America, My New Home

Illustrated by Ken Condon
From her Caribbean island birthplace, a young girl carries a dream and journeys to a new land that is at once puzzling, frightening, and inspiring. In twenty-three compelling poems, Jamaican-born poet Monica Gunning tells her immigrant's story with gentle humor, grace, and a child's sense of wonder. She describes a place where skyscrapers, rather than the moon, light the night; where people dress in woolens, ready for snow; where no one knows your name. Yet this same place offers exciting treasures: dizzying amusement park rides, stirring symphony concerts, flashy circus performers, towering cathedrals, and captivating art museums that speak to those who linger. Above all, this new land is place where "hope glows, a beacon / guiding ocean-deep dreamers / from storm surfs to shore."
Monica Gunning is the author of the NCTE National Book Not a Copper Penny in Me House: Poems from the Caribbean. Ms. Gunning lives in Laguna Beach, California. View titles by Monica Gunning
Ken Condon is the illustrator of Sky Scrape, City Scape: Poems of City Life, selected by Jane Yolen. He lives in Ashfield, Massachusetts. View titles by Ken Condon

About

From her Caribbean island birthplace, a young girl carries a dream and journeys to a new land that is at once puzzling, frightening, and inspiring. In twenty-three compelling poems, Jamaican-born poet Monica Gunning tells her immigrant's story with gentle humor, grace, and a child's sense of wonder. She describes a place where skyscrapers, rather than the moon, light the night; where people dress in woolens, ready for snow; where no one knows your name. Yet this same place offers exciting treasures: dizzying amusement park rides, stirring symphony concerts, flashy circus performers, towering cathedrals, and captivating art museums that speak to those who linger. Above all, this new land is place where "hope glows, a beacon / guiding ocean-deep dreamers / from storm surfs to shore."

Author

Monica Gunning is the author of the NCTE National Book Not a Copper Penny in Me House: Poems from the Caribbean. Ms. Gunning lives in Laguna Beach, California. View titles by Monica Gunning
Ken Condon is the illustrator of Sky Scrape, City Scape: Poems of City Life, selected by Jane Yolen. He lives in Ashfield, Massachusetts. View titles by Ken Condon

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