Something Great … is simply great! A nonbinary child stars in this story of STEM thinking, creativity, and friendship that refreshingly is not “about” their queer identity. Author/illustrator Jeanette Bradley was kind enough to share a little about her inspiration and influences.
Quinn, the young nonbinary child who stars in Something Great (Levine Querido), has created Something Great in their workshop. It might look like a plastic half-gallon milk bottle on a string, but to Quinn, it’s something that can swing, spin, and even sing (as they blow air across the top). Their sister and mother don’t understand, however. What is it supposed to be? To Quinn, however, “it wasn’t supposed to be anything. It was just . . . itself. Something Great.” Undeterred, Quinn continues to discover all the things it can do, like glow with rainbow light or cast shadows of things placed inside.
A new child in the neighborhood asks to play with it, too, and together she and Quinn find even more things Something Great can be—like a pulley, an elevator, a beat keeper, and a bug catcher. It could even be … a friend finder (but I won’t spoil things by telling you how).
Bradley told me that the original idea for the story came from a maker art class she was teaching for young kids. She explained, “Most of the kids were goal-oriented with their creations, and would tell me ‘I’m making a giraffe!’ or ‘I’m making a roller coaster!’ But one student spent the whole class experimenting with a few objects and some string, discovering what adults would call simple machines. When I asked him to tell me about his creation, he said ‘It’s just… a thing. LOOK WHAT IT CAN DO!’ I loved this kid’s process-driven approach to exploring the world and thinking creatively. I aspire to be like him when I grow up.”
The first draft, she said, “was more of a creative nonfiction exploration of simple machines. (It also starred zombie chickens!) But over time, and many revisions, the emotional core of the story became more important—and human—and I switched to fiction. I did deliberately include many layers, including the experience of creating something and putting it into the world that is not understood or valued by others, and the amazing experience of finding someone who ‘gets your weird.'”
Bradley keeps the text delightfully simple and direct, letting her charming mixed-media illustrations convey much of the characters’ feelings. Quinn has a round face, expressive eyes, and an undercut. They also wear jeans, pink slip-on shoes, and a button-up shirt with a pattern that careful readers will realize is graph paper—a texture Bradley also subtly uses in the background of some scenes, reinforcing the idea that there is science and engineering pervading our world and ourselves, should we only take the time to notice. The STEM lessons here are gentle, though, showing rather than telling about the forces and principles at work. When Quinn swings Something Great in a circle around them, for example, Bradley shows a swath of planets and stars in its path. (See more about the science behind the book in this video from the publisher.)
While the emphasis may be on STEM, elements of some scenes, notably the trees, are made of strips of text cut from classic children’s books, perhaps hinting at the stories in all that surrounds us. I asked Bradley about these snippets, and she explained that her sources and inspiration came from her own childhood and family. “I wanted the yellowed, stained look of an old, old book for my tree bark, and also needed texts that were out of copyright,” she said. “I used the childhood books of my great-aunt Jane, who always encouraged me to become a writer. She even bought me a kid’s typewriter and a typesetting kit so I could create my own newspapers when I was a kid.
“Some of the other papers I used are old drawings of mine that I did in kindergarten, on that school ‘manilla’ paper that yellows around the edges, and cardboard my daughter painted in March 2020, when we built a cardboard theater together. While I didn’t have a conscious message in mind, I was seeking out collage materials that reminded me of creating and making as a child.”
While her original intent was for a STEM book, Bradley said, “I kept switching the gender of the main character of Something Great back and forth from male to female and the story was just not quite coming together. I realized that I was writing a story about a kid who doesn’t see value in labels and stubbornly resists answering the question ‘what’s it supposed to be?’ The story wasn’t working with either gender I was assigning the main character because Quinn was agender. Once I made that change, the layers of the story clicked into place together.”
It makes sense that Quinn, a nonbinary child, is frustrated with those who want to label Something Great and is happy simply exploring its possibilities. We need more books with nonbinary and other LGBTQ characters that aren’t “about” being LGBTQ (since we already have a number that are), but that nevertheless feel like they authentically represent the way that LGBTQ people may move in the world. Add Something Great enthusiastically to this list.
Bradley added, “There is a need for all kinds of queer stories. There are kids for whom coming out today is similar to my experience of coming out in the 90s in a conservative evangelical community who need stories of surviving queer trauma. There are also kids like mine, children of two moms who have grown up in a supportive environment with a diversity of queer people, who don’t relate to traumatic coming out stories or stories of discrimination and hardship because they have not lived those experiences. All kids deserve stories of queer joy, and of queer everyday life!”
“I am lucky enough to have a nonbinary child and a nonbinary critique partner,” she added. “They are both incredible artists and writers, and I am grateful to them for their feedback throughout the process of creation!”
She also observed that everyone may read something different into the story and the characters, noting, “This book isn’t an issue book, or a book that is explicitly ‘about’ identity. I see Quinn as a neurodivergent kid who approaches the world a little differently than the rest of their family and their neighborhood, but others may not read that into the story. And that is totally OK!”
I’d say it’s more than OK. It’s great.
This post is part of a book tour with Hear Our Voices, which “hosts diverse book tours across multiple platforms for marginalized authors and readers who want equitable and inclusive representation across all genres in an era that challenges literary freedom.”