North America

Story Boat

Baby blue background with illustration of refugee children in boatWhen a little girl and her younger brother are forced along with their family to flee the home they’ve always known, they must learn to make a new home for themselves — wherever they are. And sometimes the smallest things — a cup, a blanket, a lamp, a flower, a story — can become a port of hope in a terrible storm. As the refugees travel onward toward an uncertain future, they are buoyed up by their hopes, dreams and the stories they tell — a story that will carry them perpetually forward.

This timely, sensitively told story, written by multiple award–winner Kyo Maclear and illustrated by Sendak Fellowship recipient Rashin Kheiriyeh, introduces very young readers in a gentle, non-frightening and ultimately hopeful way to the current refugee crisis.

Fry Bread: A Native American Family Story

Told in lively and powerful verse by debut author Kevin Noble Maillard, Fry Bread is an evocative depiction of a modern Native American family, vibrantly illustrated by Pura Belpré Award winner and Caldecott Honoree Juana Martinez-Neal.

Please watch WOW’s Imagination Friday with the author and illustrator of Fry Bread.

This book is featured in WOW Currents: Big Events, Strong Emotions – Anxiety.

Featured in WOW Review, Volume XV, Issue 4.

Awards:
Winner of the 2020 Robert F. Sibert Informational Book Medal
2020 American Indian Youth Literature Picture Book Honor Winner
National Public Radio (NPR) Best Book of 2019
NCTE Notable Poetry Book
2020 NCSS Notable Social Studies Trade Book for Young People
2020 ALA Notable Children’s Book
2020 ILA Notable Book for a Global Society

A Different Pond

A Different Pond is an unforgettable story about a simple event – a long-ago fishing trip. Graphic novelist Thi Bui and poet Bao Phi deliver a powerful, honest glimpse into a relationship between father and son – and between cultures, old and new. As a young boy, Bao and his father awoke early, hours before his father’s long workday began, to fish on the shores of a small pond in Minneapolis. Unlike many other anglers, Bao and his father fished for food, not recreation. A successful catch meant a fed family. Between hope-filled casts, Bao’s father told him about a different pond in their homeland of Vietnam.

Read two takes on A Different Pond in June 2019’s My Take/Your Take.

The Owl and the Two Rabbits

When two rabbit sisters ignore their parents’ warnings and decide to play outside on the open tundra, a hungry owl soon spots them and decides they will make a delicious meal. As a chase ensues, the sisters must act quickly, using the owl’s own greed against him in order to get away. A traditional Inuit story and cautionary tale, this book presents a centuries-old narrative for a new generation of readers.

¡Vamos! Let’s Go Eat

Little Lobo, a Mexican American, and Bernabe, his dog, gather tacos, frutas picadas, cuernos, and more and deliver them to los luchadores preparing for Lucha Libre 5000.

Perception: A Photo Series

Tired of reading negative and disparaging remarks directed at the Indigenous people of Winnipeg in the press and social media, artist KC Adams created a photo series that presented another perspective. Called “Perception Photo Series,” it confronted common stereotypes of First Nation, Inuit and Métis people to illustrate a more contemporary, truthful story. First appearing on billboards, on storefronts, in bus shelters and on Winnipeg’s downtown buildings as projections, Adams’s stunning photographs now appear in her new book, Perception: A Photo Series. Meant to challenge the culture of apathy and willful ignorance about Indigenous issues, Adams hopes to unite readers in the fight against prejudice of all kinds.

Featured in WOW Review Volume XII, Issue 4

The Pencil

Susan and her sister, Rebecca, love watching their mother write letters to people in other camps. Their mother has one precious pencil, and she keeps it safe in her box for special things. One afternoon, their mother leaves the iglu to help a neighbour, and Susan, Rebecca, and their brother Peter are left with their father. They play all their regular games but are soon out of things to do―until their father brings out the pencil! As Susan draws and draws, the pencil grows shorter and shorter. What will their mother think when she comes home? Based on author Susan Avingaq’s childhood memories of growing up in an iglu, this charming story introduces young readers to the idea of using things wisely.

All Of Us With Wings

Seventeen-year-old Xochi’s life changed when she became governess to precocious twelve-year-old Pallas, but the duo unintentionally summons a pair of ancient creatures determined to right the wrongs of Xochi’s adolescence.

Deadly Aim: The Civil War Story of Michigan’s Anishinaabe Sharpshooters

Sibert Award winner Sally M. Walker crafts an engaging, middle-grade nonfiction narrative of the American Indian soldiers who bravely fought in the Civil War.