Books

As a child in Georgia, Alma Thomas loved to spend time outside, soaking up the colors around her. Despite the limitations and racial injustices they faced, her parents filled their home with color and creativity. After the family moved to Washington DC, Alma shared her passion for art by teaching children. When she was almost seventy years old, she focused on her own artwork, inspired by nature and space travel, new at the time. She became the first Black woman  to have a solo exhibition at the Whitney Museum in New York City and the first Black woman to have her work chosen for the White House collection. With her bold and vibrant abstract paintings, Alma set the world ablaze with color.

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The bold story of Maya Lin, the visionary artist-architect who designed the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

As a child, Maya Lin loved to study the spaces around her. She explored the forest in her backyard, observing woodland creatures, and used her house as a model to build tiny towns out of paper and scraps. The daughter of a clay artist and a poet, Maya grew up with art and learned to think with her hands as well as her mind. From her first experiments with light and lines to the height of her success nationwide, this is the story of an inspiring American artist.

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As a young boy growing up in North Carolina, Romare Bearden listened to his great-grandmother’s Cherokee stories and heard the whistle of the train that took his people to the North—people who wanted to be free. When Romare boarded that same train, he watched out the window as the world whizzed by. Later he captured those scenes in a famous painting, Watching the Good Trains Go By. Using that painting as inspiration and creating a text influenced by the jazz that Bearden loved, Jeanne Walker Harvey describes the patchwork of daily southern life that Romare saw out the train’s window and the story of his arrival in shimmering New York City.

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A large-format picture book about a bunch of boats found on a busy bay, buoyed by simple, spare, and lyrical text. Inspired by the San Francisco Bay but with universal appeal, the book features a spectacular double-spread gatefold finale showing a boat parade and fireworks glowing against a city backdrop.

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Hawaiian locals and visitors always enjoy spotting endangered Hawaiian monk seals, but Honey Girl is an extra special case. She has raised seven pups, and scientists call her - Super Mom. After Honey Girl is injured by a fishhook, she gets very sick. Scientists and veterinarians work to save Honey Girl until she can be released back to her beach. This true story will have readers captivated to learn more about this endangered species.

Only a few days old when found orphaned, he is cared for and raised at The Marine Mammal Center in Sausalito, California. When big enough to be released to the wild where he needs to be, he has other plans! Astro keeps swimming back towards the Center, crossing miles of open ocean water to do so. After several attempts, people realize that Astro is too accustomed to humans and will just keep coming back. Based on real events, readers follow Astro through his travels that have now taken him to his current home at the Mystic Aquarium in Connecticut.