Uptown is one young boy’s impressions, descriptions, and tour of Harlem, New York.  Each page is one sentence with an impression or fact.  The next sentence is an explanation of the previous sentence.  It tells the things important to this child’s view of his world: what he notices and what he has been taught.  It is a child’s understanding of his unique and diverse neighborhood.  It is his home from his perspective.  From School Library Journal, “Looking from his window high above the sights and sounds of the city, the young narrator concludes, "Uptown is Harlem-Harlem world, my world. Uptown is home." From his perspective, it's the very best place to be, and readers will find it difficult to disagree.”

Uptown is recommended for K-4.  It is an excellent book to expose non-black students to a new culture and world.  The descriptive comparisons in text would let someone only hearing the story see the city in their mind’s eye.  An example, “Uptown is a row of brownstones.  I like the way they come together when you look at them down the block.  They look like they’re made of chocolate.”  The text is colorful and typed in different designs on each page to represent what it is describing. From School Library Journal, “Each note floats through the air and lands like a butterfly" are printed in bright yellow and blue on a deep red background.”  Children’s Literature says, “The brief text becomes part of the overall page design, often set in color with meandering lines.”

The text is precise and lean but is complimented beautifully by the complex, diverse watercolors and collage pictures.  They illustrate what the boy is trying to describe like looking through a window.  The illustrations look like photos.  School Library Journal states, “Collier's evocative watercolor-and-collage illustrations create a unique sense of mood and place. Bold color choices for text as well as background pages complement engagingly detailed pictures of city life.”  The pictures also capture the rhythm of a city.

Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award Winner