Fourth-grader Riley is a kid who loves lots of things: their parents, cousins, friends, all kinds of animals, making cool stuff (as well as messes), and being nonbinary. In this volume of the early chapter book series by Jay Albee (a pen name for Jen Breach and J. Anthony), Riley and friends Cricket and Lea go outside to be out of Riley’s dad’s way. After a stop at grandmotherly neighbor Toby’s house, they end up at a small community park named for the Hernández family. They wonder why the family has a park named for them. After some imaginative speculation about who they could be, and some further discussion about their favorite parks, they make friends with three neighborhood kids.
It turns out that Toby is the kids’ grandmother, and they’re all part of the Hernández family. Toby explains to Riley and friends that the park is named after her tata and abuela, who worked hard to support the people in the community. Riley, Cricket, and Lea help Toby and her family plant flowers in the park, and then everyone’s families join them for a neighborhood celebration.
Overall, this is a cheerful slice-of-life book with gentle lessons about friendship, community, and cooperation, and importantly, a nonbinary child being unconditionally accepted by family and friends.
Backmatter and More
Although this is a chapter book, not a picture book, comic-style illustrations at the chapter ends reflect the action of the story. Riley is biracial, with a Mexican mom and a White dad; Cricket reads as White, and Lea as Black. The Hernández family is Latinx. As with every book in the series, this one starts with two graphic-format pages titled “I’m Riley,” in which Riley introduces themselves, and two pages in which “Mx. Aude Teaches Helpful Terms,” giving definitions related to gender and queer identities. The latter might have worked better as backmatter, rather than slowing down the story with a pedagogical interruption (especially for those who have read other volumes in the series, with identical information), but this is good information to have nonetheless. Other than on those pages, however, gender identity is never mentioned, and Riley’s nonbinary identity is completely incidental to the story.
Actual backmatter includes discussion questions and writing prompts.
