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Back on that July morning in 1981, the moment my crush told my new friends and me of his finding, my mind raced. I'd stay in my impractical, wraparound skirt. This would give me an excuse to wait below while the others, dressed in shorts and sneakers, performed the impossible feat of climbing the tree. Once there, I made another split-second decision to lift my skirt and expose my mismatched calves. It was either that or admit that I couldn't catch anything more challenging than a balloon in my clumsy hands.

Calculations of this kind were second nature to me. By the time I had language, I'd made an unspoken pact with nearly everyone I encountered. I won't talk about my body's awkwardness and limitations and neither will you.

"What happened to your leg?"

I hated when the pact was broken with questions like that. In grade school, I usually went with the clipped but accurate "Nothing." After all, whatever caused my cerebral palsy occurred long before, during my birth. Also, it didn't happen to my leg, but to the part of my brain that tells that leg to move.

Once, in sixth grade, a friend whispered that another classmate posed the question to her.

"I said you fell off the Empire State Building."

"And she believed you?"

"I don't know, but she changed the subject."

After that, I told that 1,250-foot tall tale a few times myself. Though I'd stolen it, it seemed like a more original and interesting version of my other standby, "None of your beeswax."

My form of cerebral palsy, right hemiplegia, includes among its symptoms numbness along one side of my body. When, at 5 years old, I asked my own first question about it, "Why do I feel more on the left?" my mother had an answer ready. Only it wasn't an answer at all.

"Because your heart is on the left," she said. "Like everyone's."

This memory is clear to me, but there must have been times before that when my parents talked to me about my disability. After all, I knew what I had and what it was called. Cerebral, a long C word like "carnival." Palsy, which sounded a little like "pansy." My disability had a nickname, C.P., and it was why I had to wear a leg brace to bed and visit a physical therapist once a month at a place my parents referred to as the Center.

"It's nothing, barely noticeable," my mother assured me as she helped me with my leg brace at night. I knew she was right, at least compared with some of the kids I saw at the Center whose C.P. was so bad they made strange grunts when they tried to talk and couldn't walk at all. At the same time, I knew we were alike, those kids and I, in some deep, undeniable way. The only thing that separated us was luck, a tiny L word that, like "life" and "love," was somehow big enough to make all the difference in the world.

As a child trying to understand something about living in my body and in our community, neither of my mother's explanations was of much use. I don't say this to fault my mother. She grew up, as most of us did, being told not to point or to stare or to ask questions when it came to ways that people differ. This is where that pact of silence originates, from our attempt to be thoughtful and careful with one another. Now more than ever, while the emotionally delayed bully who inhabits our highest office models baiting, cruelty and mockery instead, every attempt at kindness is essential.

But where does that leave me, and others like me, as we tiptoe around the sensitive subject of our otherness? For a long time, I felt unsure not only of how to talk about my disability but even how to think about it. Its meaning was slippery and ever-changing. When I was little it meant I couldn't roller skate or run like the other kids. In my teens and early 20s, it was the flaw that made me less attractive than my friends. When, at 25, I became involved with a handsome, able, but very difficult man, disability was the scrim through which he looked like my one chance at love.

We married and had a child, and as I struggled with the physically demanding tasks involved in caring for a newborn, my disability revealed itself for what it was all along - a set of specific limitations that required modifications, creativity and, more often than I was comfortable with, that I ask for help. That first year of parenting was among the hardest I've lived through, and the most humbling. At the same time, it was what finally led me into an authentic relationship with my body, one based on what I needed to accomplish rather than how I was perceived.

Through it all, I was writing. But it would be several more years before I began to explore disability in my work.

What am I trying to say? What is this poem, essay, chapter about? What details belong in the piece and what's extraneous? These are among the questions all writers ask ourselves as we stare at the blinking cursors on our computer screens. When it comes to how relevant my cerebral palsy is to a given piece, the question can seem even more complex.

"Would I have to be disabled on every page?" I asked a friend who is also a literary agent when she suggested I write a memoir on mothering with a disability. The question, in its muddled state, made us laugh. But what I was trying to ascertain was whether the narrator - the "me" on the page - had to be thinking about cerebral palsy in every scene of her story when, in life, this was far from true.

Over time I discovered a more useful line of inquiry as I wrote. Would details about my disability not only expand this passage but also deepen it? Would they bring forth something I'd yet to articulate, perhaps didn't even know I knew?

The page is where I finally came to understand my own body and its evolving narrative, where I continue to learn when my disability informs a particular dynamic and when it's beside the point.

Eventually, I rewrote the poem about the morning of the apricots, and it was only then that I realized how lonely I'd been, even among friends I nearly worshiped. After all, there was this important aspect not just of my experience, but of my very being, that I didn't think I could share with anyone.

"Do something with your brokenness," David Hernandez urges in his poem "Sincerely the Sky."

It's a call to all of us, since everyone is broken in places if we're to tell the whole story. And especially in these factious times, telling the whole of our stories, whether on the page or in the flesh, gives us the best chance we have to truly connect.

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Back on that July morning in 1981, the moment my crush told my new friends and me of his finding, my mind raced. I'd stay in my impractical, wraparound skirt. This would give me an excuse to wait below while the others, dressed in shorts and sneakers, performed the impossible feat of climbing the tree.

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Leigh Bardugo is one of the bigger names in young adult fantasy, having penned a trilogy and a duology in the Grishaverse, the magical world inspired by Russian folklore, as well as a Wonder Woman novel and a recently-released book of short stories also set in the Grishaverse.

In addition to being a masterful teller of tales through writing, she is funny, bold, and wise in her speaking. The kind of person who would recognize a random interviewer's name on the book she was to sign and give her a hug. (Yes, the random interviewer was me, and no I'm not over it yet! Leigh Bardugo gave me a hug!)

I say this because it's important to know that Leigh isn't just an incredible writer; she's also an incredible person, not least because she writes very diverse stories that give readers the gift of representation. I was honored to have the chance to chat with her and get to know a little more about her background, as well as why specifically she writes about disability (it's personal), and some of her dream writing projects.
Why do you write books for young adults?
I'm very proud to be a young adult author, but I write the stories that interest me and sometimes they're for that audience and sometimes they're not. Young adult narratives frequently focus on moments of radical upheaval, transition, figuring out who you are in the world. I think that's why they resonate with so many readers regardless of age, and it's a big reason I'm so drawn to telling those stories.
Why do you feel it's important to write books, specifically books for teens, about people with disabilities?
Because romance, adventure, and heroism don't just belong to the able-bodied.
How do you think it might be empowering to a disabled teen to see a character like Kaz Brekker kicking ass while walking with a cane?
I don't know if it is. I hope it is. In fiction, disability is too often used as part of a character's tragic backstory, the moment they became "broken" or embittered, or the thing that they oh-so-nobly endure. Kaz has plenty of things to get over, but his disability isn't one of them.
I know part of the reason you write about disability is because you live with pain, and I believe I read somewhere there was a degenerative condition; what is it like to write about something so personal but in a fictional setting?
I live with chronic pain and there are days when it feels like it's all that I am, but I'm always surprised at the things that creep out on the page. I see a lot of my anger in Kaz, but I also see the peace I've made with at least some facets of my disability. When he talks to Wylan about shame, that's very much me talking to my readers and saying you don't have to be ruled or defined by something others have told you is a weakness...Kaz is probably the closest thing I'll ever write to wish-fulfillment and there's no question that writing him made me see myself and my cane differently. He gave me the gift of swagger.
What is one piece of advice or word of hope you would give to someone living with a disability about their own future and success, as someone who is achieving success herself?
That's so hard. I live with a disability but I know others cope with a lot more pain and more severe mobility issues, so I don't want to sit here and dish out platitudes. I guess I would just say build your army. Find people who value you and see your strength. Lean on them and let them lean on you. It's still hard for me to ask for help. I still have days when I push through instead of just saying, "No, I can't." You do the best you can in the moment and that's all you can ask of yourself.
What would be (or has been) your dream writing project?
We've been talking about the possibility of illustrated folk tales since I wrote "The Witch of Duva" in 2012. But a collection like this takes so much work and time, I never really thought it would happen. Then a year and a half ago, I got on twitter and just straight up asked if readers would be interested in a book like this, and the response was incredible. So corny as it may sound, The Language of Thorns is very much a dream project and my readers were a big part of making it happen.
Where would you like to see the rest of your writing career go?
Oh god, please don't tell me I'm supposed to have a plan. How about... Keep writing books, take on projects that scare me, maybe start a cult?

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If Leigh Bardugo Is Starting A Cult, Sign Me Up!

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Leigh Bardugo is one of the bigger names in young adult fantasy, having penned a trilogy and a duology in the Grishaverse, the magical world inspired by Russian folklore, as well as a Wonder Woman novel and a recently-released book of short stories also set in the Grishaverse.

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As a mother of biracial kids, I am always on the look out for biracial representation in children's literature. According to a report by the Pew Center, the share of newlyweds married to a spouse of a different race or ethnicity has increased more than five times - from 3 percent in 1967, to 17 percent in 2015.

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How accurate does it need to be?

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Mike Moody first picked up R.J. Palacio's novel Wonder at the age of 21 and immediately connected with Auggie, the young protagonist.

Moody was born with Crouzon syndrome, a craniofacial disorder similar to Auggie's. A UK-based write r, Moody was impressed with Palacio's ability to create a character with Auggie's condition "so truthfully," she said by email.

The movie is another matter. Released by Lionsgate on November 17, Wonder stars 11-year-old Jacob Tremblay as Auggie and Julia Roberts and Owen Wilson as his parents. Not all are excited about the on-screen adaptation of the best-selling book. Moody isn't happy that the producers made Tremblay appear disfigured, instead of hiring an actor who is.

"The film just seems to hop on the bandwagon of disability. It's 'inspiration porn', the same driven by films like The Theory of Everything -films that treat disability as a costume," she said. "That kind of attitude permeates through the films to the audience. Actors who portray disabled people are revered, and disabled people (especially actors) are ignored."

Writing Wonder, Palacio left the specifics of Auggie's face vague. His condition, thought by some to be Treacher Collins syndrome but never explicitly described, is characterized by facial differences that can be expressed around the eyes, ears, nose, and jawbone. Children born with the syndrome often undergo multiple painful reconstructive surgeries to improve breathing and other health issues.

Educator Laura Jiménez thinks that Tremblay may have been made up to soften the visual impact of what someone with a craniofacial condition can look like-and to make viewers without the disability feel more comfortable.

Disability made "more palatable"

"That comfort is not for people who have cranial facial deformities," says Jiménez, a lecturer on literacy at Boston University who specializes in reading comprehension and motivation in children. "The comfort is to make that disability more palatable."

Kayla Whaley, senior editor of website Disability in Kidlit, believes that decisions about disabled characters' appearance often reflect an ableist point of view, a social prejudice where people with disabilities are seen as less-than, which permeates books and movies.

"When that media collectively portrays disabled characters in a handful of ableist ways, that ableism is bound to crop up again and again," Whaley says.

Jiménez says that casting an actor with a craniofacial condition could have brought a level of authenticity to the role. She points to precedents including the character JJ in ABC's comedy Speechless, played by actor Micah Fowler, who has cerebral palsy, as does JJ in the series.

"He is not non-verbal, but he can reflect and bring that authenticity to the character," Jiménez says. "It probably is difficult for the cast and crew to make the set accessible to him, and yet they do it."

"Disfigurement is not a mask," adds Moody. "We can't take our faces off at the end of the day. There are many young disfigured actors who would jump at the chance to portray [Auggie]."

Wonder producers David Hoberman and Todd Lieberman considered hiring an actor with a craniofacial condition, they said in a statement to SLJ from Lionsgate.

"We looked at children in and out of the craniofacial community and non-actors across the country to play Auggie," they said. "Jacob Tremblay is a once-in-a-generation talent, and we all felt that he was the best creative choice for the film. We're thrilled to have met so many beautiful and supportive people within the craniofacial community throughout this process and are humbled by their incredible support of the movie."

Palacio did not have input in the casting, but the filmmakers' choices mirror the essence of her story, she said in a separate statement to SLJ.

"While I wasn't involved in that creative decision, I believe the movie captures the spirit of the book with great poignancy and tenderness," Palacio said. "It is a compassionate, beautiful movie about the power of kindness."

That sentiment relates a campaign connected to the book and film, Choose Kind, to combat bullying and foster empathy. Choose Kind resources and activities are available for teachers and librarians, with downloadable stickers and posters and suggestions for hosting a community event. A teacher toolkit is also available.

Moody says that such initiatives "[force] marginalised (sic) people to be ever gracious and polite in the face of people who ignore, mock, or vilify us.

Meanwhile, students in Illinois, New Jersey, and across the country have been embracing Choose Kind and its antibullying message.

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Critics Question the Representation of Disability in 'Wonder'

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Mike Moody first picked up R.J. Palacio's novel Wonder at the age of 21 and immediately connected with Auggie, the young protagonist. Moody was born with Crouzon syndrome, a craniofacial disorder similar to Auggie's. A UK-based write r, Moody was impressed with Palacio's ability to create a character with Auggie's condition "so truthfully," she said by email.

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Biggest African American Children's Bookstore - EyeSeeMe

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Discover the largest collection of great African American books for children in United States at Eye See Me. Browse top 10 African American books today!

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Author Axie Oh credits her interest in Korean culture and history to what some might consider an unlikely source: the community that surrounds K-pop fandom.

"K-pop culture is really intense. It's not just the music, it's the fandom and the music videos and the shows where people discuss the lives of the idols," Oh told NBC News. "One of my favorite things to do when I was young was watch the performances and the dances. That actually showed me a lot of what Korean culture was like."

That connection, Oh noted, was a particularly important one to her because she did not grow up hearing or speaking Korean at home except through music and Korean dramas. She incorporated a lot of what she picked up from the world of K-pop (including adding a character who is a K-pop idol) into her debut young adult (YA) novel "Rebel Seoul," which is scheduled to be released on Sept. 14.

While the 28-year-old describes the book as "a YA sci-fi adventure romance with giant robots," it also has a deep connection to her studies in Korean history and the works Oh read while doing her undergraduate degree in East Asian studies.

"Even though it's set in the future I use a lot of themes related to 1930s colonialism in Korea," she said. "I studied manuscripts that were written after that period that were reflecting on the history of Korea and the pressure of colonialism brought into the 1960s and 1970s. So I was watching these Korean dramas [for fun] and actually studying the events in history. They were all they are all about nationalism and they are all about preserving culture and preserving history."

"Rebel Seoul" tells the story of Jaewon, a Korean teen who is alone in the world until he is conscripted into the military in the year 2199. In Jaewon's world, China, Japan, and Korea no longer exist as separate countries but as part of the Neo Council, a conglomerate made up of the former nations.

"I read a lot [while studying Korean history] about freedom fighters trying to figure out how to return to their culture," Oh said, noting that people were forbidden from speaking in Korean during Japanese rule in the 1930s. "That really inspired me when I was writing my sci-fi novel."

While Oh said she always knew she wanted to write a futuristic novel featuring Asian teens, she was worried that it would never find the right audience in the world of publishing. "There wasn't that much sci-fi YA when I was growing up, in terms of books that were set in East Asia or set in Asia at all," she said. "I didn't have any markers or any books to help influence me."

Instead, she devoured books by authors like Philip Pullman and JK Rowling as a teen and did her MFA in writing for young people at Lesley University in Massachusetts.

She also began attending conferences for authors. It was at a conference hosted by the American Library Association that she learned of the New Visions Award for Writers of Color, a competition sponsored by Lee and Low Books that seeks middle grade and YA novel.

"One of the reasons I applied for the New Visions Award was because they had put out a short story anthology called 'Diverse Energies,' which is all short stories by different authors," Oh explained.

It was there that Oh read "Blue Skies" by fellow sci-fi author Cindy Pon. "It is a YA set in Taiwan and I had never read a short [YA science fiction] story set in a different country," she said. "So I was like 'It can be done.'"

Pon would go on to mentor Oh and praise "Rebel Seoul" in a blurb that appears on the book's cover. Experiences like that one are also why Oh has become an outspoken advocate for the need for diverse books in YA literature.

"I had a lot of books but not necessary ones with characters that looked like me or with direct experiences like mine either," she said. "A very strong factor was even why I was able to finish 'Rebel Seoul' was that there was this story that I read and I loved it so much. I knew [then that 'Rebel Seoul'] would connect with someone else."
Follow NBC Asian America on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Tumblr.

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How K-pop and Korean history helped this author write her debut novel

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Author Axie Oh credits her interest in Korean culture and history to what some might consider an unlikely source: the community that surrounds K-pop fandom. "K-pop culture is really intense. It's not just the music, it's the fandom and the music videos and the shows where people discuss the lives of the idols," Oh told NBC News.

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Why mirror and window books are important for young readers

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Why mirror and window books are important for young readers

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Guest blogger Katie Cunningham is an Assistant Professor at Manhattanville College. Her teaching and scholarship centers around children's literature, critical literacy, and supporting teachers to make their classrooms joyful and purposeful. Katie has presented at numerous national conferences and is the editor of The Language and Literacy Spectrum, New York Reading Association's literacy journal.

When we lived in Brooklyn, I knew my sons were growing up in a diverse community. They understood that people have different skin colors. That people speak different languages. That people eat different foods. That people believe different things. That we all share a common humanity. That life is full of complexity.

Now we live in the woods and appreciate the quiet of country living but this is far from a diverse community. For my boys, there is greater diversity in the pages of a book than on the streets of their town. Multicultural children's literature is a doorway into greater understanding that their cultural background is not the only cultural background. That their way of speaking is not the only way of speaking. That their point of view is not shared by everyone.

When we open a book and start to read a story, we use our imaginations to walk through whatever world the author has created. Children's literature is full of stories about boys and girls that look like my children. Rudine Sims Bishop uses the terms mirror books and window books to describe how we both see ourselves and see others when we read literature. The characters my sons encounter are often mirrors and they find their life experiences reflected in the books they read. Children from dominant social groups have always found their mirrors in books, but do they have enough access to high-quality stories that represent other cultural backgrounds in a positive way?

My sons need more than mirror books. As I scan our reading shelves at home I know we can do better. When I walk into many classrooms, I know they too can do better. My sons and all children need books that provide windows into other life experiences to understand the diverse world we live in and to build connections to all other humans. After all, when the lighting is just right can't a window become a mirror?

My friend, colleague, and global literacy leader Pam Allyn takes Charlotte's Web with her when she travels to Lit Clubs in Kenya, Haiti, and South Korea. She takes Charlotte's Web because even though the children she meets do not look like or speak like Fern, there is a shared humanity in E. B. White's words that is unparalleled, and all children can find a mirror in Fern's courageous spirit. Pam has created Lit Clubs and Lit Camps through her organization LitWorld that emphasize the human strengths found in stories. Imagine if all the stories we read with children were framed around human strengths? What strengths would you choose?

Of course, stories also help us understand that the world we live in is not what it should be. Stories can help young children understand that racism very much exists in this country, and that power is unequally distributed based on race, class, and gender. For children from dominant groups, window moments in stories come when the children realize they hold a powerful place in society and that there is something unjust about this. Two stories that center on human strength and offer powerful mirror/window possibilities for children are Baseball Saved Us by Ken Mochizuki and Seeds of Change: Planting a Path to Peace by Jen Cullerton Johnson. Baseball Saved Us is about an underdog believing in himself and the strength that comes from confidence, but it also tells about an ugly chapter in United States history when Japanese Americans were sent to internment camps during World War II. Seeds of Change is a story of perseverance in the face of political opposition and bias against women. It is also about respecting nature and the power of collective action to change a landscape and the sustainability of a nation. There are many more such stories. Yet, are we reading them to children at home and in our classrooms?

President Obama in his Second Inaugural Address emphasized the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. when he said, "our individual freedom is inextricably bound to the freedom of every soul on Earth." Stories can help children realize this. Isn't a sense of social justice something we want all children to develop? Through the thoughtful selection of books we read to our children we take a step toward creating adults who desire a world that is better than the one we live in today.

So, parents and teachers, what can you do?

Acknowledge that every story has mirror and window possibilities

Emphasize that we live in a diverse society

Arm students with stories where their background is represented in a positive light and where their life experiences are validated

Discuss themes in stories to unpack mirror possibilities for all children

Read aloud stories that represent positive aspects of the human spirit and where characters rally together for collective action

Be open to discussions of inequality that you see in stories and in life; discuss with children a vision for a better world

Look for links to literacy standards such as the Common Core State Standards Reading Literature Standard 6 across grade levels; this is a strand of standards that emphasizes point of view

Further reading:
What's in your classroom library? Rethinking Common Core recommended texts A More Diverse Appendix B

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"What does this book have to do with me?" Why Mirror and Window Books Are Important for All Readers

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Guest blogger Katie Cunningham is an Assistant Professor at Manhattanville College. Her teaching and scholarship centers around children's literature, critical literacy, and supporting teachers to make their classrooms joyful and purposeful. Katie has presented at numerous national conferences and is the editor of The Language and Literacy Spectrum, New York Reading Association's literacy journal.

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Daniel Vandever is writing children's books Native kids can see themselves in

In an analysis of picture books only, that number shrinks to .3 percent, or three out of 1,030. That's fewer books depicting Native Americans than those featuring talking bears (27), talking dinosaurs (15), talking penguins (six) and talking robots (four).

"It's not just animals, but also talking trucks and talking trains," said K.T. Horning, director of the Cooperative Children's Book Center, which annually collects and publishes data about the subjects of children's books and authors' ethnicity. "Last year there was a book about a talking carton of milk, a book about the letter E. There are more books about talking or personified objects than there are about Native people."

By contrast, more than 70 percent of children's books published by major presses are written by white authors and depict white characters. That means most Native children are learning to read with books that do not portray Native characters-or even other people of color.

It's an oversight that can cause children to shun books or even question their own identities, said Debbie Reese , founder of American Indians in Children's Literature , a blog that analyzes and critiques Indigenous Peoples in children's books and young adult books.

"What you see in books matters," said Reese, a member of the Nambe Pueblo. "If you like reading and you see yourself in books, you know that you matter. On the flip side, if you never see yourself in books, or if you see negative stereotypes of yourself, you disengage because it's not meeting your needs."

Navajo author Daniel Vandever, of Haystack, New Mexico, arrived at the same conclusions before writing and illustrating his first book, "Fall in Line, Holden!" published this year by Salina Bookshelf . The book follows Holden, a young Navajo boy, through a day at boarding school where he expected to conform to rigid behaviors, stay inside the lines and follow the rules.

But Holden, who is constantly reminded to "fall in line," can't stop his imagination from transforming his bleak environment into one filled with wonder. As he progresses through the school day, Holden's carefree spirit begins to influence the other students.

Vandever, 30, said he wanted to write a book for his nephew that accurately portrayed Navajo characters and told a story rooted in history. He spent six years writing and illustrating the book, which depicts Holden sporting a tsiiyéé (traditional hair bun), but dressed in modern attire and having very contemporary daydreams.

"All of this started with me wanting to tell a story for my nephew," Vandever said. "I think every kid deserves something they can identify with, something to relate to. Every kid should be able to see themselves in a book."

"By writing about boarding schools, I'm telling my father's story," Vandever said. "But it's also the story of an entire generation, and my family was impacted by it. I think it's crucial to start conversations about what happened."

"As a second-grader in Missouri, I really saw a lot of false representations of who I was supposed to be," he said. "So I shielded my identity, stifled my creativity, and this led to inner conflict. It really limited how I saw myself."

Vandever found sanctuary in the library, where he immersed himself in Dr. Seuss and Shel Silverstein. He also sang traditional Navajo songs and repeated stories from his grandparents.

But Vandever never let go of his imagination, or his love of children's literature. When he began writing "Fall in Line, Holden!" he hoped it would appeal to both children and adults.

"I wanted my nephew to understand the value of creativity and free-thinking," he said. "But children's books are for everyone, and they can be just as impactful as other books, and even more intimate. Even in their simplicity, children's books can bring everyone to the table for some kind of discussion or understanding."

Vandever's book offers an authentic Native voice in an industry where the quantity of books about Native Americans is low and the quality is, perhaps, even lower, Horning said. The Cooperative Children's Book Center, which began counting children's books about Africans in 1985, added three more minority groups in 1994: Asian, Latino and Native.

Historically, the center has found that books written about Native Americans by non-Native authors were problematic, Horning said. Books commonly revealed an ignorance of separate Native nations and often perpetuated erroneous stereotypes.

"When we look at our numbers over time, the books by Native authors and illustrators have always been a relatively small number," she said. "I can't tell you how many aspiring authors are still writing about a 'little Indian girl.'"

"Daniel is so important in the overall context of children's books," she said. "In this book, Native children can see themselves, and children from the outside can get a more realistic picture of what life is like."

The Cooperative Children's Book Center counts books from major commercial publishers, where most of the problematic books originate. It doesn't regularly receive books from small, independent or tribal presses.

Small presses are much better at producing quality books about Native Americans, Reese said. Because small publishers they lack funding and publicity, however, those books don't often

appear in libraries or schools where they would have the biggest impact.

"The big presses are still publishing books of questionable quality that are biased and stereotypical," Reese said. "We're still getting problematic books every year, published by big publishers and written by privileged authors who don't know what they're talking about."

By contrast, good books by Native authors can help "unwrite myths," Reese said. She reviewed Vandever's book on her blog and said its "Native accuracy" made her heart swell.

"If you're going to see Natives in a book, they'll be wearing feathers and skins and fringe," she said. "In Daniel's book, we get realistic stuff, but we also get playful. He talks about school being rigid, and then he blows it out of the water. He talks about falling in line, but he steps way out of the lines in his book."

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Native Representation in Children's Books Is Lacking; Native Author Steps Up - Indian Country Media Network

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Daniel Vandever is writing children's books Native kids can see themselves in In an analysis of picture books only, that number shrinks to .3 percent, or three out of 1,030. That's fewer books depicting Native Americans than those featuring talking bears (27), talking dinosaurs (15), talking penguins (six) and talking robots (four).

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Why aren't there more books about diverse characters

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1) Why do you think there's such a dearth of diverse children's books?
In a couple of words: white supremacy. The fact that there are more books published about animals than about black kids says a lot, not only about our society, but about "Western" sensibilities and colonization on the whole. About the perception of "race" and the role of literacy in the development of societal hierarchies. The English staked their claim on land in various places around the world and forced the people in those places to learn the English language, but literature and the arts were reserved for members of the highest social classes. Who were all white.

The fact that we're almost two decades into the 21 st Century and just now beginning to see books written in English that reflect the realities of the English-speaking world says a lot about who, historically, has been expected-or even allowed-to achieve English literacy. When all the business-related rhetoric is stripped away ("Those types of books statistically don't sell well." "The numbers don't suggest that this would be a good investment."), the implications are that 1) certain groups of people don't read and 2) the people who do read wouldn't want to read about x-type of people. The marginalized wind up doubting the validity of their very existence, and the privileged continue to see themselves as the protagonists of the only stories that matter. I'm sure I don't have to explain why this is detrimental to everyone.
2) In your opinion, has the call for more diverse children's books been answered?

3) What more needs to be done?
Kind of. I'd say it's being answered. Slowly. I do find it disheartening that there are still people who think the diversity thing is a "trend"... again, says a lot about the status quo and privilege and white supremacy, but a glance at the New York Times bestseller list for ANY week over the past year should make it crystal clear that diverse books do sell and people do want to read them.

On the whole, I can definitely say more books are being acquired from marginalized authors writing marginalized characters, and I really hope it continues. As I hinted at above, I think literature plays a major role in shaping social norms and informing the way people treat one another because books are integral to the development of empathy. More "diverse" books-aka books that reflect the reality of our very diverse world-means more people who see and accept that reality. That's what we're working towards, and it's encouraging to see progress.

I'd personally love to see more books that address intersectionality. I am a queer, Christian black woman in a relationship with a biracial Jewish man, and one of our best friends is a trans woman. But there's no way I'd be permitted to touch on all of those areas of marginalization and how they interact in a single novel. It'd be "too much," and I'd have to focus only on one or two things (Race? Religion? Gender? Sexuality?). What I'm saying here is that we often still treat marginalized aspects of people's identities as "issues" to be addressed. There's this push to make race or sexuality or religion-whatever it is that makes a character different from the "norm"-central to the plot. The beauty of books is that in addition to reflecting reality, they also have the power to shape it. So when we reach the point where characters can exist in a story just as themselves without their "otherness" being a big deal, we'll have arrived, in a sense, both in books and in the world at large. This is why books that feature intersectionality are so important, and why I've made it my goal to write these types of books going forward. Spoiler alert (kinda): my next book features kids of color grappling with questions about their sexualities, but at its core, the book is about navigating the intersections of friendship and romance.

Aka, its just kids being kids.

New York Times bestselling author Nic Stone was born and raised in a suburb of Atlanta, GA, and the only thing she loves more than an adventure is a good story about one. After graduating from Spelman College, she worked extensively in teen mentoring and lived in Israel for a few years before returning to the US to write full-time. Growing up with a wide range of cultures, religions, and backgrounds, Stone strives to bring these diverse voices and stories to her work. You can find her goofing off and/or fangirling over her husband and sons on most social media platforms as @getnicced.

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1) Why do you think there's such a dearth of diverse children's books? In a couple of words: white supremacy. The fact that there are more books published about animals than about black kids says a lot, not only about our society, but about "Western" sensibilities and colonization on the whole.

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Supriya Kelkar is an author and screenwriter who has worked on the writing teams for several commercial Hindi films. Her debut middle-grade historical fiction novel, "Ahimsa," won the 2015 New Visions Award, which honors a middle grade or young adult novel by an author of color who has not previously published in that genre.

"Ahimsa" takes place in colonial India in the 1940s, during the fight for independence from British rule, and 10-year-old Anjali's mother announces that she has quit her job to become a Freedom Fighter. The story was inspired by Kelkar's great-grandmother, who joined the freedom movement against the British.

In the 1990s, Kelkar grew up in a town in the Midwest that was not very diverse and faced discrimination from peers and adults. Someone threw a brick through her family's window. By middle school, Kelkar was so embarrassed by the Hindi music she loved privately that she would beg her parents to roll the car windows up so people wouldn't stare. Because the texture of her hair was different from most of the other children in town, a high school classmate wrote on her locker in permanent marker, "Put a comb in that rat's nest." Children once screamed at her parents and her as they left a Diwali celebration: "Go back to your country, Osama!"

"A lot of people don't understand what erasure, microaggressions and racism can do to a child," Kelkar said. "The effect can be subtle but it can also be long-lasting and deep, affecting how a child feels about their self-worth, their culture and their background."

"I'd love for the next generation of Indian-American kids to not feel shamed into turning their music down, or rolling their windows up," she said. "And I would love for all kids to get to see themselves in a book, because every child is important, and having your story out there just reinforces that."

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I recently chatted with Kelkar, via Google Hangouts and email, about her debut novel, social justice, and parenting and activism. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Q: How did the idea for this book come together?
A: In 2003, I began to think a lot about my great-grandmother's story. Her name was Anasuyabai Kale and she was born in 1896. She lost her mother and two of her siblings at a young age. But I was so fascinated by this strong female who was able to lead and inspire so many.

When Mahatma Gandhi asked each family to give a member to the freedom movement, her husband was the breadwinner. If he joined, they would lose their income. So she did. She was headstrong, intelligent, brave and determined. She was imprisoned once because she was going to give a fiery speech at a protest. She stayed in prison until Gandhi negotiated with the British to release all political prisoners who had not been violent offenders.

In 1942, after Gandhi and much of Congress was imprisoned, there were several riots where my great-grandmother lived. She would always go and meet with the victims of the violence and rape and offer her help, advocating for their rights. And after independence, her devotion to her country continued, as she went on to become a two-term congresswoman.

The story was bursting with girl-power and womanpower and resistance and persistence and I could not get it out of my head.
Q: Anjali is a reluctant activist; it is her mother who pulls her into her circle of Freedom Fighters. How does her experience of and commitment to activism change? How does her relationship with her mother evolve?
A: Anjali is a child of privilege. It takes her awhile to understand that even if a problem doesn't directly affect her, it doesn't mean the problem doesn't exist. Once she has this awakening, she becomes fully committed to activism, and then has a hard time understanding why others who share her privilege aren't at all interested in joining. Anjali is used to getting her way with her mother, who is quite liberal for the time. Although she has always respected her mother and was in awe of her intelligence, over the course of the book, she sees her mother in a new light, as a hero.
Q: In one of the most powerful scenes in the book, Anjali, who is Brahman, is told to "stay in her lane" by Mohan, who is Dalit. She has to face her caste privilege and is made uncomfortable by what he says to her. How does their friendship challenge her assumptions, and vice versa?
A: Like most children, and people, at that time, Anjali never thought anything of a boy just a few years older than her working to clean the sewage out of their "dry latrines," as they are called when the toilets do not flush into a sewer system. When the injustice of it all is brought to her attention and she finally has that awakening, she is ashamed and immediately wants to change things. Her friendship with Mohan helps her see that while the status quo worked for her, it hurt others. Why shouldn't everyone be allowed into her school? Why are some people not allowed in their small town's temple? Why is it okay for people to treat their fellow human beings as beneath them? At the same time, she can be blinded by her privilege, thinking change can happen easily if she just wants it to happen, and over the course of the book realizes that actual change sometimes takes time.

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Mohan is too grounded in reality to believe in everything Anjali says, but for a period, their friendship makes him think his status quo may actually change, or it may change for others in his community. And for Mohan, who is always deeply aware of how unusual their friendship is, just talking back to Anjali and challenging her when she needs to stay in her lane, is a change to his status.
Q: Anjali comes to realize that Gandhi is deeply flawed - he is a racist, for one, and can be patronizing - and she learns more about B.R. Ambedkar, who campaigned against social discrimination against Dalits and is a figure rarely mentioned in texts for young people in the United States. What about these two men is so fascinating to Anjali?
A: Anjali has to grapple with the fact that she could admire much about Gandhi's ideas and also totally disagree with other things he preached. It is a bit of a shock for her to find out that Gandhi, whom her parents so adored, could be wrong on things. And I think she, like me, really admired all that Ambedkar was doing, the more she learned about him.
Q: While the book ends "happily for now" for Anjali and her family, you acknowledge in your author's note that communal violence and caste violence are still a part of India, and that efforts are still being made to rectify these injustices. Why was it important to you to include this?
A: Although this book takes place almost a century ago, we are still seeing the issues of privilege and resistance today, both in India and in America. I wanted readers, especially young readers, to know that the injustice still exists, that strife still exists, that deep-seated issues still exist, so that they are aware of it, can check their own privilege in the matter, and can stand up for what is right, now and always.
Pooja Makhijani writes children's books, essays and articles, and also develops educational media and curriculums. She can be found online at poojamakhijani.com. Follow On Parenting on Facebook for more essays, news and updates. You can sign up here for our weekly newsletter. We tweet @OnParenting. More reading: A black mom, seeking safe ground for her daughters Serena Williams writes about power, strength and love in her letter to her mother Home ec was started by a feminist. We need to bring it back.

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Perspective | Author of 'Ahimsa' talks about social justice, activism and parenting

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Supriya Kelkar is an author and screenwriter who has worked on the writing teams for several commercial Hindi films. Her debut middle-grade historical fiction novel, "Ahimsa," won the 2015 New Visions Award, which honors a middle grade or young adult novel by an author of color who has not previously published in that genre.