Dream for the Land is a moving and ultimately hopeful look at how one family in the Southwestern U.S. works and dreams of rain during a megadrought.
A child with brown skin and messy pigtails chases bunnies away from crops on her family's small farm. But this is the second batch of tomatoes that looks "withered on the vine" and the squash is being destroyed by spider mites. When a horned toad "skitters across the soil," Pá demonstrates how to catch it, kiss its head, and make a wish. The hardworking family prunes and weeds, but the drought means clouds refuse to "burst open over [their] small farm." When Pá was a boy, this same land "used to be green as jewels" and he would swim in the "cobalt river"; now, the river is only a memory. The child realizes the family needs some magic: they find another horned toad and "plant a gentle kiss on his head," dreaming of "the world as it once was" and "the world as it could be."
Laekan Zea Kemp (Somewhere Between Bitter and Sweet) tells a tenderhearted story that depicts the hardships of tending a drought-stricken land yet maintains hope. Illustrator Leo Espinosa (Islandborn) uses pencil and Photoshop to illustrate both sweeping landscapes and intimate emotion; an earth-toned palette uses gentle colors that realistically show the stark climate. Though the child's situation is dire, the story ends optimistically. A powerful author's note points out that although the Southwest is experiencing its longest megadrought in 1,000 years, there are "Indigenous communities and other communities of color that know exactly what the earth needs to heal." --Lynn Becker, reviewer, blogger, and children's book author