In this Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award Winner, we follow along as a young boy describes the sights and sounds of Harlem, where he lives.
The main character of this story seems to be Harlem itself. Harlem is characterized by the young narrator's description as well as the illustrations. Harlem also serves as the setting obviously. The reader gets to see how unique Harlem is and what an assortment of activities there are to do in Harlem.
There isn't much plot to this story. A young boy takes us on a tour of Harlem beginning with his breakfast of chicken and waffles and ending with his family going to see the Boys Choir of Harlem at the Apollo Theater. Young readers will enjoy seeing what part of Harlem will be revealed next as the story progresses.
The writing style is both straightforward and figurative. For instance, the author uses metaphor, "uptown is a caterpillar," but then goes on to say, "well it's really the Metro-North train�" The unique aspect of this book is the illustrations and how well they fit the text. For instance, the author says the brownstones "look like they're made of chocolate." The illustration shows a row of brownstones that are actually made out of pieces of Cadbury chocolate bars (Publisher's Weekly). The illustrations are all very interesting in their design. They look as if they were created by cutting pictures out of magazines and then gluing them all together. "The artwork creates an inviting visual riff with a pastiche of watercolor portraits, fabric scraps, photographs, wallpaper snippets and newsprint" (Publishers Weekly). This unique design that will definitely appeal to children.
The overall mood just seems to be one of happiness and pride. It's obvious that the narrator loves Harlem, is proud of Harlem, and is happy there. Children will find themselves loving Harlem as well by the end of the story (Kirkus Reviews). Children will recognize the narrator's love of Harlem and think about the things they love about their own neighborhoods and cities.
Amazon.com. 2000. Publishers Weekly. Available from
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/product-description/0805057218/102-0505924-
0790555?%5Fencoding=UTF8&n=283155. Accessed 9 September 2004.
