Just ask! : be different, be brave, be you

Justice Sonia Sotomayor and award-winning artist Rafael Lopez create a kind and caring book about the differences that make each of us unique.

A #1 New York Times bestseller!

Winner of the Schneider Family Book Award!

Feeling different, especially as a kid, can be tough. But in the same way that different types of plants and flowers make a garden more beautiful and enjoyable, different types of people make our world more vibrant and wonderful.

In Just Ask , United States Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor celebrates the different abilities kids (and people of all ages) have. Using her own experience as a child who was diagnosed with diabetes, Justice Sotomayor writes about children with all sorts of challenges--and looks at the special powers those kids have as well. As the kids work together to build a community garden, asking questions of each other along the way, this book encourages readers to do the same- When we come across someone who is different from us but we're not sure why, all we have to do is Just Ask .

Praise for Just Ask -

* "Addressing topics too often ignored, this picture book presents information in a direct and wonderfully child-friendly way." -- Booklist , *STARRED REVIEW*

"An affirmative, delightfully diverse overview of disabilities." -- Kirkus Reviews

"Ahopeful and sunny exploration of the many things that make us unique with dynamic and vibrant illustrations that emphasize each character's unique abilities. . . .A thoughtful and empathetic story of inclusion." -- SLJ

Author Notes

Sonia Sotomayor was born in the Bronx, New York on June 25, 1954. She graduated from Princeton University in 1976 and from Yale Law School in 1979. She worked as an assistant district attorney in New York and then at a law firm. From 1992 to 1998 she served as a judge of the U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York and from 1998 to 2009 on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. She became an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court on August 8, 2009. She is the author of the memoir My Beloved World.

(Bowker Author Biography)

Reviews (1)

Publisher's Weekly Review

Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor's (Turning Pages) experience as a child with juvenile diabetes spurred this meditation on the idea that we're all different. Using a compassionate, forthright tone, she engages the metaphor of a garden to explain how variation creates beauty: "Thousands of plants bloom together, but every flower, every berry, and every leaf is different... Kids are all different too." Extending the theme, artwork by López (The Day You Begin) shows children working together on a spacious garden. Starting with her own story and continuing with López's experience with asthma, Sotomayor next includes 12 additional characters with diverse experiences, such as dyslexia, a nut allergy, and Tourette's syndrome. The children introduce themselves, sometimes noting differences along a spectrum (Jordan and Tian, both autistic, communicate differently). Characters engage with readers, too; after describing how he gets around in a wheelchair, Anthony asks, "How do you get from place to place?" The title expresses Sotomayor's conviction that asking, far from being impolite, banishes isolation. If anyone doesn't "feel ready to explain," "I just ask my parents or my teachers and they help me to understand." A quiet musing about how "each of us has unique powers to share." Ages 4--8. (Sept.)

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Reviews (1)

Publisher's Weekly Review