Summer of Discovery -- Our Connected World

From National Book Award nominee Mitali Perkins comes a sweet and innovative picture book about a first-generation immigrant child living in America.

All her life, Edie has known that her mom was adopted by a white couple. So, no matter how curious she might be about her Native American heritage, Edie is sure her family doesn’t have any answers. Until the day when she and her friends discover a box hidden in the attic—a box full of letters signed “Love, Edith,” and photos of a woman who looks just like her. Suddenly, Edie has a flurry of new questions about this woman who shares her name....

Yumi and her grandmother really want to see each other, but when they both set out from their homes at the same time they keep missing each other.

In this picture book, a boy writes a letter to an imagined alien, explaining all the things he will need to know about Earth and the people who live here--and adding a postscript asking what the alien might look like.

Three children from other countries (Somalia, Guatemala, and Korea) struggle to adjust to their new home and school in the United States.

Through a series of poems, a young girl chronicles the life-changing year of 1975, when she, her mother, and her brothers leave Vietnam and resettle in Alabama.

Lola was just a baby when her family left the Island, so when she has to draw it for a school assignment, she asks her family, friends, and neighbors about their memories of her homeland...and in the process, comes up with a new way of understanding her own heritage.

"Little Mazie wants the freedom to stay up late, but her father explains what freedom really means in the story of Juneteenth, and how her ancestors celebrated their true freedom." -- SkyRiver

"Inspired by Amnesty International's letter-writing campaigns to help free people who have been jailed for expressing their opinion, [this nearly wordless] book tells the story of a man who is arrested during a peaceful protest. In solitary confinement, he begins to despair--until a bird delivers a letter of support written by somebody outside the prison. Every day more missives arrive until the prisoner escapes his fate on wings made of letters"--Amazon.com....

Before her father leaves for a long trip Lilla gives him a sunflower seed, and after seasons pass she receives letters from families with photos of their loved ones with sunflowers, teaching Lilla that her gift to her father brightened others' lives.