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Hold Them Close: A Love Letter to Black Children by Jamilah Thompkins-Bigelow, Patrick Dougher
lattelibrarian's review
5.0
"When happy things come to you, hold them close and never let go."
An absolutely stunning feat of a picture book. From a poem that Thompkins-Bigelow wrote, Dougher and Shabazz created beautiful and dazzling photography-collage illustrations comprised of photography, newspaper clippings, origami paper, and more. The patterns, the bright colors, the monochrome of the photographs all come together to create something both eye-catching and simultaneously modern and historic. Thompkins-Bigelow references Martin Luther King Jr., Assata Shakur, Malcolm X, and others in her text, and in their illustrations, Dougher and Shabazz reference police brutality, stoops, names of victims, evidence of a strong and resilient history.
Read this book. Read it to your kids. Recommend it. You won't regret it.
An absolutely stunning feat of a picture book. From a poem that Thompkins-Bigelow wrote, Dougher and Shabazz created beautiful and dazzling photography-collage illustrations comprised of photography, newspaper clippings, origami paper, and more. The patterns, the bright colors, the monochrome of the photographs all come together to create something both eye-catching and simultaneously modern and historic. Thompkins-Bigelow references Martin Luther King Jr., Assata Shakur, Malcolm X, and others in her text, and in their illustrations, Dougher and Shabazz reference police brutality, stoops, names of victims, evidence of a strong and resilient history.
Read this book. Read it to your kids. Recommend it. You won't regret it.
id_rather_be_reading_'s review
inspiring
medium-paced
5.0
A missive for every Black child everywhere. Jamilah Thompkins-Bigelow shares a profound message with little Black boys and girls reminding them to hold onto all that is good and right in this world whenever they can; to seek out the love and wisdom of the elders and to lean into the resilience that is their birthright when sadness becomes too much. The photography and artwork are so beautifully aligned with the author's words that it is hard to imagine that this work could have been produced in any other way but this one...the prose and art are perfectly matched. It's a gorgeous book that anyone who loves Black children should own and read to them over and over again.
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