Goin' Someplace Special. (children's bookshelf).

Goin' Someplace Special by Patricia McKissack Illustrated by Jerry Pinkney Atheneum Books for Young Readers (An Anne Schwartz Book), September 2001, $16.00, ISBN 0-689-81885-8, Ages 4-8.

In times like today, where young African American children can not image being denied entry into McDonalds, Red Lobster, or Pizza Hut, we need a story and visual aid to teach the lessons of the past. Hurtful signs and painful comments are overcome by Tricia Ann as she makes her way to one of the only places in the city that welcomes her with open arms: the public library. Prepared and fortified by her grandmother, she ventures outside her community for the first time. Sitting in the back of the bus behind the Jim Crow sign this young girl's full of love, pride, and respect.

Remembering her grandmothers words "You are somebody, a human - no better, no worse than anybody else in this world" Tricia Ann now the adult Patricia McKissack was able to heal and chronicle an aspect of an aspect of her personal journey from a childhood in Nashville.

Jerry Pinkney, four-time Coretta Scott King winner, works magic in watercolor illustrations. Each page has soft portraits of this young African American girl as she braves the indignities and obstacles of the 1950s. His technique of sketching pencil illustrations and then transferring the design to watercolor, adding a mix of shades and jewel-like colors makes Jerry Pinkney's work distinctive.

Pinkney's attention to detail and McKissack's remembrance will certainly help our children to begin understand growing up in the segregated South.

Khafre Abif is the Director of the Children's Defense Fund Langston Hughes Library in Clinton, Tennessee.