Miguel's Community Garden

by JaNay Brown-Wood, Samara Hardy (Illustrator)

Overview

Miguel searches for sunflowers in his community garden in this vibrant exploration of growing food and healthy eating, from the Where in the Garden? series.

Miguel is throwing a party at his community garden for all of his friends, and he needs help searching for sunflowers to complete the celebration. What do we know about sunflowers? They're tall with petals and leaves—and, hold on, is that a sunflower? No, that's an artichoke. Where, oh, where could those sunflowers be? Can you help Miguel find them in time for his party?

The second title in the Where in the Garden? picture book series stars a young Latino boy who visits his community garden with his two dads to explore the fruits and vegetables growing there. Playful text guides young readers to hunt for visual clues and compare and contrast the unique characteristics of sunflowers against apricots, spinach, mushrooms, and other produce that grows in Miguel's community garden.

Artist Samara Hardy brings this multi-layered story to life with vivid, cheerful illustrations created from layers of hand painted ink and watercolor texture. Back matter includes a refreshing sunflower seed salad recipe for little chefs and their adult helpers to try together.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781682631669
Publisher:	Holiday House
Publication date:	03/01/2022
Series:	Where In the Garden? , #2
Pages:	32
Sales rank:	696,134
Product dimensions:	9.40(w) x 10.50(h) x 0.40(d)
Age Range:	3 - 7 Years

About the Author

JaNay Brown-Wood grew up with a passion for writing and drafted her first series of unpublished picture books in the second grade. After earning a BA in Psychology from UCLA, an MA in Child Development from CSU, and a PhD in Education from UC Davis, JaNay still loves storytelling! Her first book, Imani's Moon, was a NAESP Children's Book of the Year and a Reading Is Fundamental Multicultural Book Pick. She lives with her family in California.

Samara Hardy has always loved to draw. Unfortunately for her parents, this was often on their walls and furniture...with her mother's lipstick. Realizing she might make a career out of this, she graduated with a degree in Illustration from Falmouth University and has since illustrated all kinds of wonderful things from picture books to reusable bags. She spends her days scribbling away and drawing by the sea in England.

Editorial Reviews

01/21/2022

Gr 1–3—A charming, educational book about the plants that can grow in their gardens. Miguel needs to find sunflowers for his garden party. Readers learn what is unique about sunflowers and then follow Miguel around the community garden to find one. He goes through several plants that have similarities; in each case, he learns about a different one, and the quest continues. Many animal friends join him, and it happily leads to success, just in time for the garden party. Brown-Wood's words coupled with Hardy's illustrations create a colorful book for kids that centers on a Latinx child; not only is the book informative in the survey of a variety of plants children will find, but it offers further enticement in the form of a garden salad. VERDICT Perfect for introducing kids to nature and a taste of the garden-to-table experience. A great book for the green shelves.—David Roberts

School Library Journal

2022-03-30
Miguel encounters a plethora of fruits and vegetables while searching for the sunflowers that will decorate his community garden’s evening party.

In this cheerful second entry in the Where in the Garden? series, Brown-Wood first describes a sunflower’s attributes for her preschool audience: a tall, single, thick stem; yellow petals around a center with many seeds; large, pointy leaves that stick out. Readers join Miguel as he visits nine plant species, each of which shares a physical attribute with sunflowers. An apricot tree is tall but “much taller than a sunflower.” Celery “is thick in places” but has multiple stalks rather than one stem. A brief rain shower doesn’t daunt the yellow-slickered Miguel and his pet tortoise in their search. Hardy’s exuberant illustrations depict Miguel and his family, all of whom are brown-skinned, who are joined at the party by a redheaded White child using a wheelchair, a girl with Asian features, and Amara, the Black girl with twin Afro puffs from the series’ previous title. Illustrations done in Photoshop with layers of hand-painted ink and watercolor textures depict a cheery, thriving urban garden teeming with bees, ladybugs, birds, and earthworms for children to spot. Inviting, patterned endpapers dance with the fruits and veggies growing in the garden, and a recipe for sunflower seed salad rounds out the project. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

This appealing title delivers plant facts in a vibrant, harmonious setting. (Informational picture book. 2-6)

Kirkus Reviews

"A charming, educational book about the plants that can grow in their gardens. . . . Brown-Wood's words coupled with Hardy's illustrations create a colorful book for kids. . . . Perfect for introducing kids to nature and a taste of the garden-to-table experience. A great book for the green shelves."—School Library Journal

"[A] cheerful second entry in the Where in the Garden? series. . . . Illustrations done in Photoshop with layers of hand-painted ink and watercolor textures depict a cheery, thriving urban garden teeming with bees, ladybugs, birds, and earthworms for children to spot. . . . This appealing title delivers plant facts in a vibrant, harmonious setting."—Kirkus Reviews

"Hardy's colorful double-page spreads feature lots of garden detail and thoughtfully depict each plant feature Miguel examines. Along with the lesson on some basic plant biology, this book offers a breezy introduction to gardening."—Booklist

From the Publisher