A singular verse novel set across a series of moments on a day in the summer of 2020 is comprised of three sentences, or “Breaths,” sharply observed and deeply felt, set against sophisticated collage illustrations. In Breath One, the young, Black male narrator is feeling overwhelmed and isolated. The TV news tells stories of “another woman … another man … another kid my age…” while each member of his family is preoccupied, and the boy wonders if anyone who looks like him can live and breathe freely. In Breath Two, the boy worries about his dad, fevered and coughing in the next room, while his dad tries to reassure him he’ll be alright. In Breath Three, feeling like they’re all suffocating, the boy is searching for an oxygen mask when a TV commercial makes the hint of a laugh rise in his mother, “… and in that moment I realized … that maybe the oxygen mask was hidden on the hinges of my mother’s mouth … or in my brother’s PEW PEW sound effects or in my sister’s loopy handwriting or in my father’s relentless shoulders …” This quiet, monumental shift in perception is light seeping in; the boy feels a renewed hope in connection to and appreciation for his family members and their strength. Each page spread is composed of a handful of words set against the mixed-media illustrations, with myriad opportunities for meaning-making in the words and images and the relationship between them. (Age 12 and older)

A Caldecott Honor winner!

Prepare yourself for something unlike anything: A smash-up of art and text for teens that viscerally captures what it is to be Black. In America. Right Now. Written by #1 New York Times bestselling and award-winning author Jason Reynolds.

Jason Reynolds and his best bud, Jason Griffin, had a mind-meld. And they decided to tackle it, in one fell swoop, in about ten sentences, and 300 pages of art, this piece, this contemplation-manifesto-fierce-vulnerable-gorgeous-terrifying-WhatIsWrongWithHumans-hope-filled-hopeful-searing-Eye-Poppingly-Illustrated-tender-heartbreaking-how-The-HECK-did-They-Come-UP-with-This project about oxygen. And all of the symbolism attached to that word, especially NOW.

And so for anyone who didn’t really know what it means to not be able to breathe, REALLY breathe, for generations, now you know. And those who already do, you’ll be nodding yep yep, that is exactly how it is.