We began our discussion with our picture book, Soul Food Sunday by Winsome Bingham and Illustrated by C.G. Esperanza. We had various reactions to this book. Most of us loved the vibrantly colored, detailed illustrations of the young Black boy who decided to help his Granny in the kitchen as she prepared the delicious food for the weekly large family Sunday gathering at her house. A couple of readers were not so entranced by the art -- they weren't fans of Esperanza's somewhat bold and brash style. That's OK. Most of us liked the repetitive text where the little boy worked very hard as he learned various important tasks and was praised by his Granny each time with a repeated phrase. We were honored to have one 17-year-old join us, and she liked the book a lot because it helped her to learn about a custom and food of another culture. She said she would have liked to read it as a younger kid. One reader was not so thrilled with the book, she said it didn't seem real, and she had issues with some of the cooking details presented. We thought it could be useful in conjunction with several other excellent books about the foods and gatherings of different cultures.
We all agreed that our novel, When You Look Like Us by Pamela N. Harris was too long, and contained some scenes that could easily have been cut. We all felt for 16-year-old Jay whose dad had died, whose mother was in prison, and whose older sister Nic was missing, and we all had the need to keep reading just to see if she would be found. We got a glimpse into the good and bad parts of his life in the housing project where he lived, his school interactions, his friends, his love for his grandma (MiMi) and his desire to take charge of finding his sister, where several blunders were made. But -- many of us felt bothered by the fact that he didn't tell anyone Nic was missing for the longest time, and that when he finally did it was almost too late. A couple of readers said it reminded them of a Nancy Drew mystery, others didn't see that. We were all glad about the ending, although most of us felt it was almost too 'pat' when his sister was found. One reader absolutely loved it, and felt that all of the characters and actions in the book were very real. Another mentioned that it was all about perceptions and expectations -- how Jay thought he was perceived by various adults, teachers, other kids in his life, the police -- and how the expectations he had of many of them turned out to be wrong. We all agreed that young middle- and high-school readers would love this book.
