The Book Faire: Children's Literature for Grownups
Sep 30, 2026 · 25 min · 11 segments
This episode of the Book Faire Podcast discusses the ongoing issues surrounding book bans in various states, highlights new book releases, and emphasizes the importance of student advocacy in the face…
starting with Gathering Light by Joy Harjo and illustrated by Mankishig Powus-Steckley.
In this reflective narrative, former U.S. poet laureate Harjo, a member of the Muskegee Nation, and Asinahabi artist Powus-Steckley portray an indigenous custom of going out at sunrise to greet the day, to respect, to honor.
Saturated digitally painted illustrations depict an indigenous child heading into a wood, where, as the sun rises, they gather light into your hands.
Breathe it deep into your being.
Say thank you in the language that speaks your heart best.
Subsequent lines describe a practice of noticing the quality of the light and asking that it bless both loved ones and the child's individual actions.
As the sun reaches its highest point, the lilting second-person text shifts to the work of understanding and embracing one's connection with light and other beings, and as day transitions toward sundown, of letting go.
Caldecott honoree Myers delivers a luminous visual love letter to black childhood and New York City with a stunning wordless picture book that follows five kids bicycling around the boroughs.
Lighted and photographed stained glass windows comprise each intricate scene, laying vibrant colors that make every page glow with expressive life.
As the brown-skinned companions meet up and ride from landmark to landmark in one remarkable vertical spread across the Brooklyn Bridge, their nocturnal adventure is clearly filled with joyful freedom of movement.
The city itself becomes both backdrop and character in scenes that reflect the children's sense of belonging and camaraderie.
After the kids pause at a bodega where one buys a toy from a coin vending machine, late spreads show the figures becoming one with the city's skyline as sunrise hues streak the sky.
A pleasure to linger over, this polished, freewheeling portrait of children exploring, laughing, roaming, and fully inhabiting this locale also celebrates the city that an author's note calls a sacred place.
Backmatter includes more about the collaboration behind the images, and this book is recommended for ages 4 to 8.
Lowry pens an arresting dystopian novel that chronicles a tween discovering a cache of books and the startling truths they unearth about her tyrannical society.
In 2099, 14-year-old Tessa mourns the loss of her twin brother, Theo, who vanished without a trace two months ago.
She finds comfort in her relationship with her 135-year-old neighbor, Miriam, who is being involuntarily relocated to a retirement home.
Before Miriam's departure, she gives Tessa a key to a secret closet that contains contraband unfamiliar to Tessa, a baseball mitt, a newspaper, and, most surprisingly, books, which were declared illegal a long, long time ago by their community's despotic leader and largely locked away in Storage Building 903, where they await destruction.
Tessa, astonished and delighted by the images that the texts inspire within her mind, eagerly shares her findings with her parents, and as the family clandestinely discusses the extraordinary items, her father reveals that he gave Theo a book before he went missing, leading Tessa to believe that the object is connected to Theo's disappearance.
Crescent worldbuilding conjures a hyper-surveillance state that mirrors contemporary attitudes surrounding censorship and control.
It's a haunting contemporary tale about a grim future deprived of storytelling and creative expression.
starting with Gathering Light by Joy Harjo and illustrated by Mankishig Powus-Steckley.
In this reflective narrative, former U.S. poet laureate Harjo, a member of the Muskegee Nation, and Asinahabi artist Powus-Steckley portray an indigenous custom of going out at sunrise to greet the day, to respect, to honor.
Saturated digitally painted illustrations depict an indigenous child heading into a wood, where, as the sun rises, they gather light into your hands.
Breathe it deep into your being.
Say thank you in the language that speaks your heart best.
Subsequent lines describe a practice of noticing the quality of the light and asking that it bless both loved ones and the child's individual actions.
As the sun reaches its highest point, the lilting second-person text shifts to the work of understanding and embracing one's connection with light and other beings, and as day transitions toward sundown, of letting go.
Caldecott honoree Myers delivers a luminous visual love letter to black childhood and New York City with a stunning wordless picture book that follows five kids bicycling around the boroughs.
Lighted and photographed stained glass windows comprise each intricate scene, laying vibrant colors that make every page glow with expressive life.
As the brown-skinned companions meet up and ride from landmark to landmark in one remarkable vertical spread across the Brooklyn Bridge, their nocturnal adventure is clearly filled with joyful freedom of movement.
The city itself becomes both backdrop and character in scenes that reflect the children's sense of belonging and camaraderie.
After the kids pause at a bodega where one buys a toy from a coin vending machine, late spreads show the figures becoming one with the city's skyline as sunrise hues streak the sky.
A pleasure to linger over, this polished, freewheeling portrait of children exploring, laughing, roaming, and fully inhabiting this locale also celebrates the city that an author's note calls a sacred place.
Backmatter includes more about the collaboration behind the images, and this book is recommended for ages 4 to 8.
Lowry pens an arresting dystopian novel that chronicles a tween discovering a cache of books and the startling truths they unearth about her tyrannical society.
In 2099, 14-year-old Tessa mourns the loss of her twin brother, Theo, who vanished without a trace two months ago.
She finds comfort in her relationship with her 135-year-old neighbor, Miriam, who is being involuntarily relocated to a retirement home.
Before Miriam's departure, she gives Tessa a key to a secret closet that contains contraband unfamiliar to Tessa, a baseball mitt, a newspaper, and, most surprisingly, books, which were declared illegal a long, long time ago by their community's despotic leader and largely locked away in Storage Building 903, where they await destruction.
Tessa, astonished and delighted by the images that the texts inspire within her mind, eagerly shares her findings with her parents, and as the family clandestinely discusses the extraordinary items, her father reveals that he gave Theo a book before he went missing, leading Tessa to believe that the object is connected to Theo's disappearance.
Crescent worldbuilding conjures a hyper-surveillance state that mirrors contemporary attitudes surrounding censorship and control.
It's a haunting contemporary tale about a grim future deprived of storytelling and creative expression.
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