Someone builds the dream by Lisa Wheeler and Loren Long

 I don't really care for rhyming picture books and I've never been a fan of Loren Long's art, but for this particular topic I will take both and like them!

The scene opens with a winding river outside a city and a number of derelict structures. Advancing on the scene are three figures in safety gear and hard hats and their machines. "All across this great big world/jobs are getting done/by many hands in many lands./It takes much more than one."

This is the theme throughout the book; the importance, dignity, and beauty of labor. A diverse collection of race and gender is shown in the architects, planners, and artists who design things, and is echoed in the workers who build their dreams and make them reality. Working together, they build a house, a bridge, a playful fountain in a park, windmills for energy, an amusement park, and finally, a book. While a range of skin tones and implied genders is shown in the working crews and office jobs, only one person with a visible disability is shown (a man in a wheelchair working the printing press) and all the workers are shown as slim and fit, with muscled arms.

Long has a recognizable, classic style that has been used to re-illustrate a number of classic stories as well as popular series, usually showing idealized visions of small-town or rural America. Although this is certainly in that idealized mode, and Wheeler's rhyming text is rather heavy-handed, the combination is sure to attract parents and teachers who enjoy this type of book. The draw for me is the recognition of the labor force without creating boundaries between them and the readers. The neutral presentation allows kids to identify themselves and their families with either the dreamers or the builders. I keep thinking of Brian Floca's Keeping the city going which was beautiful but written from a viewpoint of privilege, assuming the readers were all staying home while "they" kept the city going. Here, all labor is celebrated and kids can be proud of their parents' contributions, whether they are the hands that build or the mind that dreams, as well as dreaming themselves of how they want to be part of the process in their own future.

Verdict: A timely and important book, which will work well as a read-aloud and encourage children to appreciate and value all labor. Recommended.

ISBN: 9781984814333; Published March 2021 by Dial; Borrowed from another library in my consortium; Purchased for the library