Racial diversity displayed in families continues to expand as people from different racial backgrounds overcome the hurdles and stigma of mixed race relationships, marriage, and children. Often these stories reveal themes involving racism and prejudice.
Browse by Racial Diversity:
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In Search of Us
Ava Dellaira
Relates the stories of Marilyn who, at age seventeen, fell in love with James, left her stage-mother, and set out on her own and Angie, her now seventeen-year-old daughter, who returns to Hollywood seeking her father.
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International Adoptions
Margaret Haerens
This volume explores the topics relating to the adoption of international children by presenting varied expert opinions that examine many of the different aspects that comprise these issues. The viewpoints are selected from a wide range of highly respected and often hard-to-find sources and publications. Allows the reader to attain the higher-level critical thinking and reading skills that are essential in a culture of diverse and contradictory opinions.
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Into the Beautiful North
Luis Alberto Urrea
Nineteen-year-old Nayeli works at a taco shop in her Mexican village and dreams about her father, who journeyed to the US when she was young. Recently, it has dawned on her that he isn't the only man who has left town. In fact, there are almost no men in the village--they've all gone north. While watching The Magnificent Seven, Nayeli decides to go north herself and recruit seven men--her own "Siete Magníficos"--to repopulate her hometown and protect it from the bandidos who plan on taking it over.
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I See Reality: Twelve Short Stories About Real Life
Grace Kendall
Popular young-adult authors weave together questions of identity, loss, and redemption into poignant tales for today's teens.
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Is That Your Sister?: A True Story of Adoption
Catherine Bunin and Sherry Bunin
An adopted six-year-old girl tells about adoption and how she and her adopted sister feel about it.
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It All Comes Down to This
Karen English
Perfect for fans of Glory Be, this charming middle grade coming-of-age novel set in Los Angeles in the summer of 1965 is narrated by Sophie, a precocious, sheltered twelve-year-old. But when her family becomes the first African Americans to move into their upper middle-class neighborhood and riots erupt in nearby Watts, she learns that life-and her own place in it-is a lot more complicated than it had seemed.
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It Gets Better: Coming Out, Overcoming Bullying, and Creating a Life Worth Living
Dan Savage and Terry Miller
Growing up isn't easy. Many young people face daily tormenting and bullying, and this is especially true for LGBT kids and teens. It Gets Better is a collection of original essays and expanded testimonials written to teens from celebrities, political leaders, and everyday people, because while many LGBT teens can't see a positive future for themselves, we can.
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It's Not All Black and White: Multiracial Youth Speak Out
St. Stephen's Community House
Biracial and multiracial youth discuss their lives and questions of identity though poems, essays, interviews, and personal reflections.
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It's Not the Stork! A Book About Girls, Boys, Babies, Bodies, Families, and Friends
Robie H. Harris
Young children are curious about almost everything, especially their bodies. And young children are not afraid to ask questions. What makes me a girl? What makes me a boy? Why are some parts of girls' and boys' bodies the same and why are some parts different? How was I made? Where do babies come from? Is it true that a stork brings babies to mommies and daddies? IT'S NOT THE STORK! helps answer these endless and perfectly normal questions that preschool, kindergarten, and early elementary school children ask about how they began. Through lively, comfortable language and sensitive, engaging artwork, Robie H. Harris and Michael Emberley address readers in a reassuring way, mindful of a child's healthy desire for straightforward information. Two irresistible cartoon characters, a curious bird and a squeamish bee, provide comic relief and give voice to the full range of emotions and reactions children may experience while learning about their amazing bodies. Vetted and approved by science, health, and child development experts, the information is up-to-date, age-appropriate, and scientifically accurate, and always aimed at helping kids feel proud, knowledgeable, and comfortable about their own bodies, about how they were born, and about the family they are part of.
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It's Okay To Be Different
Todd Parr
Illustrations and brief text describe all kinds of differences that are "okay," such as "It's Okay to be a different color," "It's Okay to need some help," "It's Okay to be adopted," and "It's Okay to have a Different nose."
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It's Test Day, Tiger Turcotte
Pansie Hart Flood
Already so worried about the big second grade test that his stomach is upset, seven-year-old Tiger Turcotte, whose parents are Black, Meherrin Indian, and Hispanic, gets stuck on the question about race.
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It Takes Love (and Some Other Stuff) to Make a Baby
L. L. Bird
"Mommy, how are babies made?" Any parent who's fielded this question knows how essential a good book can be to help guide a tricky conversation. But what if your family doesn't fit the standard mold? How do you explain pregnancy and birth if your child has two moms? It Takes Love is for little kids in lesbian families born via donor insemination. Using simple, matter-of-fact language and bright, fun illustrations, it introduces the basics of reproduction and the concept of the donor. Both known donors and sperm banks are presented, but with a light touch. Because each family is unique, the book leaves space for parents to control the most sensitive part of their child's story.
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Jack and Jim
Kitty Crowther
Jack the blackbird and Jim the seagull become friends, but Jack is sad that the other seagulls do not seem to like him.
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Jalapeño Bagels
Natasha Wing
For International Day at school, Pablo wants to bring something that reflects the cultures of both his parents.
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Janine
Maryann Cocca-Leffler
Janine is one of a kind. She focuses on the positive while navigating life with disabilities. She makes a difference just by being herself
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Janine and the Field Day Finish
Maryann Cocca-Leffler
Today is field day and even though Janine is not good at sports, she is ready to compete. Her body just doesn't work like the other kids'. But no matter what, Janine cheers for everyone and tries her best. During the big race, her classmate Abby trips and falls. Janine is right there to help. But Abby is crushed that she won't win the race. Can Janine teach Abby and her classmates that being a winner is not always about being number one?
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Jazz Owls: A Novel of the Zoot Suit Riots
Margarita Engle
Thousands of Navy sailors are pouring into Los Angeles on their way to the front lines of World War II. They are young, scared, and longing to feel alive before they have to face the horrors of battle. Hot jazz music spiced with cool salsa rhythms calls them to dance with the local Mexican American girls, who jitterbug all night before working all day in the canneries. Proud to do their part for the war effort, these Jazz Owl girls dance with the sailors until the blazing summer night when racial violence leads to murder. Suddenly the restless white sailors are attacking the girls' brothers and boyfriends. The cool, loose zoot suits they wear are supposedly the reason for the violence - but really these boys are viciously beaten and arrested simply because of the color of their skin.
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Jesus Land: A Memoir
Julia Scheeres
It's the mid-1980s. Julia Scheeres and her adopted brother David are sixteen years old and have just moved to rural Indiana, a landscape of cottonwood trees and trailer parks, and a racism neither of them is prepared for. While Julia is white, her close relationship with David, who is black, makes them both outcasts. At home, a distant mother, more involved with her church's missionaries than with her own children, and a violent father only compound their problems. When high-school hormones, bullying, and a deep-seated restlessness prove too much to bear, they are packed off to a Christian boot camp in the Dominican Republic. Surrounded by natural beauty, the Escuela Caribe is governed by a disciplinary regime that demands its teens repent for their sins, which few of them are aware they've committed. How they made it through with heart and soul intact is told here with candor and humor.
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Jimi & Me
Jaime Adolf
After his father's tragic death, twelve-year-old Keith James moves from Brooklyn to a small midwestern town where his mixed race heritage is not accepted, but he finds comfort in the music of Jimi Hendrix and the friendship of a white classmate.
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Jing's Family (All Kinds of Families)
Elliot Riley
There are many types of families. Meet Jing and her family and learn about what adoption means.
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Jin Woo
Eve Bunting
Davey is dubious about having a new adopted brother from Korea, but when he finds out that his parents still love him, he decides that having a baby brother will be fine.
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Jubilee Journey
Carolyn Meyer
Emily Rose has always felt comfortable growing up in Connecticut with her African American mother and her "French American" father, but when they spend some time with her great-grandmother in Texas, Emily Rose learns about her black heritage and uncovers some new and exciting parts of her own identity.
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Just Add One Chinese Sister: An Adoption Story
Patricia McMahon and Conor Clarke McCarthy
Claire and her mother are working together on a scrapbook as they relive their first days and hours together following Claire's arrival from her birth home in China.
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Keurium
Jessica Sun Lee
Shay Stone lies in a hospital bed, catatonic -- dead to the world. Her family thinks it's a ploy for attention. Doctors believe it's the result of an undisclosed trauma. At the mercy of memories and visitations, Shay unearths secrets that may have led to her collapse. Will she remain paralyzed in denial? Or can she accept the unfathomable and break free?
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Kimchi & Calamari
Rose Kent
Teenaged Joseph Calderaro, who was adopted from Korea by Italian parents, begins to make important self-discoveries about race and family after his social studies teacher assigns an essay on cultural heritage and tracing the past.