Teach Your Children Well: Watercress by Andrea Wang

WE ARE IN THE OLD PONTIAC, THE RED PAINT FADED BY YEARS OF GLINTING OHIO SUN. THE CORNSTALKS MAKE LINES ZIGZAGGING ACROSS THE HORIZON.

"LOOK!"MY MOM SHOUTS--AND THE CAR COMES TO AN ABRUPT STOP.

"WATERCRESS!" THEIR VOICES ARE HEAVY WITH MEMORY.

The boy and girl in the car look at each other, while from deep in the trunk, their parents pull a paper bag and a pair of rusty scissors. Mom and Dad tell them to take off their socks and shoes and help them gather some strange green plants growing in the murky water in the ditch beside the road. It's called "watercress" in English, and it's something they remember eating in China.

The girl hates the cold water in the ditch, the mud squishing up between her toes, and pulling the soggy plants, some with tiny snails still clinging to them, out of the water and stuffing them into the bag. Their outing is forgotten as her parents happily load up their find and head for home to wash and cook their prize. The girl sulks to herself in the back seat with her brother.

ON THE DINNER TABLE THAT NIGHT IS A DISH OF WATERCRESS, GLISTENING WITH GARLICKY OIL AND FRECKLED WITH SESAME SEEDS.

THE MUD AND SNAILS ARE lONG GONE, BUT I STILL DON'T WANT TO EAT IT, THE GIRL THINKS.

Her parents point out that the watercress is fresh and free.

I SHAKE MY HEAD. FREE IS BAD. "I ONLY WANT TO EAT VEGETABLES FROM THE STORE," I SAID.

Mom sadly gets up and returns with an unfamiliar photo of her family--her parents with her and a younger brother.

"DURING THE FAMINE WE ATE ANYTHING WE COULD FIND. . . BUT IT WAS NOT ENOUGH," MOM SAID.

The girl is silent as she realizes that their mother's little brother must have died of starvation in the famine.

I LOOK AT THE DISH ON THE TABLE, AND I AM ASHAMED.

TOGETHER WE EAT IT ALL AND MAKE NEW MEMORIES OF WATERCRESS.

Andrea Wang's Watercress (Holiday House, 2021) is a poignant reminder that family stories matter, that we are all alive and here because of those who came before, and that there is an almost sacred meaning to the food that they provide to nurture us to live and grow. Wang's family story is especially relevant to recent immigrants, but all of us have ancestors whose struggles, however long ago, made our lives possible. Caldecott-winning artist Jason Chin provides the gentle realistic illustrations, justaposing the first generation children and their immigrant parents with the robust American corn in the field and the delicate wild plant on its own in the wayside, which remind us of all that sustains us.

Says Booklist, "The story reveals the chasms that can separate first-generation immigrant parents from their Americanized children and how confronting past traumas from another country and time can bring a family closer together. Chin’s illustrations masterfully bring to life the vast cornfields and colors of rural America."

It Began with Ah-Choo! Katie Woo Has the Flu by Fran Manushkin

Katy sneezes... and sneezes... and sneezes.

"I feel funny! My tummy hurts, too," says Katie Woo.

"I think you have a bug," said her mom.

Katie protests that she can't have bugs in the her tummy, but Mom explains that means that Katie must be sick with the flu.

Katie feels hot, and the thermometer shows she has a fever.

"Back to bed," said Mom. "No school for you."

And Katie Woo stays in bed all day. Mom brings her a bowl of soup and some toast for lunch, but it tastes awful. Katie feels too sick to eat. Mom brings her some pills that she says will make Katie feel better.

"Pills are such a pill!" moans Katie. She's so hot that she feels shivery. At last she falls asleep but her dreams are all bad dreams.

"Boo on the flu!"

But after a few days, Katie wakes up feeling better. Soup and toast taste like the best food in the world. She talks on the phone to her friend Jojo.

"I feel like new," says Katie Woo.

Illustrated by Tammie Lyon's winsome pictures of the little patient, Fran Manushkin's Katie Woo Has the Flu (Picture Window Books) gives her spunky heroine a chance to say Shoo to the Flu in this story of the inevitable sick days of the school year in this easy-reading story.   For a Woo duo, pair this one with Manushkin's Katie Woo, Where Are You?

Jie Jie! The Year of the Three Sisters by Andrea Cheng

In the middle of the night I hear a sound. It is Fan, trying to muffle her sobs in the pillow.

"Are you worried about your grandfather?" I whisper.

Fan looks at me in the dark. "Grandfather and Mama and.... Everything. And you and Andee."

She takes a deep breath. "Andee is your friend. And now you fight. It is my fault. Andee is not happy with me. I come to America for success. Not for fun. Andee is not patient."

"If she was patient, you would not be in America," I said.

When Andee and Anna visit their pen pal in China, they find that Fan has had to stop school and work as a hotel waitress to help support her migrant family in the city. Andee instantly decides that Fan should come to school in America for a year to gain the fluency in English that will open up opportunities for a better job in the hotel.

Andee's mother arranges everything, but when Fan arrives and moves in with Andee's family, Anna can see that things are not working out between her two friends. Andee is impetuous and talks too fast, and Fan refuses to join in family fun, constantly studying by herself with her door closed. Anna tries to help, but for once Andee won't talk to her, and Fan is stubborn and unwilling to change. The dream of a year of the three sisters isn't coming true for them.

But when Fan's beloved grandfather dies, in her grief she opens up to her American sisters, confessing how lonely and homesick she is, how strange she feels in Andee's big house and in her big high school, so different from her life at home. Even Andee listens, and the empathetic Anna reveals that she is lonely in middle school, too, with Andee now at high school. Andee confesses that even she feels alone, too, in her new school. The three girls see that they are all in new situations that make them feel isolated, but that their distance from each other is also a cause of their loneliness.

Andrea Cheng's fourth book in her Anna Wang series, The Year of the Three Sisters (An Anna Wang novel) (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2015), shows best friends Anna and Andee moving into adolescence and experiencing the changes that time has brought to their relationship, and when they think about how many more changes Fan is going through, they find a way to make their friendship grow strong again. Author Cheng reveals the feelings of her characters skillfully in their own thoughts and words, a technique that helps readers interpret the emotions that come with changes. Most young adolescents feel like "strangers in a strange land" at times, that sense of living in two different worlds that children of immigrants feel in spades, and Cheng's novels provide a window into that world. "Cultural details are woven skillfully throughout, while [Patrice] Barton's comely illustrations add to the overall appeal. Another winner!" says School Library Journal.

Earlier books in this series are The Year of the Baby (An Anna Wang novel), The Year of the Book (An Anna Wang novel), and The Year of the Fortune Cookie (An Anna Wang novel).

For stories of slightly younger Chinese-American protagonists, there are also Newbery author Grace Lin's notable Pacy Lin books. (See reviews here.)