

Each of the sixteen verses in this autobiographical poem by Juan Felipe Herrera plucks on the strings of our collective hearts.  Each word in those verses supplies us with the sensations he experiences.  He invites us to travel with him on this remarkable journey allowing us to share in his many accomplishments.  By beginning the verses with "if" and ending them with "imagine" a soothing melody sings in our minds.   Here is another verse.

If I let the stars

at night

paint my blanket with milky light

with shapes of hungry birds

while I

slept outside,

imagine what you could do.

It is my deepest desire all readers can identify with the image on the front, right, of the opened dust jacket.  Month after month a full moon shines upon us as it does on the child.  It's as if it casts a spell on us, opening our minds to possibilities, now and in the future.  This scene is peaceful and brimming with potential.  To the left, on the back, an older boy takes his pen collection and writes word after word on a river of pieces of paper.  

A deep midnight blue is the background on the front and back of the book case.  It is sprinkled with gold foil stars.  The title word, also in gold foil, is placed in the middle on the front.  A burnt orange, a rusty shade, covers the opening and closing endpapers.  This hue is used throughout the book.

Rendered in pen and foam monoprint by Lauren Castillo the illustrations interpret and heighten the lyrical narrative.  Each of them is a double-page picture.  There is tenderness in the details; the delicate chamomile flowers, lily pads floating in a creek, birds soaring over a valley at night, and a child walking down a dirt road alone to bring water home.

Lauren shifts the point of view to accentuate the pacing.  Sometimes we are kneeling with him as tadpoles squiggle around hands, or lying on a blanket on a hill at night overlooking a small community or walking into a new town with buildings spread before us as we move, much smaller, toward the school.  The use of golden yellow draws our attention to flower centers, lilies, outlines of flowers and trees in a neighbor's yard, moonlight glowing on objects below, an evening walk for water, or the acceptance of a highest honor.

One of my many, many favorite illustrations is the nighttime scene of Juan sleeping outside.  Several shades of blue in the sky seem to pulsate with swirls of light, left to right and right to left.  The full moon on the right hangs over dark mountains in the distance, providing a backdrop for the community.  Trees grow on the nearer hills on the right.  Night birds numbering five glide from right to left.  On the left, on a hill closest to us, the boy is stretched on a blanket, knees bent and resting his head in his hands. The left edge is framed with a large tree extending off the top of the page.  Everything is dotted with golden yellow as if kissed by moon beams.

Whether silently alone or aloud with a group, the first time imagine written by Juan Felipe Herrera with illustrations by Lauren Castillo is read not a word will be spoken when it's finished.  This silence will be followed by sighs and a huge gasp of appreciation for the splendor these words and images create.  Certain to inspire others but most importantly a title to love, this book should be on all professional and personal bookshelves.  

To learn more about Juan Felipe Herrera please follow the link attached to his name to access information about him and his work at poets.org.  To discover more about Lauren Castillo and her other work, please go to her website by following the link attached to her name.  Scholastic's Ambassador of School Libraries, John Schumacher, chats with Juan and Lauren at the reveal of the book's cover on his blog, Watch. Connect. Read.  Both Juan and Lauren have accounts on Twitter.  You can find Lauren on Instagram.  You can view interior illustrations at publisher's websites here and here.

Together We Are Stronger

Everyone has a story to tell.  Everyone's story has value.  By hearing the stories of others we learn.  When we learn we grow toward being the best we can be.  We know all of this to be true.

We need to remember the person we pass walking down a street, pushing a grocery store cart, sitting at a table in a library, or sitting or standing with us, waiting in a line, has a story we might need or want to hear.  If we listen to their story or read their story, it further validates them and us as human beings of worth.  First Generation: 36 Trailblazing Immigrants And Refugees Who Make America Great (Little. Brown And Company, September 4, 2018) written by Sandra Neil Wallace and Rich Wallace with illustrations by Agata Nowicka is captivating and illuminating at every page turn.

Introducing The Heroes Of
First Generation
The United States is a nation of diversity, from Native American peoples to immigrants and refugees.  Maybe you can trace your family back to the first colonists who came over from Europe, or to immigrants who arrived during the late 1800s.  But immigrants and refugees didn't just come to this country hundreds of years ago.  There are millions of new Americans making this country thrive right now.  

Following a stirring, informative and inviting introduction readers meet eighteen women and eighteen men whose lives have and continue to elevate this country's greatness.  Each of them found their gift, persisted through challenges and used those talents for the benefit of others.  Person by person you feel something wonderful growing inside you.  It's gratitude.

At six a little girl born in a refugee camp in Kenya relocates to St. Cloud, Minnesota.  One year ago in 2017, this little girl, Halima Aden, is showcased on the cover of a magazine in the United States as the first hijab-wearing model.  Google co-founder Sergey Brin fled the Soviet Union with his parents also at the age of six for religious reasons.  One of six children, Maria Contreras-Sweet worked odd jobs to help her single mother when they left Mexico to live in California.  Her mother supported this move knowing opportunities would be better for Maria in America. Maria was the first Latina to start a bank;

a bilingual bank for California's Latinx small-business community.

As a boy (born in 1883 in Syria) Kahlil Gibran came to America with his mother and three siblings seeking freedom from a troubled marriage.  This beloved poet lived in a single room apartment his entire adult life.  When you read The Prophet you will understand why its popularity grew.

A librarian who read her Mary Poppins inspired this first Asian American woman to serve in the United States Senate to learn English faster.  He and his brothers and sisters (ten) living on the continent of Africa ate dirt to curb their hunger.  Meb Keflezighi was the first American citizen to win the Boston Marathon in thirty years.  Did you know conservationist John Muir immigrated to the United States from Scotland?

An Ethiopian orphan and his sister are adopted by a Swedish couple.  Today he owns numerous restaurants throughout the United States.  A Polish immigrant as an infant was instrumental in the women's rights movement.  She suffered for seven months in jail but her notes smuggled out gained national attention in assisting the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment.  The stories of these first generation women and men no matter how times you read them resonate long after the book is closed.  The America seen through the eyes, hearts and minds of these thirty-six people is an America to preserve and protect for future immigrants and refugees.


As you read the words penned by Sandra Neil Wallace and Rich Wallace their thorough research is apparent in the collective biographical essays.  Individual quotations by each person top the entries and are included in the body of the narrative.  Dates and statistics are seamlessly woven into the conversations about each person.  Their use of language allows us to become personally aware of the world in which these people rose to their considerable accomplishments.  Each page also contains at least one but usually two or three separate but significant facts placed within a box in the lower right-hand corner.  Here are some examples from the essays.

Mazie Hirono
"I wanted to do something with my life
that would help people."

In 1955, seven-year-old Mazie Keiko Hirono stood
with her mom and brother on the deck of a ship sailing
out of Yokohama Harbor, knowing they needed 
to leave Japan in a hurry.  Her father's problems with
alcohol and gambling had made him abusive and had
left his family poor and hungry.  Mazie cried a lot
during the trip to Hawaii because she didn't know
what to expect, but she believed in her hardworking
mom.  "My mother was my whole world," she
remembered.  "I learned risk-taking from her."

*Mazie became a US citizen in 1959-the same
year Hawaii became a US state.

Carlos Santana
"I would never take anything
from America that I wouldn't want
to put back a hundred times."

When Carlos Santana was nine years old, his father
took out a violin and played softly.  A bird settled on
a branch and sang along with the instrument.  "It was
as if I suddenly found out my father was a great wizard,"
Carlos recalled, "only this wasn't magic---it was
music."

*Carlos established the Milagro Foundation to
provide money to organizations that work with
children around the world in education, health,
and the arts.


Looking at the opened book case of this title, it's as if illustrator Agata Nowicka has presented readers with portraits revealing the passion at heart in the soul of each individual.  They all look ready to move into action or speak to us directly.  Her choice of color palette here and throughout the book is bold and vibrant.

A royal blue canvas covers both the opening and closing endpapers.  Small gold stars scatter and frame the text on the title and dedication pages.  For each image black acts as the defining hue bringing the elements in each illustration prominently forward.  In numerous visuals red, white and blue are used to excellent effect.

Readers need to pause at each depiction.  Look carefully at the details.  What is meaningful to the individuals and represents their talents, achievements and continued endeavors is present.  It's a gallery of greatness.


This book, First Generation: 36 Trailblazing Immigrants And Refugees Who Make America Great written by Sandra Neil Wallace and Rich Wallace with illustrations by Agata Nowicka, is powerful and meaningful, relevant now and in the future.  Whether you read it as a whole in one sitting or read an entry a day, the impact will be as potent.  I can't imagine a personal or professional collection without this title.  These are stories we need to hear.  These are stories our children need to hear.  At the close of the book both Sandra Neil Wallace and Agata Nowicka acquaint readers with the inspiration and process of their work on this title.

To learn more about Sandra Neil Wallace, Rich Wallace and Agata Nowicka and their other work, please visit their respective websites by following the links attached to their names.  At the publisher's website you can listen to a podcast by the authors about this title.  At School Library Journal you can read a sponsored interview of the authors.  When the cover is revealed at Scholastic's Ambassador of School Libraries John Schumacher's site, Watch. Connect. Read., he engages them in conversation about this title and nonfiction in general.

 
Book Chat with the Editor - Deirdre Jones on FIRST GENERATION from LB School on Vimeo.


I hope you will take a few moments to visit Kid Lit Frenzy hosted by educator Alyson Beecher to view the selections by other bloggers participating in the 2018 Nonfiction Picture Book Challenge this week.