Colin Bootman – illustratör

The extraordinary biography of Salif Keïta, a Malian singer born with albinism, who overcame all odds to become a musical and social justice icon reminding all who hear his voice, they can accomplish anything.Salif Keïta was born in the Malian village Djoliba in West Africa. While his parents were as dark as the night sky, Salif was born with skin as white as lamb’s wool. Some of his family's neighbors were frightened by Salif's albinism. Others questioned whether Salif was fit to live, making his mother hold him close. But as Salif grew, trying to keep him safe from harm was like trying to hold the harmattan wind in his mother's hands. Even though the sun would make Salif's skin blister painfully, he always went back for more. The life outside his family's hut called to him. Music called to Salif, too, and helped him forget the pain of being different. He was captivated by the griots who would come to serenade his family. But when Salif once spied an unattended balafon, tempted to strike its keys, Salif's father admonished him: "Remember who you are," he said. "We Keïtas do not play music." The Keïta family were warriors, hunters and farmers. They were not musicians. But still Salif could not forget how music made him feel, how when he sang, his voice pierced through his pain allowing him to wail triumphantly at everyone and everything that made him feel powerless and ugly. So, at age eighteen Salif decided to hitch a ride to the city to see if he could make a living through song. Karen Ehrhardt's lyrical, affecting words paired with Colin Bootman's dynamic, lush art meld effortlessly to chronicle the untold story of a legend whose music and resilience has influenced and inspired generations.

Once upon a time in the city of Harlem, there was a terrible problem. Rats had taken over the city. They were everywhere―subways, restaurants, even people’s homes! The mayor didn’t know what to do. Then one day a stranger stepped off the subway and began playing a melody on a simple steel pan. People began to dance. The man went to the mayor and told him he could play many melodies, including one that would solve Harlem’s rat problem―for a price. The mayor had no choice. He agreed. The man was true to his word. He played a melody to drive away the rats. But the mayor refused to keep his word. The man with the steel pan had no choice. He played the mayor another tune for another purpose. . . . A captivating retelling of The Pied Piper of Hamelin, set in the Harlem Renaissance.

What happened when a former enslaved man took beat-up old instruments and gave them to a bunch of orphans? Thousands of futures got a little brighter and a great American art form was born. In 1891, Reverend Daniel Joseph Jenkins opened his orphanage in Charleston, South Carolina. He soon had hundreds of children and needed a way to support them. Jenkins asked townspeople to donate old band instruments—some of which had last played in the hands of Confederate soldiers in the Civil War. He found teachers to show the kids how to play. Soon the orphanage had a band. And what a band it was. The Jenkins Orphanage Band caused a sensation on the streets of Charleston. People called the band''s style of music "rag"—a rhythm inspired by the African American people who lived on the South Carolina and Georgia coast. The children performed as far away as Paris and London, and they earned enough money to support the orphanage that still exists today. They also helped launch the music we now know as jazz. Hey, Charleston! is the story of the kind man who gave America "some rag" and so much more.

What happened when a former enslaved man took beat-up old instruments and gave them to a bunch of orphans? Thousands of futures got a little brighter and a great American art form was born. In 1891, Reverend Daniel Joseph Jenkins opened his orphanage in Charleston, South Carolina. He soon had hundreds of children and needed a way to support them. Jenkins asked townspeople to donate old band instruments—some of which had last played in the hands of Confederate soldiers in the Civil War. He found teachers to show the kids how to play. Soon the orphanage had a band. And what a band it was. The Jenkins Orphanage Band caused a sensation on the streets of Charleston. People called the band''s style of music "rag"—a rhythm inspired by the African American people who lived on the South Carolina and Georgia coast. The children performed as far away as Paris and London, and they earned enough money to support the orphanage that still exists today. They also helped launch the music we now know as jazz. Hey, Charleston! is the story of the kind man who gave America "some rag" and so much more.

Ten-year-old Louis Daniel hates it when Mama treats him like a baby. But when Hurricane Katrina blows through the Gulf Coast on a fateful August night, followed by broken levees and rising floodwaters threatening the Ninth Ward, Louis feels like a little kid again. With no time to gather their belongings save Louis's beloved horn Daddy leads the family from their home and into an unfamiliar, watery world of floating debris, lurking critters, a winsome black-and-white dog, and desperate neighbors heading for dry ground. Taking shelter in the already-crowded Superdome, Louis and his parents wait and wait. As the days pass, the electricity goes out, the air conditioning dies, the bathrooms are closed, and people around them begin to bicker as they run out of food and water. When Daddy fails to return from a scouting mission within the Dome, Louis knows he's no longer a baby. It's up to him to find Daddy, with the help of his prized cornet.