Multicultural Children’s Book Day (#ReadYourWorld)
Librarian Laura’s Review of Definitely Daphne by Tami Charles
Definitely Daphne is a delightful new middle grade novel by Tami Charles. It is a perfect choice for Multicultural Children’s Book Day, as it is filled with characters of all colors, backgrounds, and histories.
Seventh-grader Annabelle Daphne Louis, known as “Belle” to her family, has always been home-schooled because she’s moved so many times. Her mother is a Master Sargent in the Air Force and she’s lived in Germany and the UK. Recently, she was uprooted from Germany and brought to live in her mom’s hometown of Linden, New Jersey, all the way across the world from her best friend Mae, a Japanese girl she befriended on the Air Force base in the UK. Now she “sees” Mae during an almost daily Facetime session and through near-constant texting. Annabelle is tech-savvy and smart; her favorite thing to do in her free time is shoot Youtube videos in her girl cave. Black with Puerto Rican roots, Annabelle is very cultured and accepting of others different from her. She also can speak more than three languages, thanks to being a military kid. Now she is going to attend an actual school for the first time because her mom has to go to Afghanistan on an assignment and her father just landed a huge client at his tech company. She starts school at McManus where she sticks out like a sore thumb as the “new kid from Germany” with the weird clothes and funny accent.
When she asks to quit school after a very stressful first day, her mom suggests bringing her to therapy. Her therapist, Dr. Varma, actually “gets” her feelings and suggests that she start a vlog in order to help her acclimate to her new school and make friends. To keep her anonymity, she dresses in disguise and goes by her middle name, Daphne, and “Daphne Doesn’t” is born. Her first vlog becomes an almost instant internet sensation, which surprises Annabelle, as well as her family and best friend Mae.
She does make some true friends at McManus, other unique kids who don’t really fit in with the popular group: John, Clairna, and Navdeep. But when popular, beauty queen Rachael starts giving her attention for all the wrong reasons, Belle begins ditching her real friends in order to “fit in” with the “it” crowd. Along the way she loses her uniqueness that her three new friends love about her. When someone finds out that Annabelle is actually the popular internet video queen “Daphne,” Belle must decide how to handle the fame & popularity without losing her own identity and true friends in the process.
This is a wonderful story of family, friendship, and navigating the curve balls life throws at kids sometimes. The characters are unique and feel very real. The story line moves along rather quickly and is very humorous in places. I really enjoyed Annabelle’s story and I know you will too!
Thank you to the publisher for providing me with the review copy of this title.
Multicultural Children’s Book Day 2019 (1/25/19) is in its 6th year and was founded by Valarie Budayr from Jump Into A Book and Mia Wenjen from PragmaticMom. Our mission is to raise awareness of the ongoing need to include kids’ books that celebrate diversity in homes and school bookshelves while also working diligently to get more of these types of books into the hands of young readers, parents and educators.
MCBD 2019 is honored to have the following Medallion Sponsors on board!
*View our 2019 Medallion Sponsors here: https://wp.me/P5tVud-
*View our 2019 MCBD Author Sponsors here: https://wp.me/P5tVud-2eN
Medallion Level Sponsors
MCBD 2019 is honored to have the following Author Sponsors on board
We’d like to also give a shout-out to MCBD’s impressive CoHost Team who not only hosts the book review link-up on celebration day, but who also works tirelessly to spread the word of this event. View our CoHosts HERE.
Co-Hosts and Global Co-Hosts
A Crafty Arab, Agatha Rodi Books, All Done Monkey, Barefoot Mommy, Biracial Bookworms, Books My Kids Read, Crafty Moms Share, Colours of Us, Discovering the World Through My Son’s Eyes, Descendant of Poseidon Reads, Educators Spin on it, Growing Book by Book, Here Wee Read, Joy Sun Bear/ Shearin Lee, Jump Into a Book, Imagination Soup,Jenny Ward’s Class, Kid World Citizen, Kristi’s Book Nook, The Logonauts, Mama Smiles, Miss Panda Chinese, Multicultural Kid Blogs, Raising Race Conscious Children, Shoumi Sen, Spanish Playground
TWITTER PARTY Sponsored by Make A Way Media: MCBD’s super-popular (and crazy-fun) annual Twitter Party will be held 1/25/19 at 9:00pm.E.S.T. TONS of prizes and book bundles will be given away during the party. GO HERE for more details.
FREE RESOURCES From MCBD
Free Multicultural Books for Teachers: http://bit.ly/1kGZrta
Free Empathy Classroom Kit for Homeschoolers, Organizations, Librarians and Educators: http://multiculturalchildrensbookday.com/teacher-classroom-empathy-kit/
Hashtag: Don’t forget to connect with us on social media and be sure and look for/use our official hashtag #ReadYourWorld.
Originally published in Library Journal, August 2018.
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