Written by: Michael Dahl

Illustrated by: Omar Lozano

For ages: 4 years and up

Language: English 

Topics Covered: Family, Superhero, Love, Kindness, Compassion, Education, Strength, Global Community, LGBTQ Families.

Summary: This book embodies the third characteristic we wish to take into 2020: Family (Chosen and/or Biological)! This book pairs superhero traits with traits families and individuals can take into their daily lives to help others and be the best they can be for their community.

We really like how the book it setup, one page showing DC superheroes helping and the other showing a regular family doing the same.  Standing up to bullies, cleaning up their community, a dad staying home with his kids while their mother goes to work.  The narratives are showing real, diverse, and multifaceted look at the families that make up our community.  The juxtaposition between the two world, DC and real, shows readers that they can be real-life superheroes and help others (whether that be welcoming someone to dinner or showing strength through a hard time.

One thing we wish from this book: On the jacket flap it says the families in the book are based on real life diverse families, and we wish they were pictured!  Recognizing the families maybe in a compilation in the back, actual photos and names, or something else would have really tied the whole book together and drawn parallels to the real world.

This book was sent to us by Capstone for consideration in the Best Books of 2019 List put on by the Read With River book club, but all opinions are our own!

About the Author & the Illustrator:

Michael Dahl is the author of more than 100 books for children and young adults. He loves to write mysteries His five-book Finnegan Zwake mystery series published by Simon & Schuster won rave reviews. He also wrote a creepy series called The Library of Doom and another called Dragonblood. His nonfiction has won the AEP Distinguished Achievement Award three times. Not once, or twice, but three times! His Finnegan Zwake books were shortlisted for the Edgar and the Anthony Mystery Awards twice. He speaks at schools, libraries, and conferences across the country on graphic novels, mysteries, and books for boys, and has been a featured speaker at ALA, AASL, NYAEC, TLA, NOLA, EncycloMedia and IRA.

From Omar Lozano’s website:

Hello there and welcome to my portfolio!

My Name is Omar, commonly known as ‘Omarito’. I started my professional career as assistant for colors in a studio called Graphikslava where we used to paint comic books for Marvel, DC, IDW and Stonearch. There I had the chance to work as illustrator in the remake of the 90’s mexican comic ‘Ultrapato’ (Ultraduck) and right after that I had the chance to enter CGBot where I worked mostly making art for mobile games. Then I became freelancing for various companies being Capstone the one I have worked with the most, making several children books with them led me to the chance to work in some DC IP’s such as Wonder Woman, Superman and Supergirl. Recently I have worked on ‘Valiants’ (Again a remake of a 90’s Mexican comic book and spin-off of Ultraduck). As of now I’m still loking to give my best in each book or character I make!