In the 2018 book, when Julián’s imaginings lead to dressing up as an adored mermaid, Julián’s abuela (grandmother) offers a necklace and they go to a festival of adults dressed as mermaids (modeled after the actual Coney Island Mermaid Parade). Love moves between Julián’s imaginings and the details of the real world with grace. She does start the story with “This is a boy named Julián,” so it seems more about a gender creative boy than a transgender girl—but of course, readers can imagine Julián’s future in many possible directions, with growing maturity and self-awareness.
The Klaus Flugge Prize was launched in 2016 by influential picture book publisher Klaus Flugge, who founded Andersen Press in 1976. This year’s judges were effusive in their praise of Love and Julián. Former Children’s Laureate and multi-award-winning illustrator Anthony Browne said, “Julián is a Mermaid is an astonishingly beautiful book. It’s amazing to realise this is Jessica Love’s first attempt. She has quickly realised how picture books work—the understated words fit so brilliantly with the stunning illustrations, never getting in the way, never trying to do the same job. It’s a perfect picture book.”
Fellow judge Farrah Serroukh, of The Centre for Literacy in Primary Education, added, “The illustrations say things that it would be difficult for words alone to express. The layers of meaning that can be inferred through each spread are rich, sophisticated and plentiful. Quite simply, it is a stunningly beautiful, heart-warming debut.”
I wanted to give kids who identify with Julian a chance to see themselves reflected, but I also wanted kids who don’t identify with him a chance to get inside his experience and feel what it might be like.
This isn’t the first prize for Julián; it also won the 2019 Stonewall Book Award from the American Library Association. Love, an actor as well as an author and illustrator, told the Flugge Prize team that the book was partly inspired by a trans friend of hers and questions about how to explain his transformation to younger family members. “It got me curious about what sort of literature there was out there for families looking to have conversations with their children about identity, and how sometimes a person has to do a little more work to create the proper cover for their own book. I wanted to make something that didn’t feel didactic but that gave children a chance to experience this character’s inner life and identify with it. I wanted to give kids who identify with Julian a chance to see themselves reflected, but I also wanted kids who don’t identify with him a chance to get inside his experience and feel what it might be like.”
In an interview with the Guardian, Love explained further that when she first met her partner’s older brother, he had recently transitioned, “so a lot of the stuff that comes up in a family when one member transitions was still sort of fresh.” Additionally, her aunt and aunt’s wife were “two very visible queer role models” and “the effective heads of the Love family,” she said. “I never knew a world without strong, gay role models and I’ve seen the impact that has had on the second generation of my family. I wanted to make a book that provided that kind of support and pride of place, but quietly; subtly.”
She also said she is working on another book about Julián and his grandmother. I can’t wait!
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