The Life of Augusta Baker,
Librarian and Master Storyteller
A TRUE TALE WITH
A CHERRY ON TOP
Dial Books for Young Readers
(Penguin Random House)
(pub. 2.6.2024)
40 pages
Ages 5-8
Author: Breanna J. McDaniel
Illustrator: April Harrison
Character: Augusta Baker
Overview:
"Before Augusta Braxton Baker became a storyteller, she was an excellent story listener. Her grandmother brought stories like Br’er Rabbit and Arthur and Excalibur to life, teaching young Augusta that when there’s a will, there’s always a way.
When she grew up, Mrs. Baker began telling her own fantastical stories to children at the 135th Street branch of the New York Public Library in Harlem. But she noticed that there were hardly any books at the library featuring Black people in respectful, uplifting ways. Thus began her journey of championing books, writers, librarians, and teachers centering Black stories, educating and inspiring future acclaimed authors like Audre Lorde and James Baldwin along the way.
As Mrs. Baker herself put it: 'Children of all ages want to hear stories. Select well, prepare well and then go forth and just tell.'"
Tantalizing taste:
"She decided to use her voice - not just to share the stories she already knew, but to search out new ones, and even create some of her own.
Augusta remembered how the heroes in her grandmother's stories sometimes started out at the bottom but would rise up!
She wanted Black children to have heroes that rose up and looked, talked and shined bright ... just like them."
And something more: In the Author's Note, Breanna J. McDaniel shares a photo of herself with her childhood librarian, Ms. Michelle Carnes (to whom she dedicates the book) and explains: "Standing cheek-to-cheek with a woman who had known me when I was a young, passionate-about-everything girl and had, with her guidance and grace, helped me grow into the scholar and writer I am today, I fully understood why Audre Lourde adored Augusta Baker so much. Ms. Baker had taught her to read. She had saved her life, just as my own librarian had saved mine."
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