All Are Welcome
Written by Alexandra Penfold
Illustrated by Suzanne Kaufman
Alfred A. Knopf, 2018, 44 pp
ISBN: 978-0-525-57965-6

This New York Times bestselling picturebook is about a close-knit community in the U.S. where no matter what your skin color or ability, YOU are welcome. The story begins on the endpapers showing families from all backgrounds, including single parents, same-sex couples, and even interracial families walking their children to school. The story moves into a classroom where it shows the diversity of the class. Children are wearing patkas, hijabs, yarmulkes, and baseball caps. Children move around on wheelchairs and others use a white cane to support their vision. As students learn about each other’s culture and traditions, they come together to celebrate the Lunar New Year. This picturebook portrays that in this classroom and community, everyone is welcome.

This picturebook is a must read for children of all ages because it represents children from many backgrounds. The world is more diverse than ever, and children truly need to know that no matter the color of their skin, no matter what they wear on their heads, or their abilities, they are welcome.

Books that could be paired with All Are Welcome are The Day You Begin by Jacqueline Woodson and Rafael López (2018) and All Because You Matter by Tami Charles and Bryan Collier (2020). The Day You Begin is a story about Angelina, a young African-American girl who enters her classroom and instantly notices she looks different than everyone else. Angelina finally is brave enough to share during circle time and makes connections with others, realizing everyone has similarities and differences. All Because You Matter is a poetic story about a Black couple who watch their child grow up into a world full of racism and injustice. They want their child to know that he matters in this world no matter what the circumstance. This message relates to readers from all ethnicities or cultures.

Kaufman’s illustrations represent children from a diverse neighborhood, using bright colors to show the different clothes and headwear students wear from their cultures. She uses a variety of skin tone colors to represent children of multiple races and a variety of colors and styles for their hair. Kaufman uses acrylic, ink, and crayon with fine lines to create polished shapes. The majority of the backgrounds are white, allowing the bright vibrant colors to pop. Some illustrations are double-page spreads throughout and some pages are collages.

Alexandra Penfold dreamed of becoming a writer ever since elementary school. She graduated from New York University, starting her career as a children’s book publicist. Penfold has been publishing for over a decade and has worked as an editor and a literary agent at Upstart Crow Literary. She has published other children’s books such as Food Truck Fest! (2018) and The Littlest Viking (2018). Penfold likes public speaking on all aspects of writing for children. To find out more about Alexandra Penfold visit her website.

Suzanne Kaufman is an author, illustrator, and animator. She has received several awards for her books such as Notable Books for Global Society and Amazon Best Children’s Book of the Year. Throughout her career, she has also done animation for Universal and Discovery, for which she has won several awards. Kaufman loves to hike with her family. When she is not with her family, she is busy illustrating or animating! To find out more about Suzanne Kaufman visit her website.

Brianna Perez, Texas Women University

© 2021 by Brianna Perez

WOW Review, Volume XIV, Issue 1 by Worlds of Words is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Based on work by Brianna Perez at https://wowlit.org/on-line-publications/review/xiv-1/3/