4 stars
A fantastic informational read. Provides a great detailed look at the history of Juneteenth for children and adults to read together.
I love that this book doesn’t just end with emancipation but also discusses the years following, recognizing the continued inequalities and discrimination. The book covers important events in history including chattel slavery, the Civil War, the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, Reconstruction, and the Jim Crow era. Provides good details and explanations.
The conversational tone of the text keeps it engaging for a young audience.
Nice visual format that uses different text sizes and colors to keep the book engaging.
My only negative is that the back cover says this book is for children 5 and up to read together with an adult. I think that’s probably a bit young to get much out of this as it is quite long, wordy, and uses some advanced words. Some of the words are defined in footnotes (emancipation, chattel) while others are not (assassination, compromise, proclamation, oppression, solidarity). I could see it being really helpful for older readers (roughly 7 and up). There are simpler books on this topic that I think would work better for a younger audience, especially fiction picture books and board books like Juneteenth Is, Juneteenth for Mazie, and The Story of Juneteenth
As with the other books in this series, there is an intro and an outro for adults that encourages them to continue to share and reflect on the topic with children.
A great resource for learning a more detailed history of Juneteenth.