A review by mschley
Just Right Family: An Adoption Story by Silvia Lopez
Diverse Book
Published March 2018
Young Meila loves her family and thinks it’s just right. One of her favorite things is when her parents tell her her bedtime story, the story of how she was adopted from China. Then everything changes when they tell her she is going to be getting a new baby sister from Haiti. Meila would rather have a puppy and struggles with the idea of her family changing. Slowly she warms to the idea, and when her little sister Sophie arrives with her parents from Haiti, Meila is completely in love. She makes sure to tell Sophie her own bedtime story of how they all looked in their hearts and saw her and knew she would make their family just right so Mommy and Daddy brought her home from Haiti just like they had brought Meila from China. Short paragraphs create a complexity in sentence structure that will help expand the young reader’s understanding of English. It also fits into their increased attention span and helps them practice paying attention to a longer story. The illustrations are bright and captivating, adding texture and depth to the story. There are elements that repeat from the beginning of the story, but it is more than simple repetition and require them to hold details from the beginning and realize that the story is coming full circle by the end, an important reading comprehension skill.
This book celebrates diversity. The family is multiethnic, with a white mother, an African American father, Meila as a Chinese American, and little Sophie as a Haitian American. The fact that they are an adoptive family as well only adds to the diversity. It allows the book to explore the transition into being an older sibling from the perspective of an adopted child and through adoption. It also reinforces the fact that they are a family built around love. These elements combine into a beautiful, loving story of a diverse, growing family.
Published March 2018
Young Meila loves her family and thinks it’s just right. One of her favorite things is when her parents tell her her bedtime story, the story of how she was adopted from China. Then everything changes when they tell her she is going to be getting a new baby sister from Haiti. Meila would rather have a puppy and struggles with the idea of her family changing. Slowly she warms to the idea, and when her little sister Sophie arrives with her parents from Haiti, Meila is completely in love. She makes sure to tell Sophie her own bedtime story of how they all looked in their hearts and saw her and knew she would make their family just right so Mommy and Daddy brought her home from Haiti just like they had brought Meila from China. Short paragraphs create a complexity in sentence structure that will help expand the young reader’s understanding of English. It also fits into their increased attention span and helps them practice paying attention to a longer story. The illustrations are bright and captivating, adding texture and depth to the story. There are elements that repeat from the beginning of the story, but it is more than simple repetition and require them to hold details from the beginning and realize that the story is coming full circle by the end, an important reading comprehension skill.
This book celebrates diversity. The family is multiethnic, with a white mother, an African American father, Meila as a Chinese American, and little Sophie as a Haitian American. The fact that they are an adoptive family as well only adds to the diversity. It allows the book to explore the transition into being an older sibling from the perspective of an adopted child and through adoption. It also reinforces the fact that they are a family built around love. These elements combine into a beautiful, loving story of a diverse, growing family.