I was VERY excited to come across this book, and not just because it’s by Patricia MacLachlan (of Sarah, Plain and Tall fame). It’s just that you don’t often come across a book for kids featuring a mixed-race white and Asian family. Which seems nuts when you think about it because there are so damn many of us these days, and, well, we love books.
Of course, You Were the First isn’t explicitly about being a multiracial child of Asian or Pacific Islander descent (feel free to use the term hapa). The book, with lovely illustrations by Stephanie Graegin, is a prose poem that parents of any color can read aloud to help prepare their toddler for a baby on the way. It reminds the kid that they were the first to crawl, the first to sing, the “first to lift your head, to look at the trees and flowers and sky.” Underlying message: “Be nice to the new baby! She’s got nothin on you!”
There’s no plot here. It’s one of those sweet, sing-songy, soothing books that don’t need a plot. I love that it exists. Even if the publisher missed out on titling the book “You’re No Second Banana.” Ha ha.
The grandmother in this illustration is secretly debating whether the baby looks white or Asian. The mother in the picture knows exactly what her mother is thinking.
I’ve recently started a new project on Instagram devoted to hapa culture. Feel free to check it out @generationhapa
Love your blog. Wow – so much to discover. I am looking forward to reading more of your posts. Was searching for books with hapa children and Asian-White families and found this entry.
Another one I stumbled upon from the local library is “I Know It’s Autumn” by Eileen Spinelli and illustrated by Nancy Hayashi. It’s one of my hapa daughter’s favorites. Even though she is not yet 2, I think it means a lot to her to see our family represented in books. I bought “You Were the First” also, and it’s also one of her regular favorites at bedtime. Thank you for this blog and your wonderful work.
I love How My Parents Learned To Eat, but you’re right, books with Asian/White families are scarce. Far too scarce. And now my kids are growing up and marrying white kids (and having babies, the Italian/Chinese/mixedWhiteAmerican kids range from blondish to “did she adopt him from China?”) and I’m going to get that book because even though it doesn’t look like my grandkids’ family at all, it’s still inclusive and multicultural and actually, if you stick a Russian/French/Welsh grandma in the middle of that family picture, it does look like my grandkids’ family.