04/01/2023
Gr 2–4—Tough topics are handled in a straightforward manner in this series. The authors promote positive body image, antiracism, gender equality, and mental health awareness. Each book ends with a creative activity to demonstrate the readers' new knowledge and asks children to put themselves in the shoes of someone experiencing trauma, such as the death of a loved one or racism. However, the efficacy of the text is somewhat diminished by poor format choices; for example, vocabulary words are yellow on a white page, which creates poor contrast according to ADA recommendations. Additionally, there are other occurrences of text over images that create poor pairings, and some of those images are extremely pixelated. The books include a glossary, an index, and resources. VERDICT Unless the format is improved during the final printing, this series should be skipped in favor of something that can appeal to all readers.
