"Viewing literature through a lens of windows and mirrors helps us understand that, in addition to texts being stories to be enjoyed, they are powerful tools of social justice" (Everett).

The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo

Winner of the National Book Award for Young People's Literature, the Printz Award, and the Pura Belpré Author Award.

Click on the cover image to access the publisher's website for more information about this book.

Recommended for ages 13 and up by Common Sense Media.

"Books are sometimes windows, offering views of worlds that may be real or imagined, familiar or strange. These windows are also sliding glass doors, and readers have only to walk through in imagination to become part of whatever world has been created and recreated by the author. When lighting conditions are just right, however, a window can also be a mirror. Literature transforms human experience and reflects it back to us, and in that reflection we can see our own lives and experiences as part of the larger human experience. Reading, then, becomes a means of self-affirmation, and readers often seek their mirrors in books" (qtd. in Harris).

Everett, Chad. "Windows and Mirrors: Why We Need Diverse Books." ReaderLeader
Blog, Scholastic, www.scholastic.com/bookfairs/readerleader/windows-and-mirrors-why-we-need-diverse-books. Accessed 13 Nov. 2017.

Harris, Violet J. "In Praise of a Scholarly Force: Rudine Sims Bishop."
Language Arts, vol. 85, no. 2, Nov. 2007, pp. 153-59. NCTE, www.ncte.org/library/NCTEFiles/Resources/Journals/LA/0852-nov07/LA0852Profiles.pdf.
Accessed 13 Nov. 2017.