Pink: A Women's March Story

by Virginia Zimmerman (Author) Mary Newell Depalma (Illustrator)

Pink: A Women's March Story
Reading Level: 2nd − 3rd Grade

Celebrate the fifth anniversary of the Women's March with this delightful multigenerational picture book about female empowerment.

Lina notices her grandmother knitting with pink yarn and soon learns that she's making special hats to wear at an important march to celebrate women and their rights. Even though she sometimes feels small, Lina learns how to knit her own pink hat, and her confidence begins to build. When Lina and her family join the Women's March in Washington, DC, she is energized by the crowd and the sea of pink hats. It's amazing to see so many people all knitted together! And as Lina marches, she feels much bigger than she ever has before.

Celebrate the importance of the Women's March with young children in Virginia Zimmerman's and Mary Newell DePalma's remarkable and empowering story about one girl's journey from knitting a hat to making a difference.

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Hardcover
$17.99

Kirkus

A timely nod to female empowerment that knits together generations of girls and women and raises a hat to activists everywhere.

Publishers Weekly

Knit pink caps dot the pages of this picture book, which marks the fifth anniversary of the 2017 Women's March. A first-person narrative delivers the lead-up to the initial march through the eyes of Lina, who learns to knit as her grandmother works up protest hats for the whole family. Along the way, the light-skinned figures discuss the reasons for the march ("Sometimes the men in charge disrespect women and make us feel small. But we are not small," Zimmerman writes), while the appearance of a family cat hints at, but does not contextualize, the term flipped on its head by participants ("Pussycat! Pussyhat!"). A strand of pink yarn winds through DePalma's collages, which employ textiles, speech bubbles, and multidimensional vignettes with a handmade feel. Depictions of the variously inclusive crowd, protest signs, and a sea of pink hats combine with Lina's observations to re-create the event in this intergenerational story of female empowerment. Ages 4-8. (Jan.)

Copyright 2022 Publishers Weekly, LLC Used with permission.

School Library Journal

Gr 1-4--The 2017 Women's March is the climactic event in this warm, loving story about a family who knits hats together to wear for the march and discusses the value of gender equity. Lina's grandma loves to knit and takes her grandchildren with her to the yarn store to pick out special pink yarn for a march in Washington, DC. Lina learns how to knit and, in doing so, the motif of diligence, togetherness, and support are emphasized, exploring feminism in a candid, open way. Gender norms, such as whether men can be feminists or wear pink, are gently shattered by the men in Lina's family and the positive repetition of phrases like "you are strong and smart and beautiful." While it lacks some transitions between scenes, the illustrations provide a continuity of movement and balance. Mixed media collage draws the eye toward text placement and art. As an extended metaphor, it adds to the theme that equity and dignity are ideas individuals do not stop working towards together. Includes an author's note. VERDICT Highly recommended for collections serving youth for its demonstration of feminism, equity, and exploration of gender norms.--Rachel Zuffa

Copyright 2022 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Review quotes

"A timely nod to female empowerment that knits together generations of girls and women and raises a hat to activists everywhere."
Kirkus Reviews
Virginia Zimmerman

Virginia Zimmerman is a professor of English at Bucknell University as well as a children's book author. Her middle grade novel, The Rosemary Spell, was published in 2015. This is her first picture book. She grew up in the suburbs of Washington, DC, and now lives with her family in Pennsylvania.

Mary Newell DePalma has illustrated twenty picture books and has authored seven, including the IRA/CBC Children's Choice winner A Grand Old Tree and the Bank Street College of Education's Best Books choice Bow-Wow Wiggle-Waggle. In her long and varied illustration career, Mary has drawn just about everything, including eyeballs, cans of shrimp, mice, matchsticks, and dogs in swimsuits. She lives in Boston.

Classification
Fiction
ISBN-13
9780762473892
Lexile Measure
-
Guided Reading Level
-
Publisher
Running Press Kids
Publication date
January 04, 2022
Series
-
BISAC categories
JUV013030 - Juvenile Fiction | Family | Multigenerational
JUV039140 - Juvenile Fiction | Social Themes | Self-Esteem & Self-Reliance
JUV014000 - Juvenile Fiction | Girls & Women
JUV039290 - Juvenile Fiction | Social Themes | Activism & Social Justice
Library of Congress categories
Hats
Picture books
Girls
Feminism

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