Tuesday, June 19, 2012

The Birthday Party Pledge - a new initiative to encourage the giving and reading of kid and teen books with Characters of Color




Children's author Zetta Elliott started The Birthday Party Pledge to give all children, but particularly children of color, books by and about people of color for their birthdays. 

As author Lyn Miller-Lachmann (former editor of MultiCultural Review and author of the award-winning Gringolandia (2009), which portrays a Latino family) explains:

The idea of the Birthday Party Pledge is to create a new generation of readers and to support the works of authors of color and others who write authentic books with characters of color. To help people choose authentic books, the various BPP committee members have created lists of 15 recommended titles for different age levels, genres, and topics. For instance, teen blogger Ari Valderrama of Reading in Color and I created the lists for global fiction and historical fiction, and Zetta Elliott assembled the speculative fiction list.

A very cool and worthwhile initiative - and the website includes some wonderful suggestion booklists, in categories that include

Books Boys Love

Books Girls Love

Chapter Books

Global Fiction

Graphic Novels

Historical Fiction

LGBTQ Fiction

Non-Fiction

Picture Books

Poetry

Speculative Fiction

and

Sports Books


Check it out, be inspired by, and maybe even take the Birthday Party Pledge! 

Illustrate and Write On, 
Lee

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