Patricia Hruby Powell

Author, Storyteller, Dancer

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“Brownstone” by Samuel Teer and Mar Julia

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Fourteen-year-old Alumdena gets dropped off by her white mother at the fixer-upper house of her Guatemalan father in Brooklyn, so her mom can take a vacation, in the graphic novel, “Brownstone” (Versify 2024) by Samuel Teer and Mar Julia. Alumdena’s father, Xavier, seems happy to see her, but she doesn’t even know him. The house is a dump, he speaks rapid-fire Spanish, a language she doesn’t know, and he expects her to help fix the house.

 

The teen hears her father saying “Spanish sounding stuff,” but then she gets to slam a crowbar into the wall to tear off the plaster down to the brick. Maybe this won’t be completely bad, after all. She learns the word “bonito” and “cuidoso.” She’s left alone in the basement, but Isolda comes to the rescue to translate and offer information about her Guatemalan heritage. Our teen, about to turn fifteen, isn’t interested. And Isolda seems a little too close to her father.

 

After sleeping on the floor, Almudena, hungry, finds no food in the refrigerator. She makes her way to the bodega and buys donuts, gives one to the homeless guy, and dodges a crazy man on the street. Lorena brings by chile relleno for breakfast.

 

Emotions fly. Dad is angry that she went out on her own, the two grown women are jealous of each other. But everyone is kind and warm to Alumdena. Still, she quips, “Helloooo? Child with power tools here?” It’s hard not to like Alumdena.

 

She and her dad laugh over their body odor. Our girl goes to the laundromat and burns all of their clothes in the dryer. Practically all the players turn out to be related, including the bodega man. It’s like one big family. But now she has to wear a hand-me-down dress. A dress?!

 

Alumdena repurposes the dress and everything else they’ve given her, to make a scrappy but hip fashion statement. They name her “Off-Brand,” she continues to grimace, but maybe a little less so. It turns out Xavier helps everyone in the hood and is fixing this building to offer affordable housing for their community.

 

Gradually Alumdena, with the neighbors’ help and encouragement learns more and more Spanish, as more and more Spanish appears in the speech bubbles. She allows the group to dress her in a yellow gown for her quinceañera, her 15th birthday and coming-of-age party. We are all falling in love with this Hispanic community. And just before her mother returns at the end of the summer we hear the story of Alumdena’s origin. It’s a good one.

 

They will all become an extended family including the crazy man on the street, who rescues Alumdena when she gets lost.

 

This is a must-read, feel-good (eventually) coming-of-age story and the winner of the prestigious 2025 Printz Award.

 

 

Patricia Hruby Powell is the author of the award-winning books: Josephine; Lift As You Climb; Loving vs Virginia; and Struttin’With Some Barbecue all signed and for sale at Jane Addams bookstore. Her forthcoming books are about women’s suffrage, Martha Graham, and Ella Fitzgerald, as well as waterfowl. talesforallages.com

 

 

“Run Away With Me” by Brian Selznick

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A 16-year-old boy roams the streets of 1986 Rome while his mother works as an antique book restorer in “Run Away With Me” (Scholastic 2025) by Brian Selznick. First the boy sees a shadow, then a voice, then a beautiful Italian boy who looks like the statues of angels all over Rome.

 

As is true of all Selznick’s stories (“The Invention of Hugo Cabret” which was made into the movie, “Hugo”), they exist in a state of dreaminess. The first 100 pages of this one are his magnificent hatch drawings of Rome’s architecture, statuary, and of the boys. For quite a while I wondered if the Italian boy was an imagined character.

 

The Italian boy names our character “Danny” and Danny names his friend “Angelo.” We do not discover their real names until the end of the book. Angelo knows the city and tells stories of its vast history as they visit the places we’ve seen in the drawings. Clearly, they’re falling in love, and this is one of the most beautiful books about new love that I’ve ever read. All the time, the reader is falling in love with Rome.

 

One of the many intriguing facts is learning that there’s an underground river that feeds all the fountains of Rome.

 

Danny knows his time in Rome is limited and he’s counting the days. Angelo tells stories of the twins, Romulus and Remus, brothers raised by wolves, and the mythical founders of Rome. There are stories about Dante and his helper who sculpted the elephant on the top of an obelisk, which the boys are drawn to.

 

A wonderful passage hints at the lonely itinerant life Danny shares with his mother. “But she and I had come to Rome, a map had appeared, which led me through a crack in the world into another universe, and even though there was a time limit to the invisible passport I’d been issued, I was happy. The one thing I was unable to imagine was bringing these two dimensions together.”

 

Each of the stories that Angelo tells and that the two boys explore lead back to the mystery of his mother’s work. Each story arrives at the situation of two men in love with each other and how they navigate society’s restrictions on them. One story from a century ago tells of two men who pose as brothers so that they can live together undetected as gay men. Even in 1986 when this story is set it was much more difficult for two men to love each other openly.

 

The conclusion of the book is told by Selznick’s beautiful illustrations. If that doesn’t lure you to read this book, the end notes are outrageously intriguing. You’ll wish you could have been in Rome when the author was writing this book.

 

Patricia Hruby Powell is the author of the award-winning books: Josephine; Lift As You Climb; Loving vs Virginia; and Struttin’ With Some Barbecue all signed and for sale at Jane Addams bookstore. Her forthcoming books are about women’s suffrage, Martha Graham, and Ella Fitzgerald, as well as waterfowl. talesforallages.com

 

“Louder Than Hunger” by John Schu

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Jake is bullied throughout middle school and responds by wanting to disappear. He develops anorexia nervosa, an eating disorder that effects more girls than boys, but an affliction from which more boys than girls die.

 

This novel in verse, “Louder Than Hunger” (Candlewick 2024), is based on the life of its author, teacher and book ambassador, John Schu, and his middle school experience. There is a lot of bullying at this age and lots of kids suffer as victims. This book might help some kids.

 

Jake shares a love of books and musicals with his grandmother. He’s an outsider, kids laugh at him and whisper about him. These are the same kids that liked him earlier in his school career. It’s so painful, that Jake tries to shrink himself down to nothing, by not eating.

 

Jake says: “The/ negative/ Voice/ inside/ my/ head/ talks/ nonstop. / It/ has/ since/ the/ middle/ of/ seventh/ grade./ It’s/ louder/ than/ the/ hunger/ in/ my/ stomach. / I/ weigh/ myself/ 10/ times/ per/ day./ Then/ 15/ times/ per/ day./ Then/ 20/ times/ per/ day./ The/ lower/ the/ number/ on/ the/ scale/ goes, / the/ bigger/ I/ feel. / The/ bigger/ I/ feel, / the/ less/ I/ eat. / The/ less/ I/ eat, / the/ less/ I/ feel.”

 

He goes in and out of residential treatment facilities to battle his demons. But he resists help from the nurses, his therapist, and other residents. He refuses to eat, nor will he participate in group therapy. But he does write in his journal.

 

The Voice tells him he’s not enough. He listens to music, but it won’t drown out the Voice. And then his beloved grandmother dies, making everything so much worse.

 

But he makes a friend in the facility. He starts to eat, participates in group and listens to his therapist. He begins to improve. He’s doing so well that he gets a day pass. His mother takes him to a musical. He’s so happy at the performance that in his head, he screams back at the Voice, louder than the Voice, telling it to leave him alone. But at a restaurant afterwards, he won’t eat and suffers a setback. Back in the facility he’s fitted with the dreaded feeding tube.

 

Jake has relapses but also moves forward. Writing in his journal helps. He must give himself permission to take up space. But as we near the end of this brave and heartfelt novel, we know that Jake is a survivor—just as Mr. Schu surely is.

 

Get this book into the hands of young readers. It could save a life.

 

 

Patricia Hruby Powell is the author of the award-winning books: Josephine; Lift As You Climb; Loving vs Virginia; and Struttin’ With Some Barbecue all signed and for sale at Jane Addams bookstore. Her forthcoming books are about women’s suffrage, Martha Graham, and Ella Fitzgerald, as well as waterfowl. talesforallages.com

 

“One Big Open Sky” by Lesa Cline-Ransome

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From 1879 Mississippi, Lettie and her impoverished Black family set out for Nebraska in a covered wagon, part of the westward migration in “One Big Open Sky” (Holiday House 2024) by Lesa Cline-Ransome. Her father made the decision to go, as was so often the norm for homesteaders, but Lettie’s mother Sylvia must decide on and prepare the provisions and care for the family of five along the way, even if she doesn’t want to take the journey.

 

Throughout the story, we see what’s different for Black migrants and what is probably the same for white folk. The men are in charge, but are they really? Where does the strength truly lie?

 

The story is told in the voices of three women starting with preteen Lettie. Lettie says, “There was the story before we left/ and the story after/ but the story in between/ is the part that’s the hardest.” The family suffers heart breaking hardships on their trip, as almost every family in the age of Manifest Destiny did.

 

There is discrimination against their all-Black group. They wait, with their covered wagons, for a scheduled ship to take them part of the distance up the Mississippi River, which will relieve them of having to walk every single step of the way.

 

Sylvia, says, “…to see/ the hurt/ of folks standing on the banks/ holding all they had/ hopes/ and dreams/ only to have them/ left behind/ when the ships came again/ and didn’t stop”. The ships never stop so they set out on foot. White men try to steal their mules and oxen, so they have to fight them off to save their families.

 

The third voice is Philomena’s. She is a strong young woman and an orphan, who is traveling alone to take a position as a teacher in Nebraska. Lettie writes an account of the journey and keeps track of what has been spent. Philomena, not that much older than Lettie, and a teacher, can look over her shoulder and help her school-learning. Philomena does the work of a man and becomes essential to the family, and they to her.

 

The story is not without sweet romance. A member of the group, Beau, fancies Philomena who is oblivious, until Sylvia sets her straight.

 

Lettie’s young brothers go out with the father, Thomas, and the men to hunt and fish but usually come back having gathered berries and plants, and only occasionally a rabbit. There are places along the way where supplies can be bought, but Lettie’s family has run very low on funds. Thomas, we realize, wants to be a leader, but makes irresponsible decisions which endanger everyone. And still the womenfolk must back him up.

 

Lettie loves her father deeply but is beginning to see his flaws. Lettie also notes that women cannot vote, but clearly the women in this story are towers of strength and intelligence.

 

Of course, there are the raging rivers that all pioneers had to cross and those are alarmingly dangerous.

 

This wonderful book won the Coretta Scott King Award as well as a Newbery Honor this last year, is a fast, fascinating, and insightful read.

 

 

Patricia Hruby Powell is the author of the award-winning books: Josephine; Lift As You Climb; Loving vs Virginia; and Struttin’ With Some Barbecue all signed and for sale at Jane Addams bookstore. Her forthcoming books are about women’s suffrage, Martha Graham, and Ella Fitzgerald, as well as waterfowl. talesforallages.com

 

“When the Mapou Sings” by Nadine Pinede.

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In exquisite yet accessible poetry, Nadine Pinede tells the story of Lucille’s coming of age in “When the Mapou Sings” (Candlewick 2024). The story is set in 1935 Haiti, when the nation is just emerging from the USA occupation that has lasted from 1915 to 1934. Haiti was first inhabited by the Taino people, then was occupied by Spain in 1496. The eastern half of the island of Hispaniola was ceded to the French in 1697. In 1791 African-born slaves and their descendants revolted against the French and in 1804, Haiti became an independent country ruled by itrs own citizens. But Haiti’s problems weren’t over.

 

Teenaged Lucille claims traces of all these cultures mentioned above.

 

On Lucille’s first day at the Mission School, she befriends beautiful Fifina, who is “drawing a bird/ in red earth with a twig/ from Mapou.” Mapou is the kapok tree, and Lucile is delighted to have befriended Fifina. “We walked back to the classroom/ inside me/ a sunrise.” The two girls soon make plans to start their own school: “We’ll teach girls how to carve, sew, draw, climb trees./ We’ll teach girls the songs of trees, flowers, birds, butterflies, the sun, moon, mountains, clouds.”

 

The mapou tree sings to Lucille, whose mother has died. The girl says, “A mother whose face/ I can’t remember/ and whose songs/ I can’t forget.

 

Their teacher, Sister Gilberte, shows the girls a map of her home—Belgium. She became a nun when her fiancé was killed in World War I. The nun says, “The trouble with love/ is the cracks in your heart/ never mend.”

 

The girls are the same age, but Fifina has matured into a woman sooner than Lucille and one day she disappears. In a dream the mapou tree tells Lucille to go to the village section chief. Something horrible has happened to Fifina at the section chief’s hand, and whereas Lucille doesn’t know exactly what happened, she knows the chief is corrupt and tells him so. This puts her in grave danger.

 

Lucille must leave her home and village. She’s hired as a servant for a wealthy Port-au-Prince woman. Foolishly she falls in love with the woman’s son. The educated young man helps raise Lucille’s consciousness concerning the corruption occurring in Haiti. Having become an activist in the reform movement, Lucille must move again to save herself. All the time she searches for Fifina.

 

Now she works for an America scholar who is doing fieldwork and studying Haitian voodoo and writing a novel. This turns out to be Zora Neal Hurston who is writing Their Eyes Were Watching God. Because of Hurston’s research and their activism, the two women find themselves fighting for their lives and the country of Haiti, all the time Lucille searches for her childhood friend and the man she loves.

 

This story, set in a time and place of important but little-known history, is not only poetry, but it’s a page-turner.

 

 

Patricia Hruby Powell is the author of the award-winning books: Josephine; Lift As You Climb; Loving vs Virginia; and Struttin’ With Some Barbecue all signed and for sale at Jane Addams bookstore. Her forthcoming books are about women’s suffrage, Martha Graham, and Ella Fitzgerald, as well as waterfowl. talesforallages.com

 

“The Ballerina of Auschwitz” by Dr. Edith Eva Eger

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Dr. Edith Eva Eger, in her insightful memoir, “The Ballerina of Auschwitz” (Atheneum 2024) tells us about her Jewish family and her need for love in 1943 Hungary. She says, “I’m the runt of the family, the unwanted child.” Her eldest sister, Klara is a violin prodigy and away in Budapest at the conservatory of music. Magda, next eldest, is the prettiest, and a pianist. Their mother always tells Magda to watch what she eats. But her mother just throws up her hands at the lively Edith.

 

Edith likes her own thirteen-year-old lean and muscular body, suited to dancing and gymnastics although she envies Magda’s curves. Her father, a tailor, tells Edith she’s built for couture and will be the best dressed girl in town. She likes the attention her father bestows on her, but “Like my mother’s it is precious…and precarious. As though my worthiness of their love has less to do with me and more to do with their loneliness.”

 

Edith says of her parents’ love and admiration in general, “Magda and I have to work at getting something we are certain there will never be enough of; Klara has to worry that at any moment she might make a fatal mistake and lose it all.” Edith loves her dance classes and her personal dance improvisations. Dancing is her fantasy world where she can reinvent, enact, and sweeten her parents’ love relationship.

 

One day on the way to class, she loses her school tuition money and fears her father’s anger. “I’m scared, but the fear is more personal. It’s more about something I feel I’ve done wrong.” Soon the gestapo will take the family away and end her relatively simple life.

 

Edith falls in love with gentle Eric. “Our bond isn’t a casual crush, a puppy love. This is love in the face of war.” You are so happy for the young people, but you fear for the young Jewish pair as their love grows deeper and you know what lies ahead. Edith must stop attending her dance classes, because she’s Jewish. These are the laws.

 

Their normal family life, with regular growing pains, ends abruptly when the family is taken away. Klara is away at the conservatory and might be spared the camps, if she can convince the authorities that she’s not Jewish. But the rest of the family arrives at Auschwitz, not understanding what is happening. Edith is asked if her mother is her sister. Not understanding the gravity of the question and how to answer it, she tells the truth. “Mother.” And her mother is sent to the death showers.

 

Edith must live with her hideous, but innocent, betrayal. Eger does not spare us the horrific details of the camp, but we know she survives to write this memoir. And (spoiler) so does Magda. The year after their liberation is almost as traumatic as being in the camp and it is information that is not as densely covered in other books and movies, so especially interesting.

 

This young adult edition of the author’s memoir “The Choice” earned a Young Adult Notable Book from the Association of Jewish Libraries.

 

 

Patricia Hruby Powell is the author of the award-winning books: Josephine; Lift As You Climb; Loving vs Virginia; and Struttin’ With Some Barbecue all signed and for sale at Jane Addams bookstore. Her forthcoming books are about women’s suffrage, Martha Graham, and Ella Fitzgerald, as well as waterfowl. talesforallages.com