Sonderbooks25 – 2003 Sonderbooks Stand-outs

Sonderbooks25, Stand-outs 0

I did it! I revised my 2003 Sonderbooks Stand-outs to a phone-friendly format!

I’m celebrating my 25th year of writing Sonderbooks with #Sonderbooks25.

My original plan was to reread *one* book from each year’s Sonderbooks Stand-outs, revise the early years’ Stand-outs pages to the new, phone-friendly format, and blog about all the other books in this series.

Well, my plans are changing. First, I can’t resist reading *all* the reviews I posted each year. In the early years, they were “issues” of Sonderbooks – and 2003 went from Sonderbooks #45 to Sonderbooks #69. (You can find all the back issues on the Back Issues page.) And I’m rereading my Project 52 posts. 2003 was the year I was 38 and 39. We still lived in Germany, still thought I had a happy marriage, my kids were 15 and 9, and we took a family vacation to Scotland. I still worked half-time at Sembach Base Library.

Another thing that’s slowing me down is it turns out I made a *lot* of books Stand-outs. (I read and reviewed even more – I was only working half-time.) And it takes a very long time to revise the webpages because I pretty much have to do it from scratch. This will get easier after I finish 2005, when I can do more simple copying and pasting.

So – I did reread and review Beyond the Limit, by Joan Spicci, as part of this project, but I also found some other old Stand-outs available on eaudio and listened to them. And I’m finding I want to reread everything! It won’t happen – but I read some wonderful books back then.

So instead of blogging about all the books I didn’t reread – I’m trying to post on social media most days about those old Stand-outs. That way I can think about them one at a time and present them to people one at a time. But meanwhile, do check out my new webpage for the 2003 Sonderbooks Stand-outs!

I do love that Fairfax County Public Library still owns a copy of almost all the picture books I named as Stand-outs in 2003. I maintain this is not because our picture book collection is too old but because those picture books were and are truly wonderful.

I’m having lots of fun celebrating #Sonderbooks25. I hope some of the fun will spread to readers!

The Printz Awards – Day 1 ALA Annual Conference 2025

Conference Corner 0

The first day of ALA Annual Conference is also the night the Printz Awards are given. What I like about the Printz Awards is that *all* the authors give speeches, not just the winners, unlike the Newbery. They also consider the art, not just the text, unlike the Newbery. So attending the awards is a way to start off Annual Conference with inspirational speeches, happy to be a librarian. I’ll give notes from their speeches below.

This year marked the 25th anniversary of the Printz Awards, so Laurie Halse Anderson, who won an Honor that first year with Speak, delivered a keynote address.

We serve a vision of how the world ought to be. Not only do we write for teens, but we have a responsibility to them.

If you’re not pissing off haters, you need to try harder.

The Printz is part of a recognition of adolescence itself. Adults often try really hard not to remember being a teenager. Adolescence is so powerful. Teenagers might be the original woke people, the opposite of anesthetized.

Young people always lead change. 25 years ago the Printz honored books that are still freaking people out today.

The first Honor recipient to speak was Safia Elhillo for Bright Red Fruit.

Despite the best efforts of our enemies, libraries will continue to thrive.

There is nothing meager about being a poet.

Today is Day 804 of the war in Sudan, “the forgotten war.” Her family used her grandfather’s bookshelves to stop bullets after the windows were shattered.

Books give hope of stopping bullets.

The next Honoree was Andrew Joseph White for Compound Fracture.

This book reached teen readers at the right time. About people fighting for good in a place written off.

It’s about family history and queer history, based on his own family.

Queer people are here and we exist. It’s also a scary time to be queer.

Then we heard from Molly Knox Ostertag, author of the Honor book The Deep Dark.

She doesn’t write queer characters because she’s looking for representation. These are people you love.

Transition is a declaration of hope. The roles are not fixed.

Good books show you the world is bigger than yourself.

An expansion of freedom, a celebration of choice. There’s no one else I’d want to be fighting the good fight with.

Next, Rex Ogle received an Honor for The Road Home.

He began by talking about ice – frozen water. Ice is human ingenuity at its core.

When you’re homeless, you’re invisible to the people around you. 2.8 million kids are homeless right now, and 40% of them are LGBTQ.

Life is painful. We make a difference, but it comes at a cost.

He is still working so hard just to be seen, and this award shows that librarians see him.

He used to wish on dandelions that he’d be a writer. His pain got him here. Times are dark, but where there’s conflict, there’s growth.

Abuela gave him a drink with ice after he’d gone a summer without it.

Don’t focus on the hurt. Focus on the beauty of ice. You survived today.

Now it was time for the winners to speak, the author and illustrator of Brownstone. Mar Julia spoke first.

This is an important book today. Get involved in your community! Especially right now. Know your neighbors. Check on someone you haven’t seen in a while.

Community is difficult at times, but it’s deeply rewarding.

Then Samuel Teer spoke, also for Brownstone.

He began with a story – about an adorable Latino boy growing up in the Midwest. He was too much and didn’t have friends until he got into comics, then made two friends. His bus driver gave him a coverless comic preview because her husband worked for DC Comics. That was when he realized that comics could be a job and he decided to make comic books. That’s his origin story.

But things were tough after that. He worked on Brownstone for a year – figured it was his last shot. He kept asking, Is this worth it? (Comics are always worth it.)

Making comics is what he always wanted to do, and Brownstone gave him a second chance at that.

And the Printz means Brownstone is actually getting read. And he gets to work! And make comics! He gets to make little Sammy’s dreams become reality.

Review of A Bright Heart, by Kate Chenli

Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

A Bright Heart

by Kate Chenli

Union Square & Co., October 17, 2023. 331 pages.
Review written May 29, 2023, from an advance reader copy sent by the publisher.
Starred Review

As this book opens, Mingshin is being tortured and killed by her betrothed, Prince Ren, the man she funded and strategized with so he would become king. He tells her that he will marry her cousin, the one he always loved anyway, and no king would marry a commoner like her.

But as she lies dying, she begs heaven for a second chance – and something happens. She wakes up two years earlier, before she met Ren, soon after they moved to the capital city and the king announced that there would be a competition among his sons as to who would succeed him.

Now Mingshin knows that Prince Ren, as well as her uncle and cousin, cannot be trusted. Can she save her mother from her terrible death in the other timeline as well as their loyal servants and protectors? Can she keep the fortune they inherited from her father? And more importantly, can she keep the cruel Ren from winning the throne and stay alive?

But after being so horribly betrayed, when Prince Jieh shows an interest in Mingshin, she is afraid to trust him, either. After all, no royal would truly be interested in a commoner, would he? And when things start happening differently in this timeline, she’s not sure what course to take.

There’s magic involved in this story, and how it works is a bit murky at times, but we find out along with Mingshin, so that didn’t bother me too much. I like her cleverness and her determination to set things right.

Although this book comes to a resolution, there are many ongoing details, so I will look forward to the continuation of this story. A strong debut novel, with promise of more to come.

katechenli.com
unionsquareandco.com

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/bright_heart.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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Review of The Antidote, by Karen Russell

Audiobooks, Historical, Paranormal 0

The Antidote

by Karen Russell
read by Elena Rey, Sophie Amoss, Mark Bramhall, Shayna Small, Jon Orsini, Natasha Soudek, Karen Russell, and James Riding In

Books on Tape, 2025. 16 hours, 56 minutes.
Review written June 22, 2025, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review

The Antidote is a historical novel of the Dust Bowl, woven throughout with magical realism. When I began the book, I wasn’t sure I liked it, and the pace is literary and more slow-moving than the young adult and children’s books I often read. But by the last several hours – well, let’s just say that I stayed up until 3 am and finished a jigsaw puzzle to also finish this book. (Would I have stayed up to finish the jigsaw puzzle anyway? Maybe. But wanting to finish this audiobook meant I didn’t even try to resist.)

The “Antidote” of the title is a person. She’s a prairie witch, and that’s the name she uses for customers. She’s a vault for things you want to forget, memories that trouble you or that you want to stop thinking about for a time. The Antidote goes into a trance and the customer talks into her ear trumpet and the memories get transferred to her to carry. The customer doesn’t remember what they confided, and the Antidote never heard it, but they can come back at any time, read their deposit slip backwards, and this time the transfer will go the other way, giving the memories back to the customer.

But the book opens on Black Sunday, the day an enormous dust storm went through Nebraska. On the same day, the Antidote went bankrupt. She can feel in her body that all the deposits were lost. What will she do when the customers fleeing the dry prairie want their deposits back?

There are other characters we follow. Harp Oletsky is a farmer whose wheat crop was miraculously spared. Even the scarecrow survived intact! He starts seeing lights coming from the land.

Harp’s niece, Asphodel, is living with him after her mother was found dead in a ditch. She tries to escape her nightmares about her mother’s body by playing basketball. But the folks supporting their team one by one are leaving Nebraska. And Asphodel wants to make some money by working for the Antidote.

Then there’s a government photographer. She’s a Black lady traveling alone. She tries to follow the instructions for the pictures the government wants to support the New Deal – but then her camera reveals images that she didn’t see when she took the pictures.

And through all of this, we learn about life on the prairie and the hard things that happen there – things people are willing to pay to forget. For example, the Polish settlers don’t want to face that they were offered free homesteads in order to secure land that belonged to the Pawnee people. And in fact, the Pawnee people are being treated exactly the way the Polish people were treated in Europe.

It also turns out that the no-good sheriff has been forcing the Antidote to receive deposits in order to hide evidence. And that comes to a head when the Lucky Rabbit’s Foot Killer – who supposedly killed Asphodel’s mother – has a botched execution on Black Sunday when the electric chair malfunctions. The election is coming up, and the sheriff intends to win on his record, never mind what is really the truth behind the murders.

And it’s all wound together in a way that winds itself into your heart. I have to admit it got me thinking uncomfortable thoughts about my homesteading ancestors in a way I never faced before. The motto of the prairie in this book is “Better you than me.” And the book shows up the problems with that motto – and how deeply it’s embedded in the heart of America. Powerful stuff, and an engrossing read (once you get started).

karenrussellauthor.com

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Fiction/antidote.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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Day 1 – ALA Annual Conference 2025 in Philadelphia

Conference Corner 0

The American Library Association Annual Conference this year was in Philadelphia, not too far away, so my library system paid for some of us to attend.

I drove up the day before. It took longer than Google maps said it would, so I didn’t have time to register, but there was plenty of time on Friday. My hotel was right near Independence Hall, so first I visited Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell. I hadn’t visited either one since 1991, when my family lived across the river in Burlington County, New Jersey.

Then I walked to the Convention Center (about a mile) and got registered. There was one session happening for a general library audience without needing a ticket or invitation – but the room was packed by the time I got there, so I made my way a little early to the Bloomsbury Tea at the Marriott.

At the tea, I was delighted to find Kim, who’d been the chair of the Morris Award Committee I was on last year. Sandy, our administrative assistant, was also there, but she was seated at a different table. It makes me happy to see Library Friends at conferences and that I’ve made many such friends over the years.

Besides elegant food and tea, three stellar authors spoke at the tea. First up was Debbie Levy, author of A Dangerous Idea: The Scopes Trial, the Original Fight over Science in Schools.

She said that the story of that trial was an irresistible story because of how badly adults will behave when they want to keep teens in the dark.

She found that the characters involved were full of nuance, all trying to do what is right from their perspective. But the world is rarely black and white.

They used the same techniques as book banners use today, telling false narratives about those who were presenting Darwin’s work.

It was about the rejection of facts because they make people uncomfortable.

It has reverberations today. Those who are misinformed mean well. You *can* reach people with words.

Next up was Kate Messner, whose new book is The Trouble with Heroes.

The book is about an angry middle school student grieving his father. And the day it came out, her own father went into the ICU.

Parts of the book are sad, and parts are funny, because grief is like that.

Written for readers who aren’t sure they’re readers. In verse to have that comforting white space.

When her Dad died, she leaned on the words.

Sometimes people seem like sort of a mess, when really they’re doing their best. Books are lifelines.

Then came Renée Watson, whose new book is All the Blues in the Sky.

We all bring our stories with us – our joys and our sorrows.

She’s not writing books to escape, but books to help cope. Her books are the hug a child needs.

Her character wants to be a pilot and is dealing with loss. The sky has layers.

Grief is like hunger – we eat today, but we’ll still have hunger we need to satisfy. That’s the story of living – living with wounds and living to be healed.

Our young people are experiencing sadness. I hope we do right by them and give them books that help them feel it all.

After they spoke, attendees had a chance to have all three authors sign our copies of their books we’d been given. And after hearing the speeches, I’m super eager to read them!

After the Bloomsbury Tea, I went back to the hotel to get my wheeled bag. (I have a doctor’s note. 14 years ago, I had a vertebral artery dissection that caused a stroke, and it’s not good for me to carry heavy things. My neck was hurting by the end of the day – so I’m glad I decided to go with wheels.)

I was back in time for the opening session with Governor Whitmer. I honestly didn’t realize her interviewer was Emma McNamara from Capitol Choices – a local group of librarians I’m part of – until I saw the pictures later! (I was sitting way in back.)

Honestly, Governor Whitmer’s talk was on the fluffy side. She said that she read To Kill a Mockingbird many times as a kid and it helped her find her passion in life for public service.

Her book – which now has a YA edition with resources added – is about how she got through hard things. She was assaulted in college, and that gave her a mission to give survivors tools and encouragement – though it took her 25 years to find her voice.

Be curious, not judgmental. Learn one another’s stories.

She keeps a gratitude journal, even on the hardest days. Violence is the antithesis of what democracy is supposed to be. Humor is a good way to deal with a bully – take their weapon and make it your shield.

After the Opening Session, I spent time in the exhibits – first making sure to get a signed Advance Reader Copy of Sara Pennypacker’s new book, The Lions’ Run. Other than that, I showed a lot of restraint! Now that advance reader copies get mailed to my office, it’s easier to resist free books.

After the exhibits, I headed to the Philadelphia Free Library for the Printz Awards. That will get a post of its own, but here’s a picture of my goodies from the first day. Again, I feel I showed great restraint!

Review of Dance Fast, by A. R. Cribbins

Contemporary, Picture Book Review 0

Dance Fast

by AR Cribbins

Little, Brown and Company, 2024. 36 pages.
Review written June 9, 2025, from a library book.

This picture book has a lovely message about perfectionist that will speak to kids and adults alike.

A little girl named Bizzy tells the story. She wants to dance at this year’s ceremony and wants her own regalia. But her mother’s old dance dress is too big, so she plans to make her own regalia with her mom and grandma. She wants it to be perfect.

Bizzy has sewn pillows before. She’s confident in her skills. But then things go wrong, and she’s convinced her dress is ruined.

After some more trials and tribulations, her grandma shows her own dance regalia and explains:

Grandma says it’s the Pomo way to leave one little flaw in everything you make.

“And then we dance fast so no one sees where that part is!”

The book ends with Bizzy happily dancing, in a beautiful dress complete with flaws.

I love a book that speaks to children in a natural way about beauty in mistakes.

arcribbins.com
LBYR.com

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Picture_Books/dance_fast.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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Review of Rebellion 1776, by Laurie Halse Anderson

Children's Fiction Review, Historical, Starred Review 0

Rebellion 1776

by Laurie Halse Anderson

Caitlyn Dlouhy Books/Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2025. 416 pages.
Review written June 18, 2025, from an Advance Reader Copy sent by the publisher.
Starred Review

Here’s a side of the American Revolution I had never heard. We’ve got Elspeth, an ordinary girl living in Boston in 1776 and working as a maid. Her mother and brothers had died of smallpox in Philadelphia, so her father took the two of them to Boston, and he found her a position as a maid. The book opens as cannons are firing from both the British, under siege in Boston, and from the Patriots, trying to dislodge them.

The British and Loyalists are driven out, and Pappa plans to evacuate at the same time. Elspeth doesn’t want to go, so she hides overnight – but Pappa never shows up! Did he leave without her? Did something happen to him? While she’s trying to find him, to get in touch with him, Elspeth works for the family that replaced the loyalist judge she’d been serving. But her position is precarious as a girl without her father there to vouch for her.

And then smallpox comes to Boston. Elspeth has had it, but now folks are being inoculated – given a light dose of the disease – which is still a dose of the disease. And still takes months to run its course! (And I thought being sick for a day after a vaccination was bad.) And her good friend wants to enlist as a soldier. And the 16-year-old ward of the family she serves has independent ideas. And there are nefarious characters making use of wartime to enrich themselves.

The whole tale pulled me in and made me think about ordinary people during wartime – and how most folks simply want to live their lives. But world events can make that difficult.

It was a delight to read about Elspeth’s resourcefulness and courage as she holds on when it seems like she’s alone in the world.

madwomanintheforest.com

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Childrens_Fiction/rebellion_1776.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

What did you think of this book?

Review of Star Splitter, by Matthew J. Kirby

Science Fiction, Teen Fiction Review 0

Star Splitter

by Matthew J. Kirby
read by Jennifer Jill Araya and Cory Myler

Listening Library, 2023. 10 hours, 37 minutes.
Review written December 20, 2023, from a library eaudiobook.

I love the premise of this young adult science fiction story: In the future, humankind has figured out how to teleport to distant stars — by leaving our bodies behind. Specifically, they scan your “reference body” with a laser that destroys it at the same time. Then they send all your data — your consciousness and memories, along with all the specs of your physical body — and print you a new body in a distant location. This is a scary concept, and they have counselors and liaisons to help people adjust to the idea. Fortunately, the technology is wonderfully reliable and nothing ever goes wrong in transport. (There’s a set-up for you!)

As the book opens, one of the liaisons is thinking about a girl he prepared for teleportation named Jessica. She was the first person to ask if it hurts her reference body. She wasn’t happy that her parents had decided to send for her at their new assignment exploring a planet with a large volcano that had wiped out any previous life. They’d left Jessica behind six years ago, and now she’d rather be with her friends.

Next we see Jessica waking up on the alien planet, and something is very wrong. She’s in a body printer in a landing craft of the ship she was supposed to teleport to. The lander has crash-landed on the alien planet, and the first person she sees is — herself. For some unknown reason, the Jessica who teleported to the ship has printed another copy of herself with the data that got sent a few weeks before. (Something that’s definitely not supposed to ever happen.) Now they are the only two (one?) people on the planet.

So there’s a survival situation — they need to get to the habitat where their parents were supposed to be stationed and let the space agency know about the disaster and the people who died. Meanwhile, interspersed with the chapters on the planet, we get the story of what happened when the first version of Jessica teleported to the spaceship as planned.

I love the premise. And there’s some nice exploration about whether they will even get rescued or if the powers-that-be will simply print a new body for them back on earth. And how they feel about that. And which one of them? And if they use the earlier scan, what will happen to them?

The execution of the premise, for me, had some bumps in spots. Some of the things that went wrong and caused the disaster weren’t adequately explained, in my view. Some of the things they discovered on the alien planet were a little out there.

However, the way it was presented ratcheted up the suspense all the way, as you’re dying to know what actually happened and what choices they’ll make next.

The book reminded me of Neal Shusterman’s Scythe trilogy, because as with that series, death isn’t permanent, because they can fix you up with a new body and your old data. This would have taken place when the technology isn’t quite as developed, though, and people are still getting used to the idea that what makes you the person you are is not your reference body, but the data inside it.

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/star_splitter.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

What did you think of this book?

Review of Worth Fighting For, by John Pavlovitz

Christian, Nonfiction Review, Starred Review 0

Worth Fighting For

Finding Courage and Compassion When Cruelty Is Trending

by John Pavlovitz

Westminster John Knox Press, 2024. 154 pages.
Review written June 10, 2025, from my own copy, purchased via Amazon.com
Starred Review

I think of John Pavlovitz as someone who comes across as angry. However, even though this book features a picture of boxing gloves, it’s ultimately a book about making compassion our primary characteristic as Christians. And he indeed makes a strong case that this is worth fighting for.

The sections in this book are short, so it made an easy morning read to read one section. I found myself talking about what I’d read with other Christians, especially this passage:

What we believe about faith and God and the afterlife is not as fixed as we often like to think. It is rather an ever-shifting point in space and time. Very likely, you believe quite differently than you did ten years ago in both subtle and substantial ways, and ten years from now the same will almost certainly be true. In this way I like to think of theology as a place – as the specific location where you are right at this moment.

This is important as you interact with others, because it helps you recognize your limitations and potential. You cannot make someone be where you are. It’s not your job or your right to forcibly pull someone to your faith perspective, to make them see as you see or agree to the givens you’ve established in your mind. Your responsibility is to openly describe the view from where you stand and hope that something in that is helpful or encouraging or challenging to people. I never feel I need to convince someone to believe what I believe, only to let them know where I am and ask them to meet me there in relationship.

I love that perspective, because I hadn’t stopped to think about it, but, yes, my beliefs are quite different than they were ten years ago, in many ways. I think sometimes we feel like we’ve seen the light and been set straight in one particular area – so we want to set everyone else straight, too. But why would someone else have to follow the same path as me? John Pavlovitz comes at faith with a deep respect for each person’s journey with God – even of those who berate him.

Yes, John Pavlovitz often comes across as angry, but that seems to be coming from a place of compassion, for those who try to exclude others from the table.

He doesn’t pretend that it’s easy to be inclusive and welcoming. But compassion is worth fighting for.

Love is still the greatest weapon we have in the face of fear. It is still the antidote to all that afflicts us. No, opposing hatred isn’t hateful. Opposing hatred is how we embody love.

And he’s absolutely right that hatred and exclusion are becoming more and more common in our society. In the chapter “The Future We Want,” he includes a section on “The America Worth Fighting For” and encourages us to help make a future America that stands against white supremacy and defends the vulnerable. He encourages us all to use our own abilities to do what we can to make a better future.

Affirm life, speak truth, defend the vulnerable, call out injustices – and gladly brave the criticisms and the wounds you sustain in doing it, knowing that they are a small price to pay for the nation that could be if you speak – or the one that will be if you do not.

So that gives you an idea of what you’ll find in this book – encouragement to stand up and be more compassionate. Here’s another passage I marked:

Compassion is what defines the community we feel called into.

In this shared desire to care for one another and for this planet, we who are a disparate assembly find an affinity that transcends the other boxes. It is the bigger table we are building, the expansive community we are forming.

And this is the side we choose regardless of the other boxes: the side of empathy and equality and benevolence and diversity. These don’t come with a prerequisite doctrinal statement or political affiliation, nor with any condition regarding race or orientation or pigmentation. No group has a market cornered on such selflessness and decency.

The powerful thread knitting together this new chosen family in these days is humanity that gives a damn about other humanity. This is the place where like-hearted people can all find belonging and live fully and heal wounds and fix broken things.

And this compassionate coalition of those who give a damn is what will save the world.

johnpavlovitz.com

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Nonfiction/worth_fighting_for.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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Review of Brownstone, by Samuel Teer & Mar Julia

Contemporary, Graphic Novel, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Brownstone

by Samuel Teer & Mar Julia

Versify (HarperCollins), 2024. 318 pages.
Review written February 18, 2025, from a library book.
Starred Review
2025 Printz Award Winner
2025 Cybils Award Winner, Young Adult Graphic Novels

Brownstone is a graphic novel about an almost-fifteen-year-old girl named Almudena sent to spend the summer in New York City with the Guatemalan father she’s never met while her dancer mother does a European tour.

Almudena’s not happy about it. Her father doesn’t speak much English, and she doesn’t speak much Spanish. So the neighbor lady comes over to translate. Almudena’s not sure how she feels about that. The address is a brownstone that looks beautiful on the outside – but on the inside, her father is in the midst of renovating it.

This is a story of Almudena getting to know the neighborhood and the neighbors and learning about her Guatemalan heritage. She also bumps against some prejudice when she befriends a lesbian who runs the local bodega, and learns about gentrification when some of those neighbors have to move because of rising rent.

It’s all lovingly told, and I enjoyed getting to know Almudena’s new family, too.

We end up with social commentary in readable, interesting graphic novel form.

marjulia.com

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/brownstone.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

What did you think of this book?