Search Our Database of Nearly 2,000 Diverse Picture Books

Our collection of picture books featuring Black and Indigenous people and People of Color (BIPOC) is available to the public. *Inclusion of a title in the collection DOES NOT EQUAL a recommendation.* Click here for more on book evaluation.

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The Day Saida Arrived

2020

by Susana Gómez Redondo and Sonja Wimmer

"Two girls forge a forever-friendship by learning each other’s language. The Day Saida Arrived demonstrates the power of language to build bonds beyond borders. What happens when a new friend arrives who doesn’t speak your language? A young girl searches for the words to help her friend feel welcome and happy in her new home, and along the way learns about differences and similarities in countries and words. The two forge a strong bond while they each learn the other’s language, exploring the world around them. A joyous, lyrical text—including English translations and pronunciations and the complete Arabic alphabet—offers an accessible, fresh approach to talking about immigration. Paired with lushly vivid illustrations, The Day Saida Arrived demonstrates the power of language to build bonds beyond borders. Printed on FSC-certified paper with vegetable-based inks." -- publisher

Idriss and his Marble

2019

by René Gouichoux and Zaü

"When war threatens their home, Idriss and his mother must flee. He clutches his lucky charm--a single marble-- throughout their journey, walking over hazardous terrain, crawling under barbed wire, and sailing on a fragile little boat. Will the marble's luck help them avoid capture and bring them to the safety of a new world?"--

Fatima the spinner and the tent

2016

by Idries Shah and Natasha Delmar

"Fatima's life is beset with what seems to be disasters. Her journey leads her from Morocco to the Mediterranean, Egypt, Turkey and, finally, to China. It is in China that she realizes that what seemed at the time to be really unfortunate events were an integral part of her eventual fulfillment."--Jacket flap

The Village that Vanished

2002

by Ann Grifalconi and Kadir Nelson

In southeastern Africa, a young Yao girl and her mother find a way for their fellow villagers to escape approaching slave traders.

My Name is Blessing

2013

by Eric Walters and Eugenie Fernandes

Based on a true story about a young Kenyan boy whose mother left him but had named him Muthini which meant suffering because he was born with no fingers on his left hand and only two on his right. Many times he was made fun of or avoided which hurt him deeply. He lives with his very elderly grandmother, his Nyanya, along with many cousins whose parents had either died or left them. They are extremely poor and there is never enough money or food, but plenty of love. A difficult choice must be made and Muthini is the youngest child and needs to have a better chance in life, so his Nyanya takes him to an orphanage where he is blessed and his name is changed to Baraka which means blessing for he was a blessing just as his grandmother always knew

Grandad Mandela

2018

by Zazi Mandela, Zindzi Mandela and Sean Qualls

The great-grandchildren of Nelson Mandela ask their grandmother fifteen questions about the former South African president, from his activism work, his Nobel Peace Prize, and his time in prison.

The princess and the pea

2009

by Rachel Isadora

When a prince sets out to find a princess to marry, he soon discovers this is not a simple task. There is no shortage of so-called princesses, but how can he tell whether or not they are what they claim to be? Then one night a great storm rages, there comes a knock on the palace gate, and the prince's life is never the same.

The girl who saved Yesterday

2016

by Julius Lester and Carl Angel

Silence, sent on a mysterious mission by the ancient trees that raised her after she was sent away from her village, reconnects the villagers with their forgotten ancestors.

The people could fly

2015

by Virginia Hamilton and Leo Dillon

Resplendent, powerful paintings by these two-time Caldecott-winning artists bring new life to the title story from the late Hamilton's 1985 collection, The People Could Fly: American Black Folktales . Making dramatic use of shadow and light, Leo and Diane Dillon (whose half-tone illustrations also graced the original volume) ably convey the tale's simultaneous messages of oppression and freedom, of sadness and hope. "They say the people could fly. Say that long ago in Africa, some of the people knew magic," opens the narrative, as the full-color artwork reveals elegant, beautifully clothed individuals with feathered wings serenely ascending into the sky. On the following spread, images of the Middle Passage set a fittingly somber tone, depicting Africans who "were captured for Slavery. The ones that could fly shed their wings. They couldn't take their wings across the water on the slave ships. Too crowded, don't you know." The picture-book format allows room for the relationship to develop between Sarah, who labors in the cotton fields with an infant strapped to her back, and Toby, the "old man," who utters the magic African words that give her flight. Toby helps others take flight as well (a stunning image shows seemingly hundreds linking hands and taking to the skies)- and eventually does so himself, sadly leaving some of the captives "who could not fly" behind to "wait for a chance to run." Art and language that are each, in turn, lyrical and hard-hitting make an ideal pairing in this elegant volume that gracefully showcases the talent of its creators. All ages

Nelson Mandela