The Diverse Families bookshelf was created and funded through numerous grants. Due to lack of additional grants and the loss of key personnel, the project has come to an end. We have tremendously enjoyed creating this database and hope that it can help bring readers and books together.
Browse by Race & Culture:
Interracial
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Anna Hibiscus
Atinuke .
Anna Hibiscus, who lives in Africa with her whole family, loves to splash in the sea and have parties for her aunties, but Anna would love to see snow.
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A Place in My Heart
Mary Grossnickle
Charlie, a chipmunk adopted by a family of squirrels, begins to wonder about his birthparents but is afraid that asking questions will upset his family.
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A Place in the World
Malcolm Frierson
Set in Baltimore, Ghana, and rural Georgia, a novel of love, marriage, betrayal, divorce, discovery, African heritage, international adoption, racism, and tragedy unfolds. Kwame and Evelyn adopt Kofi whom they adore. After divorce and remarriage, their nationalistic and interracial families clash. Caught between households, Kofi strives to find himself and battles dangerous anxiety attacks.
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Army Brats
Daphne Benedis-Grab
When the Bailey family moves into an army base in Virginia there are a lot of adjustments to make; twelve-year-old Tom runs afoul of the base school bully, ten-year-old Charlotte finds herself trying too hard to make friends with the "cool" girls, and six-year-old Rosie is just being difficult as usual--but they come together to investigate a mysterious building full of weird cages, and uncover Fort Patrick's secrets.
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A Sister for Matthew: A Story About Adoption
Pamela Kennedy
When Matthew's parents decide to adopt a baby girl from China he has many questions, but by the time she arrives, he is excited about his new sister.
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As the Crow Flies
Melanie Gillman
Charlie Lamonte is thirteen years old, queer, black, and questioning what was once a firm belief in God. So, she's spending a week of her summer vacation at an all-white Christian backpacking camp. And she can't help but poke holes in the pious obliviousness of this storied sanctuary with little regard for people like herself...or her fellow camper, Sydney.
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A Tale of Two Mommies
Vanita Oelschlager
A young boy describes to two other children how his two mommies help him with all his needs.
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A Thirst for Home
Christine Leronimo
Alemitu lives with her mother in a poor village in Ethiopia, where she must walk miles for water and hunger roars in her belly. Even though life is difficult, she dreams of someday knowing more about the world. When her mother has no choice but to leave her at an orphanage to give her a chance at a better life, an American family adopts Alemitu.
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Away
Emil Sher
A gentle tale told entirely through sticky notes between a mother and daughter as the girl's departure for her first summer camp draws near demonstrates how love can be found even in scribbled messages and other unlikely places.
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Baby's First Words
Stella Blackstone and Sunny Scribens
Brief text relates the daily activities of a city baby with two daddies by featuring terms for objects, actions, and sounds. On die-cut board pages with tabs.
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Barack Obama: Son of Promise, Child of Hope
Nikki Grimes
When David asks his mother about the man on television, she tells him the story of Barack Obama, discussing his childhood in Hawaii and Indonesia, his parents' divorce, and his desire to help others.
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Beginnings: How Families Come to Be
Virginia Kroll
Parents and children discuss how their families came to be, covering birth families, adoptive families, two-parent families, and single parent families.
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Behind You
Jacqueline Woodson
After fifteen-year-old Jeremiah is mistakenly shot by police, the people who love him struggle to cope with their loss as they recall his life and death, unaware that 'Miah is watching over them.
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Ben and the Sudden Too-Big Family
Colby Rodowsky
Until now, ten-year-old Ben has believed that life is made up of "all right" and "not all right" stuff, but when his father remarries and the couple adopts a Chinese baby, he wonders which kind of stuff will prevail.
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Between Us Baxters
Bethany Hegedus
The story of twelve-year-old Polly, a poor white Southern girl whose close friendship with Timbre Ann, a middle-class black teen, puts both families in danger. As white supremacists set fire to black businesses, Polly struggles to cope with the implications for her family and to understand the true meaning of friendship. Polly's sense of justice threatens to upset the status quo in her small town.
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Billie of Fish House Lane
Meredith Sue Willis
A twelve-year-old girl attempts to understand and accept her affluent, white cousin while living in a multiracial, eccentric family.
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Billy and Belle
Sarah Garland
A newborn baby and the exciting confusion of Pet Day at school combine to make a very special day for Billy and Belle.
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Black and White
Eric Walters
Thomas meets Denyse after he watches her amazing skills at basketball. As the two become friends, they endure name-calling, cruel glances, and hurtful comments because of the difference of their skin.
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Black is Brown is Tan
Arnold Adoff
Describes in verse a family with a brown-skinned mother, white-skinned father, two children, and their various relatives.
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Black Means…
Barney Grossman
Records the feelings of New York elementary school children toward the word "black."
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Blackout
John Rocco
When a busy family's activities come to a halt because of a blackout, they find they enjoy spending time together and not being too busy for once.
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Black, White and Tan
Nicole C. Mullen
Nicole C. Mullen’s book reminds children “Together we are beautiful!” God loves all the kids in his family―no matter what color they are.
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Black, White, Just Right!
Marguerite W. Davol
A girl explains how her parents differ in color, tastes in art and food, and pet preferences, and how she herself is different too but just right.
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Blended
Sharon M. Draper
Piano-prodigy Isabella, eleven, whose black father and white mother struggle to share custody, never feels whole, especially as racial tensions affect her school, her parents both become engaged, and she and her stepbrother are stopped by police.
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Bo at Ballard Creek
Kirkpatrick Hill
It's the 1920s, and Bo was headed for an Alaska orphanage when she won the hearts of two tough gold miners who set out to raise her, enthusiastically helped by all the kind people of the nearby Eskimo village.