Beyond the Secret Garden: Books for Everyone
Darren Chetty and Karen Sands-O’Connor find a way to include everyone on your holiday gift list.
The holiday season is an important time for children’s books. With that in mind, we thought we would offer a list of children’s books that suit a variety of reading tastes and needs. We would especially like to stress that the books we list below are for ALL children, and not just children from similar backgrounds to the main characters in these books.
2019 has been a great year for books by and about BAME people and there is a sense that some of the initiatives of the past few years are just beginning to impact UK children’s publishing. By way of example, two authors who were first featured in 2017’s A Change Is Gonna Come (Stripes) had superb debuts – Aisha Bushby’s magical middle-grade A Pocketful of Stars (Egmont), and Yasmin Rahman’s YA tale of friendship and survival All The Things We Never Said (Hot Key).
We’ve organised the list by genre, and tried to highlight books that have appeared or won awards in the last year or so, and some books you might have missed. We encourage you to seek out your local independent children’s bookshop, if you’re lucky enough to have one, or independent online services such as Letterbox Library, as they can offer further suggestions and great books to suit your child.
Picture Books Fifty years after the first moonwalk, Ken Wilson-Max’s Astro Girl (Otter-Barry 2019) gives young children a chance to read and dream about their own experience in space. Look Up! (Penguin) by Nathan Bryan and Dapo Adeola is a beautifully illustrated story featuring Rocket, who is fascinated by the stars and is eager to convince her big brother Jamal that there is a whole universe to discover beyond his phone. My Hair (Faber & Faber), written by Hannah Lee and illustrated by Allen Fatimiaharan, combines the excitement
of a forthcoming birthday party with a celebration of the wealth of Black hairstyles for women and men. Breanna J. McDaniel’s Hands Up! (Dial) reimagines a potentially frightening phrase through the activities of a young girl experiencing an ordinary day—and a protest march. For the very youngest booklovers, and those learning their letters, Atinuke’s B is for Baby (Walker) delights with its pictures of an adorable toddler falling into a basket of bananas that become breakfast. Nadia Shireen’s follow up to Billy and the Beast, is the hilarious Billy and the Dragon (Jonathan Cape).
Folk and Traditional Tales Poonam Mistry, whose beautiful and complex illustrations for Chitra Soundar’s You’re Safe with Me gained a Kate Greenaway nomination last year, has created a remarkable visual experience with How the Stars Came to Be (Tate). Soundar and Mistry have combined again for You’re Snug with Me (Lantana). Amin Hassanzadeh Sharif’s graffito illustrations are the ideal complement to Sally Pomme Clayton’s retelling of The Phoenix of Persia (Tiny Owl). Leah’s Star – A Nativity Story (Alanna Max) written by Margaret Bateson-Hill and beautifully illustrated by Karin Littlewood tells the nativity story through the eyes of the innkeeper’s daughter. Under the Great Plum Tree (Tiny Owl), written by Sufiya Ahmed and illustrated by Reza Dalvand draws upon the Ancient India text The Panchatantra.
Historical Fiction Catherine Johnson’s Freedom (Scholastic) won the Little Rebels Award this year, and for good reason; it intertwines one boy’s experience as a Black Briton with the fate of the Zong Case in the 18th century, keeping readers involved in historical events
14 Books for Keeps No.239 November 2019
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