These are absolutely gorgeous illustrations that go along perfectly with a strong narrative. In fact, with every negative comment, she finds something else that is remarkable of her sister's blue hijab. To the kids at school, its strange and thus they make mean comments about it. To her, it represents beauty and tradition. Faizah admires her older sister Asiya and she just loves her bright blue hijab. As she deals with the bullies, Faizah learns to truly appreciate the beauty of the hijab.Īnother great children's book with a most important message. Faizah thinks her sister looks like a most beautiful princess and does not understand why others at school do not see it in the same way. Most of all, she is excited because it is the first day of school in which her sister Asiya is going to wear her blue hijab.

It is the first day of school and Faizah is excited. It's not written primarily for non-hijab-wearers (though we can learn from it what the purposes might be for Muslims see above where Harry, a white kid, says it is about 'celebrating differences' for him), but for young girls who will and do wear it. I really do like the cover, and all the blue, that seems to in many ways be about pride and happy energy for the girl.

They said that in Arabic there are such resources for children, but this is the first such book they have seen in English, so they loved it. I happened to have read this on the train on the way to my class and when I came in the room I pulled the book out of my backpack, gave it to my three hijab-wearing Muslim students who hovered around it together, delighted with it, and that moved me a lot (see above, Grandma's comment). One thing I like is that the antagonistic boys are depicted non-racially, just plain brown, so that makes it see less judgmental about a particular race.ĭave: 4 I liked this on first read, thought maybe 3 stars, as I found it good, okay, about the hijab, sisters, bullying, the story and art just fine, but I was influenced by other factors in my rating, finally. If I go by how it was for me as a reader, and my interests, I would say 4 stars, I liked it, but if I can imagine an audience of hijab-wearing girls, I would say definitely 5 stars. And dealing with prejudice, staying strong through that. Wait, what's with all the counting (steps, and so on) and numbers in this book?! This book is really about celebrating differences. Olympic medalist and social justice activist Ibtihaj Muhammad. It was written By Olympic medalist, social activist (and hijab-wearing!) athlete Ibtihaj Muhammed with the help of (writer) She. This is book #18 (of 20) of 2019, and we liked it.

My family reads all the Goodreads-award-nominated picture books every year.

The Proudest Blue by Ibtihaj Muhammad