These ten volumes are among the favorites in our apartment and nearly sing off the page when read aloud. They are perfect for city kids, honoring their imagination with pictures and notions that look like their world. And they are great for slipping some pro-city propaganda to your suburban niece or nephew.
Uptown by Bryan Collier, Henry Holt & Co., 2004
Collier's moody collage art illustrates the poem-like narration of a little boy who rhapsodizes with pride about his Harlem neighborhood: "Uptown is basketball at the Rucker. Uptown is a Van Der Zee photograph …Uptown is the Apollo Theater." As the boy tours the neighborhood, Collier's textured, detailed collages create a warm, dense backdrop of sidewalks, storefronts and brownstone stoops.
Apt. 3 by Ezra Jack Keats, Puffin, 1999
Jack Keats is deservedly beloved for his 1962 classic "Snowy Day." His other books are just as great. In "Apt 3," two school-aged brothers who live on the upper floors of an apartment building hear a magical sound in the hallway. Curious, they follow the music down a shadow-laden stairway to Apt. 3 where they meet a blind jazzman. It's a lovely lesson about the mystery and potential beauty behind the closed doors of a neighbor.
Dreams by Ezra Jack Keats, Puffin, 2000
Another beautiful Keats story, "Dreams" is sparsely written and illustrated with understated sketches. A little boy and girl with adjoining upper story windows play in the orangey evening light. Soon mothers' voices can be heard throughout the building, sending everyone to bed and snapping off each light. But the boy can't sleep. He leans on his window sill, watching the sleeping neighborhood. When a dog menaces a neighbor's cat, the little boy drops a paper toy. Its tumbling casts a massive shadow that scares off the dog. When morning comes, the apartment building wakes but the hero slumbers on, his window radiating a beautiful swirl of dreamy colors.
Black Cat by Christopher Myers, Scholastic Press, 1999
In this rhythmic, poetic story, a slinky black cat roams across fire escapes and vacant lots, along basketball courts and under parked cars. The cat is clearly a stray, but it sees the city as its playground and is proudly free. Myers illustrations are stylish fabric, newspaper and print collages.
Tar Beach by Faith Ringgold, Dragonfly Books, 1996
The work of African-American quilt artist Faith Ringgold is exhibited at the Guggenheim Museum, displaying a contemporary approach to the folk art story quilts of the antebellum south that told family stories and mapped journeys on the Underground Railroad. "Tar Beach" is narrated by a little girl during the Depression who spends summer nights on the roof of her building near the George Washington Bridge. As her parents and neighbors eat dinner and play cards on a folding table, the girl takes flight, floating over the bridge her steelworker father built, the meeting hall of the union that excludes him because he is Native American and African-American and, for good measure, the ice cream factory.
