Books like My Powerful Hair
By Carole Lindstrom
For the child starting to ask questions about where they come from, this is a gentle way into a family's history and pride. Tender, dignified, and quietly powerful.
A girl in Hawaiʻi who feels neither wahine nor kane sets her sights on leading her school's boys-only hula troupe in a traditional kane chant.
A young Asian girl notices her eyes look different from her friends' — then realizes her eyes match her mother's, grandmother's, and little sister's, and learns to see them as beautiful.
A Puerto Rican girl grows up surrounded by love and pride in her Taíno and African heritage, but painful treatment from the world slowly dims her sense of her own beauty — until her community rallies to wake her up again.
A young boy travels before dawn with his family to Granny's farm for their annual reunion, where every child must find their own way to honor the family's history — but Lil Alan isn't sure what he'll bring.
After spotting three dazzling mermaids on the subway, a boy transforms his home into a lagoon of imagination, fashioning his own mermaid costume from a curtain and some ferns.
A girl with six names asks her father why she was given so many — and learns each one carries the story of a grandparent who came before her.
Across generations, the women in one family pass down the art of quilting — from a seven-year-old girl sold away from her parents who sewed secret maps to freedom, to daughters who carried her knowledge through segregation and into the fight for literacy.
A rap-inspired tribute moves through the stories of Indigenous heroes past and present — Tecumseh, Sacagawea, Crazy Horse, astronaut John Herrington, NHL goalie Carey Price — all building to one message: we are people who matter.
A little girl with kinky, coiling, curling hair needs an extra-special style for a big occasion, so her daddy steps in to figure out how to make her hair — and Zuri — happy.
A child notices that black isn't in the rainbow, then traces the color through everyday things and through the history, culture, and legacy of Black people and community.
A mistreated girl mocked as Sootface by her cruel older sisters sets off to try her luck with a warrior who can only be seen by someone with a kind, honest heart.
A boy settles into the barber's chair for a fresh cut, and with every snip of the clippers feels himself transform into something sharper, prouder, and more sure of who he is.
