Poli F. reviewed The Colors of Us-a fun, lighthearted story about skin color on
The text of this children's book is poetic. In addition, the illustrations are above par. They are unique and truly "colorful" (no pun intended). Unfortunately, the cover picture does not come up on PBS' booklist. I did just check on Amazon.com and they DO show the front cover, have the "search inside" feature available, and many more reviews available to read as well.
This story centers around a little girl who wants to paint pictures of the people in her neighborhood. She intends to use brown paint to do so. However, after the little girl's mother takes her for a walk through the neighborhood the little girl realizes that plain ol' "brown" just won't do.
The little girl soon learns that she will need to mix paint colors to better match the skin colors of the folks in her neighborhood including:
Mr. Pellegrino at the pizza parlor. "He is the color of pizza crust, a golden brown."
Her best friend Jo-Jin. "Jo-Jin is the color of honey."
Her cousin Kyle. "His skin is a reddish brown, like leaves in fall."
Isabella, "Isabella is chocolate brown, like the cupcakes we had for her birthday."
and Lucy, "Lucy has skin that is peachy and tan."
The theme of this book does not reach beyond outward appearances. In talking with my own children, I pointed out that there is far more to each of us than the mere color of our skin. I think this is of paramount importance and should not be minimized.
However, that theme was not the intention of this book. I believe this book does what it sets out to do very well. The theme of the story encourages children to delight in their own skin color. In addition, this book gives children and adults a fun, even poetic way to describe skin color besides the proverbial black, white, and of course . . . brown.
This story centers around a little girl who wants to paint pictures of the people in her neighborhood. She intends to use brown paint to do so. However, after the little girl's mother takes her for a walk through the neighborhood the little girl realizes that plain ol' "brown" just won't do.
The little girl soon learns that she will need to mix paint colors to better match the skin colors of the folks in her neighborhood including:
Mr. Pellegrino at the pizza parlor. "He is the color of pizza crust, a golden brown."
Her best friend Jo-Jin. "Jo-Jin is the color of honey."
Her cousin Kyle. "His skin is a reddish brown, like leaves in fall."
Isabella, "Isabella is chocolate brown, like the cupcakes we had for her birthday."
and Lucy, "Lucy has skin that is peachy and tan."
The theme of this book does not reach beyond outward appearances. In talking with my own children, I pointed out that there is far more to each of us than the mere color of our skin. I think this is of paramount importance and should not be minimized.
However, that theme was not the intention of this book. I believe this book does what it sets out to do very well. The theme of the story encourages children to delight in their own skin color. In addition, this book gives children and adults a fun, even poetic way to describe skin color besides the proverbial black, white, and of course . . . brown.
