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AS GOOD AS ANYBODY by Richard Michelson Kirkus Star

AS GOOD AS ANYBODY

Martin Luther King Jr. and Abraham Joshua Heschel’s Amazing March Toward Freedom

by Richard Michelson & illustrated by Raúl Colón

Pub Date: May 13th, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-375-83335-9
Publisher: Knopf

Two boys, one an African-American, one a Polish Jew, learn from their fathers’ pride and self-respect. Martin’s father believes in looking up instead of down: “The way things are is not the way they always have to be.” Abraham’s father tells him to “walk like a prince, not a peasant . . . we are all God’s children. You are as good as anybody.” Martin experiences the discrimination of his Southern town with “whites only” laws. Abraham witnesses the persecution of his Jewish community as the Nazis rise to power. As adults, Reverend King Jr. and Rabbi Heschel heed their parental guidance, coming together to work for America’s struggle in the civil-rights movement in this powerful, fictionalized account of 1965’s Selma-to-Montgomery march. Colón’s softly textured colored pencil-and-watercolor illustrations render the early Southern scenes in brown/yellow tones and the European settings in blue/green; the colors blend together in the final pages, bringing out the diversity of skin tones in the march for equality. Gentle, powerful and healing. (Picture book. 7-10)