Archives › Books for Kids
“She Got Me Pregnant”: Episode 119
After a few weeks hiatus, I’m back with a new vlog about LGBT parenting books and videos of 2010—great for holiday gifts! (Those of you who prefer your gifts guides in text could try my earlier written post.) Mombian: She Got Me Pregnant, 12-16-2010 Uploaded by drudolph. – Watch more LGBT videos. (If the embedded [...]
My Princess Boy Book Gets Mainstream Publisher
Remember the news story that broke a couple of months ago about the mom who wrote the book My Princess Boy for her five-year-old son, who loved to dress up in princess clothes? The mom, Cheryl Kilodavis, began selling it locally and directly through Amazon. Her son’s school began using it as an anti-bullying tool. Now, Simon and Schuster–a major mainstream publisher–has picked it up and will begin selling it on December 21. You can pre-order it through Amazon.
A Gift Guide to Media for LGBT Families
2010 brought us a number of excellent films—and a few books—about LGBT families. Here are some you may want to add to your holiday list. Mom’s Apple Pie: The Heart of the Lesbian Mothers’ Custody Movement, a documentary by Jody Laine, Shan Ottey and Shad Reinstein, gives us a look at early custody cases involving [...]
A Book for Siblings with Same-Sex Parents
A reader wrote to ask if I knew of any books for young children that discussed getting a new sibling—but which did not feature a mom and a dad for parents. Great question. The answer is that (to the best of my knowledge) there is one, And Baby Makes 4 by Judith Benjamin. (Don’t confuse [...]
New Award for LGBT Children’s and Young Adult Books
Go librarians. The American Library Association (ALA) this week announced it will add an annual award for “English-language works for children and teens of exceptional merit relating to the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered experience.”
My Princess Boy and Family Acceptance at Its Finest
Via the Advocate comes a wonderful interview with the family of a gender variant child, five-year-old Dyson. (Video below.) Dyson’s mother even wrote a book, My Princess Boy: A mom’s story about a young boy who loves to dress up, for other families like theirs. I have not yet read the book myself, but the [...]
New Book for Youth with LGBTQ Parents
I’m very excited to let you all know that Let’s Get This Straight: The Ultimate Handbook for Youth with LGBTQ Parents is hitting bookstores today. It’s a practical, inspirational, and forthright guide for pre-teens and teens with LGBTQ parents—and we parents could benefit from reading it as well. I had the pleasure of interviewing Tina [...]
Happy Banned Book Week!
It’s Banned Book Week once again—the American Library Association’s annual celebration of the freedom to read. I’ll refer you back to the piece I wrote for Banned Books Week last year, “Penguins, Rabbits, and Guinea Pigs: In Celebration of Banned Books,” noting that LGBT-themed books continue to be banned or challenged, as a July case [...]
Same-Sex Parents in Children’s Books: A Testing Ground
Jonathan Kemmerer-Scovner has a spot-on essay at Critical Masses Media about same-sex parents in children’s books. “Children’s literature,” he observes, “acts as a testing ground for the social mores of a society. You may think we’re all progressing along at a fine rate, but if you really want to see where we’re at, stick it in a children’s book and see what that gets you.”
New Books and Media for LGBT Families
(Originally published in Bay Windows, July 23, 2010. Regular readers will recognize many of the items in this mid-year roundup from previous reviews I’ve done—but there’s one new item in there, so read on.) It’s been a good year so far for books and media about LGBT parenting—but not so much for items aimed at [...]
New Guide Offers Insights for Donor-Conceived Children
(Originally published as my Mombian newspaper column.) A long-running study of lesbian families created through donor insemination made headlines June 7 when it published new results showing that teens from these families tend to do better than their peers socially and academically. While these findings from the National Longitudinal Lesbian Family Study are positive, they [...]
“She Got Me Pregnant”: Episode 107
I’m vlogging solo this week—Helen is away on business again, but I’ll carry on without her. Because the 5th Annual Blogging for LGBT Families Day is coming up on June 1, and I’m all about getting the word out, I invite viewers to participate. I also share brand new works by authors of some of [...]
Milk Is Good for Kids
It’s the first annual Harvey Milk Day in California, an official state holiday signed into law by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. The Kern High School District Board of Trustees in Bakersfield, California, however, voted to not observe the holiday. Several speakers at a board meeting said they don’t think Milk is a good role model for [...]
Tango Authors Discuss Their New Children’s Book
Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell, authors of the famed LGBT children’s book And Tango Makes Three (and gay dads themselves), were kind enough to answer some questions about their latest book, Christian, the Hugging Lion, about which I posted more yesterday. What attracted you to Christian’s story? Justin: First there was that extremely moving video. [...]
Tango and Heather Authors Bring Us Two New Books
(Originally published as my Mombian newspaper column. Stay tuned for tomorrow when I’ll share Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell’s answers to a few questions about their new book. Click image to enlarge.) The authors of two of the most famous LGBT children’s books have two new books out this month. Neither work has an overt [...]
Penguins Lose Top Spot on Challenged Books List
Author Lauren Myracle’s young adult series ttyl has topped the American Library Association’s (ALA) Top Ten list of the Most Frequently Challenged Books of 2009. A “challenge” is a formal, written complaint to a library or school, “requesting that materials be removed or restricted because of content or appropriateness.” Ttyl gives us a look at [...]
“She Got Me Pregnant”: Episode 104
I have a special guest this week while Helen is away on a business trip— our six-year-old son. He offers his thoughts on one of his favorite books of the moment, Redwoods, by Jason Chin. It’s not LGBT-related at all, but it’s delightful, and our son likes it, which is reason enough for me to [...]
Kids’ Poems, LGBT and Not
April is National Poetry Month, for no reason I can discern except that this glorious weather seems a perfect inspiration for writing poems. The Academy of American Poets site has everything you’d ever want to know about the celebration, but I’m going to share a couple of additional resources because we’re almost all parents and/or [...]
Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss!
Happy birthday to Theodor Seuss Geisel, aka Dr. Seuss, who was born on this date in 1904. As those of you with children in elementary school likely know, today is also Read Across America Day, an an annual reading motivation and awareness program run by the National Education Association (NEA). I feel obliged to point [...]
Read LGBT Books, Win Prizes
I was delighted to discover the new(-ish) blog GLBT Reading, home of the GLBT Challenge 2010. The goal of the site is to encourage people to read books about GLBT topics and/or by GLBT authors. To participate in the Challenge, simply read relevant books (or short stories, poems, or essays), post reviews on your blog, [...]
Johnny Weir, His Mom, and Gay Guinea Pigs
What does Olympic figure skater Johnny Weir have to do with gay guinea pigs? The talented Sarah Brannen, author and illustrator of Uncle Bobby’s Wedding, the much-challenged children’s book about two male guinea pigs who marry, made a name for herself with photographs and watercolors of ice skaters long before she turned to furry rodents. [...]
2010 Rainbow Bibliography Highlights LGBT Books for Kids
(Originally published as my Mombian newspaper column.) The American Library Association’s Rainbow Project has just published its third annual Rainbow Bibliography, a list of recommended, LGBT-inclusive books for readers under age 18. Nel Ward, head of the Rainbow Project, says one of the biggest problems librarians have with including LGBT-inclusive books in their collections is [...]
Kansas School Board Stands Up for Tango
The North Kansas City Schools Board of Education recently voted 3 to 2 to keep And Tango Makes Three on the shelves at Bell Prairie Elementary School, despite a parent’s request that the book be removed, reports School Library Journal. I’m annoyed every time a children’s book with LGBT content is challenged, but I’m especially [...]
2010 Rainbow List Is Out
The 2010 Rainbow Project Bibliography is out! The Bibliography is a list of recommended titles for youth from birth to age 18 that contain “significant and authentic” GLBTQ content. The titles are chosen by the GLBT Round Table and the Social Responsibilities Round Table of the American Library Association. This is not a list of [...]
