Dreamers

We are resilience. We are hope. We are dreamers.

Yuyi Morales brought her hopes, her passion, her strength, and her stories with her, when she came to the United States in 1994 with her infant son. She left behind nearly everything she owned, but she didn't come empty-handed.

Dreamers is a celebration of making your home with the things you always carry: your resilience, your dreams, your hopes and history. It's the story of finding your way in a new place, of navigating an unfamiliar world and finding the best parts of it. In dark times, it's a promise that you can make better tomorrows.

This lovingly-illustrated picture book memoir looks at the myriad gifts migrantes bring with them when they leave their homes. It's a story about family. And it's a story to remind us that we are all dreamers, bringing our own strengths wherever we roam. Beautiful and powerful at any time but given particular urgency as the status of our own Dreamers becomes uncertain, this is a story that is both topical and timeless.
The lyrical text is complemented by sumptuously detailed illustrations, rich in symbolism. Also included are a brief autobiographical essay about Yuyi's own experience, a list of books that inspired her (and still do), and a description of the beautiful images, textures, and mementos she used to create this book.

Born in Xalapa, Mexico, where she currently resides, Yuyi Morales lived for many years in the San Francisco Bay Area, where she still maintains close relations with booksellers and librarians. Professional storyteller, dancer, choreographer, puppeteer, and artist, she has won the prestigious Pura Belpré Award for Illustration five times, for Just a Minute: A Trickster Tale and Counting Book (2003), Los Gatos Black on Halloween (2006), Just in Case: A Trickster Tale and Spanish Alphabet Book (2008), Niño Wrestles the World (2013), and Viva Frida (2014), also a Caldecott Honor Book.

★ Many books about immigration describe the process of making new friends and fitting in; this one describes what it's like to become a creative being in two languages, and to learn to love in both. 'We are two languages./ We are lucha./ We are resilience./ We are hope.'-- Publishers Weekly, Starred Review

★ An immigrant's tale steeped in hope, dreams, and love. . . . Details in the art provide cultural markers specific to the U.S., but the story ultimately belongs to one immigrant mother and her son. Thanks to books and stories (some of her favorites are appended), the pair find their voices as 'soñadores of the world.' A resplendent masterpiece.-- Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review

★ Every page of Dreamers vibrates with energy, depicting the emotions, the turmoil, the stress and the joy that come with creating a new life.-- Shelf Awareness, Starred Review

Morales tells, through illustrations that seem to dance and sing, the story of crossing borders on a bridge of language with her young son. Together they discover picture books and public libraries, and the gifts they brought with them -- open hearts, art, poetry and stories -- blossom. --The Washington Post, Best Books of 2018

• Winner of the Pura Belpré Illustrator Award!
• A New York Times / New York Public Library Best Illustrated Book
• A New York Times Bestseller
• Recipient of the Flora Stieglitz Strauss Award
• A 2019 Boston Globe – Horn Book Honor Recipient
• An Anna Dewdney Read Together Honor Book
• Named a Best Book of 2018 by Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly, School Library Journal, Shelf Awareness, NPR, the Boston Globe, the Chicago Tribune, Salon.com– and many more!