Uncle John's City Garden

by Bernette Ford (Author) Frank Morrison (Illustrator)

Reading Level: 2nd − 3rd Grade
How does this city garden grow? With help from L'il Sissy and her siblings--and love, love, love! A celebration of nature, family, and food. Visiting the city from her home in the suburbs, an African American girl sees how a few packets of seeds, some helping hands, and hard work transform an empty lot in a housing project into a magical place where vegetables grow and family gathers. It's the magic of nature in the heart of the city! Bernette Ford's autobiographical story is a loving glimpse at a girl, her siblings, and her uncle, and their shared passion for farming. L'l Sissy's fascination with measurement, comparison, and estimation introduces children to STEM concepts. And the progress of Uncle John's garden introduces readers to the life cycle of plants. Frank Morrison, winner of multiple Coretta Scott King awards and an NAACP Image Award, depicts dramatic cityscapes as well as the luscious colors and textures of Nature. A Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection
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Hardcover
$18.99

Publishers Weekly

Three Black siblings assist Uncle John, "a great big man," with a veggie patch in this warm intergenerational portrait. Narrated from the perspective of youngest sibling Li'l Sissy, the book is based on the late Ford's own uncle, who, per an author's note, cultivated a similar plot in 1950s Canarsie, Brooklyn. With personal-feeling prose that centers themes of relative size and growth through life's seasons, Li'l Sissy describes how, under Uncle John's tutelage, she and her brother and sister plant corn, lima beans, tomatoes, onions, and okra--the ingredients for succotash, a family favorite--in a city housing development's garden and spend the summer watching it grow until a season's-end barbecue. Emphasizing the quartet's kinship and pride in their work, Morrison's distinguished oil and spray-paint art also juxtaposes expansive planes to portray the sizable horizontal garden plot amid the community's vertical buildings. Aptly partnered, the creators present a moving picture of how food can bind people and communities. Back matter includes an author's note and succotash recipe. Ages 4-8. (May)

Copyright 2022 Publishers Weekly, LLC Used with permission.

Review quotes

★ Capturing the togetherness as well as the wonder of working side by side in the garden, brown faces glisten and elongated limbs rise up toward the sun, just as the garden itself rises. . . . . An inviting story that is also a fine example of using everyday life to exemplify science and success. A joy to experience!—Booklist, Starred Review

This visually lush story paints a memorable, sensory-rich portrait of family bonding through gardening—The Horn Book

The madly saturated colors of picture-perfect plants bring vibrancy, and the body language of the siblings is both sturdy and dynamic.—The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books

Aptly partnered, the creators present a moving picture of how food can bind people and communities.—Publishers Weekly

Ford's lovingly remembered autobiographical tale highlights the power of urban gardening to foster community, revive decaying property, create food resiliency, and even promote STEM learning. The figures in Morrison's oil-and-spray-paint paintings emote pride and quiet joy, challenging the negative association between African American people and farming.—Kirkus Reviews
Bernette Ford
Bernette Ford (June 30, 1950 - June 20, 2021) was an author and editor renowned as one of the few African American women writers of children's books. Recognized for bringing diversity to publishing, she founded a group called Black Creators for Children, which would assist African American authors in creating new works by following a set of philosophies. During her career she penned many popular kids' books, several with Boxer Books, including No More Diapers for Ducky!, No More Bottles for Bunny!, and Ballet Kitty. A publisher for many years, she also founded and ran her own company, the children's book packager Color-Bridge Books. Bernette lived in Brooklyn, New York, with her husband, George Ford, until her passing in 2021.

Erin K. Robinson is an Emmy-nominated illustrator trained at the Parsons School of Design and the Corcoran School of the Arts & Design. Erin's illustrations have been featured in the New York Times and the Washington Post, among other publications. Her magical imagination is inspired by travel, color, texture, the feminine shape, and the many shades and coifs of Brooklyn, New York. She works in a variety of media, including watercolor, ink, markers, charcoal, stencil, and collage, as well as digital artistry. She illustrated Brave. Black. First.: 50+ African American Women Who Changed the World (Penguin Random House, 2020) and A Library (Versify, 2022). She has also designed a U.S. postage stamp, which was unveiled in October 2022. Robinson lives in New York City, and The Magical Snowflake is her first children's book with Boxer Books.

Classification
Fiction
ISBN-13
9780823447862
Lexile Measure
-
Guided Reading Level
-
Publisher
Holiday House
Publication date
May 03, 2022
Series
-
BISAC categories
JUV029000 - Juvenile Fiction | Nature & the Natural World | General
JUV013030 - Juvenile Fiction | Family | Multigenerational
JUV011010 - Juvenile Fiction | People & Places | United States - African-American
JUV023000 - Juvenile Fiction | Lifestyles | City & Town Life
JUV050000 - Juvenile Fiction | Cooking & Food
Library of Congress categories
African Americans
Picture books
City and town life
Gardens
Gardening

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