Social Justice Books

Critically reviewed selection of multicultural and social justice books for children, young adults, and educators.

Ruth and the Green Book

Reviewed by Deborah Menkart Review Source: Rethinking Schools Book Author: A historical fiction picture book for 7- to 11-year-olds about the challenges of traveling for African American families during the Jim Crow era. As Ruth travels with her family from Chicago to Alabama to visit her grandmother, she learns that the Green Book provides a […]

Piecing me Together

Reviewed by Crystal Brunelle Review Source: Rich in Color Book Author: Jade creates stunning collages. She’s an artist turning bits and pieces of color, texture and shapes together. Art has often been one of the ways people explore what they think about the world and sometimes it’s a way to find healing. Jade creates these […]

Unbound: A Novel in Verse

Reviewed by Deborah Menkart Review Source: Rethinking Schools Book Author: When Grace, the enslaved protagonist of this beautiful novel-length poem, turns 9, she is sent to live and work in the big house, forcing a heart-wrenching separation from her family. Then Grace hears that her mother and younger brothers will be placed on the auction […]

Kindred: A Graphic Novel Adaptation

Reviewed by Crystal Brunelle Review Source: Rich in Color Book Author: Kindred is not generally tagged as young adult, but it will likely be a cross-over title and it was one I wanted to read for our focus on women in graphic novels this month. Dana, the main character, has just turned twenty-six when the main […]

Hidden Figures: Young Readers Edition

Reviewed by Tameka Brown Review Source: The Brown Bookshelf Book Author: The book pays homage to four trailblazing African American human computers–Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson, Katherine Johnson and Christine Darden–who served as an integral part of NASA/NACA at the height of the Space Race between America and Russia. In November 2016, HarperCollins released the Young […]

Freedom Over Me: Eleven Slaves, Their Lives and Dreams Brought to Life

Reviewed by Megan Schliesman Review Source: Reading While White Book Author: Peggy, John, Charlotte and child, Stephen, Mulvina, Jane, Athelia, Qush, Bacus, Betty. It is with little more than these names that this book began. Ashley Bryan explains in his author’s note that he acquired a collection of slave-related documents and found among them an 1828 […]