Making it in America

Carmela Full of Wishes By Matt de la Peña; illustrated by Christian Robinson (Putnam; 40 pages; $17.99; ages 4-8)

The same team that collaborated on the Newbery winner “On Market Street” is back with another picture book focused on a loving family of little means. Plot: At 7, Carmela gets her birthday wish: to finally scooter to town with her big brother. But he doesn’t want her tagging along to the laundromat, vegetable stand and bodega. She is annoying. Still, he comes to the rescue when her chance at a “dandelion” wish is almost lost. Child-like collaged paintings place Carmela near the farm fields her father once worked, while several pages with Mexican papel picado represent wishful thinking: that her father returns home, his papers fixed, and that her mother sleeps in a fancy hotel bed, not just makes it. Graceful writing further helps transform a testy sibling relationship into something better in one hard-pressed, hardworking Latino family.

Countdown: 2979 Days to the Moon By Suzanne Slade; illustrated by Thomas Gonzalez (Peachtree; 144 pages; $22.95; ages 10 and up)

Learn from mistakes. That is an underlying theme in this stunning album about the significance of the Apollo program. On every page, daring and danger commingle, beginning in 1961 when President Kennedy commits to landing a man on the moon within the decade through July 1969 when Neil Armstrong steps onto the lunar surface. With the makings of a great readaloud, dramatic free verse recalls the trials (continual testing), tragedies (assassination and fatal fire), teamwork (400,000 people worldwide), and ultimate triumph, summed up in a heart-stopping declaration: “The Eagle has landed.” Glorious multimedia spreads balance “the need for accuracy with the need to display the power of experience.” And that experience feels immediate — nerves of steel, claustrophobic spacecraft interiors, celestial views, and monumental achievement. What a stellar way to celebrate the upcoming 50th anniversary of the first manned moon mission.

Blended By Sharon Draper

(Atheneum; 312 pages; $16.99; ages 8-12)

With a wealthy black father and a working-class white mother, caramel-colored Isabella is a blend, but, surprisingly, this coming-of-age novel is about much more than being biracial. Out front is her parents’ divorce. Simply put, they are childish, and their 11-year-old daughter is the victim of ridiculous acrimony. In alternating Mom/Dad chapters, they rigidly divide custody each week, leaving Isabella unsure of her identity. From front-page news, two incidents amplify the drama — one at school, involving a noose, and the other on the street, involving racial profiling and gunhappy police. It’s scary to see what happens to Isabella and her A-plus, soon-to-be stepbrother. (Harvard, maybe?) Add in subplots around Isabella’s love for piano and parental weddings, and the result is a layered page-turner that illuminates the dangers of anger and assumptions at home and in the wider world.

Ode to an Onion By Alexandria Giardino; illustrated by Felicita Sala (Cameron Kids; 40 pages; $17.95; ages 5-8)

Gloomy versus hopeful. Therein lies the timeless tension between Nobel Laureate Pablo Neruda and his wife-to-be in this lovingly envisioned and supremely handsome book. Focused on “miners who do very hard work,” the socially conscious poet struggles to enjoy his Matilde’s sumptuous garden of fennel, peaches, tomatoes, garlic and the like. Neruda: As for onions, they only make you cry. Matilde: But aren’t they beautiful? With her cajoling, Neruda comes to see the onion as more luminous than lowly and then does what a poet does best. He pens an ode, printed in English and Spanish at book’s end. Rich paintings tap into a range of emotion from moody to merry with see-through onionskin pages as bookends, front and back. And so this rather sophisticated story presents a life-affirming paradox: that it’s possible to feel downhearted and happy at the same time.

Blue By Laura Vaccaro Seeger

(Roaring Brook; 40 pages; $17.99; ages 3-6)

Ever feel blue? This nuanced concept book gives blue its due along many emotions. Fabulously textured acrylic-oncanvas paintings present shades like berry, ocean, sky, stormy and midnight. Terrific vision and vocabulary builder! But previewed and reviewed through clever die-cuts, each gorgeous spread also advances a tender story, clarified by two-word labels. It is sweet to watch a baby and Lab pup grow up and older together until the inevitable happens. A teenage boy is seen cradling his “old dog.” Also lovely is what happens next: The boy encounters a girl and her new pup. Gently acknowledged: death, grief, healing, and renewal. But this heartfelt companion to the Caldecott Honor Book “Green” is not just for sad times as a tool for bibliotherapy. Rather, “Blue” is for any time, to nurture understanding when it comes to the life cycle, here color-coded.

Eliza: The Story of Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton By Margaret McNamara; illustrated by Esmé Shapiro (Schwartz & Wade; 48 pages; $17.99; ages 4-8)

"Hamilton” is coming back to town. (The musical opens in February.) Kids lucky enough to score a ticket or fan enough to know every song will relish this portrait of the founding father’s wife. Here, at 97, Eliza has lived to tell her own story in a lengthy letter like those popular in her day. Addressed to an unborn great-grandchild, it is imagined but filled with facts about her privilege, pain and philanthropy. Naive Colonial-style art captures time and place. Hamilton’s affair and the duels that ruin their lives come up in rich back matter. For 50 years, the widowed Eliza raises money for the Washington Monument, speaks against slavery, preserves her husband’s legacy, and founds the first orphanage in New York City. This fine portrait rightfully glorifies the “best of wives, best of women” and her young nation, too.