New Board Book Series Introduces the Youngest Children to “People of Pride”

Ellen DeGeneres and Harvey Milk are the subjects of two new board books offering the youngest children simple biographies of LGBTQ heroes. But are they really simple enough for the board-book age range?

Ellen DeGeneres, illustrated by Victoria Grace Elliott (and with no stated author beyond the publisher), is the first in the series, part of the ongoing partnership between LGBTQ advocacy organization GLAAD and Little Bee Books. It tells readers a little about her life, from her early stand-up performances to her sitcom, coming out as gay, her show’s cancellation, and her eventual return to television with a successful talk show. It ends with a mention of her marriage to Portia De Rossi, the many ways she works for “equality and fairness,” and her receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama.

The book deals clearly but gently with the bias she faced. “Ellen helped people understand that being gay was not something to be afraid of,” it says, explaining, “Gay people did not have the same rights as others. It was not legal to get married or jointly adopt children. It was hard to buy a home together or even visit a sick partner in the hospital.” After she came out, “bullies said and wrote mean things about her.” If the book never quite explains why gay people didn’t have the same rights or why being gay was seen as “something to be afraid of,” perhaps that’s because there really is never a good reason for such bias (and complex discussions of systemic injustices are for older ages).

We see Ellen’s determination in spite of the obstacles, however. “Brave Ellen wouldn’t give up. She wanted to show the world that gay people could succeed, too,” the book tells us. It notes the many gay fans who supported her and how “with courage and kindness,” she helped make the country and the world “a more accepting place to live.”

In Harvey Milk, the second book in the series, we learn about his life from his days in the Navy to his time running a camera shop in San Francisco and deciding to run for political office. We see how his campaigns inspired others to come out. Once elected, we read, he worked on a law to stop gay people being fired from their jobs, fought other injustices, and was among those who asked Gilbert Baker to design a symbol for the LGBTQ rights movement—the rainbow flag. The book does not mention his assassination, which feels appropriate for the intended age range of 2- to 5-year-olds. (Other biographies for slightly older children, Pride: The Story of Harvey Milk and the Rainbow Flag, by Rob Sanders, and The Harvey Milk Story, by Kari Krakow, do mention his death.)

Yet that target age range from Little Bee seems miscalibrated to the level of language used in both books, which feels better suited to 5- to 7-year-olds. That’s not because the queer content in the books is inappropriate for the very youngest children; but words like “trailblazer,” “scholarships,” “degenerate,” “spectacular,” and “antiwar,”  as well as more complex sentences and concepts (like “civil rights,” “public service,” “political office,” the idea of something being “legal,” or what a “comedian” is) may mean younger children simply won’t understand them yet.

This approach seems to be part of a trend, noted by Elizabeth Bluemle in Publishers Weekly last year, “where books meant for ages 4-7 are suddenly in toddler format,” even though “the stories just don’t connect with the children whom board books aim to serve.” She observes about several other (non-LGBTQ) board-book biographies, “While children should be introduced to real role models as early and often as possible, often the stories we share mean zippity-doo-dah to a two-year-old…. Wouldn’t it be better to wait just a few years until young children can truly appreciate these admirable heroes? Or work a little harder to marry the delivery of the information to the age of the listener?”

Exactly. And there are plenty of ways to create LGBTQ-inclusive board books that are geared linguistically to the very youngest children—such as these, which focus on themes of family, ABCs, and rainbow colors. (Little Bee’s own Our Rainbow is among them.) Alternatively, board books about Ellen and Milk that focused on narrower aspects of their lives (even lightly fictionalized stories, say, about Ellen trying out new dance moves or Milk looking for his megaphone so he could speak with a loud voice) might have been a better way to introduce them to toddlers and preschoolers, rather than presenting these fuller, but more complex, biographies.

Yes, you could simply use these new biographies with slightly older children, for whom they’d be terrific—but even five-year-olds, at the upper end of Little Bee’s target range, may not want to read books whose board-book format marks them as “baby” books. Still, these are not bad stories by any means. I just hope that children who are old enough to understand their language aren’t turned off by the format. And introducing children of all ages to LGBTQ heroes is a fine goal—GLAAD and Little Bee are to be commended for reminding us of this ongoing need.

Ellen DeGeneres is available now; Harvey Milk will be published May 19th, but is available for preorder. A book on RuPaul is planned next.

Other books in the GLAAD-Little Bee partnership include:

• Prince & Knight, by Daniel Haack and illustrated by Stevie Lewis, reviewed here.
• Maiden & Princess, by Daniel Haack and Isabel Galupo, with illustrations by Becca Human, reviewed here.
• Jack (Not Jackie), by Erica Silverman, illustrated by Holly Hatam, reviewed here.
• Our Rainbow, by a variety of artists, reviewed here.
• Except When They Don’t, written by Laura Gehl and illustrated by Joshua Heinsz, reviewed here.
• Spirit Day: A Book About Spreading Joy, written and illustrated by Joy Yang, reviewed here.

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