Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC of 21 Cousins. I requested this book we are a bilingual Spanish/English family, and because it’s about family!

As others have said, there are some hits and some misses.

Hits:
- the language!
-the cousins are all physically diverse: tall, short, light skin, dark skin, straight hair, curly hair, a cousin using a wheelchair and a cousin with Down’s Syndrome.
- all the sports!
-the portrayal of family supporting family!
-the inclusion of the word mestizo
- I LOVED the conclusion.

Misses:
-I felt that it was fine to mention that the cousin with Down’s Syndrome, Beto, needed extra help, but more should’ve been written about him
-and a missed opportunity to talk about emotional characteristics and values instead of sports and accomplishments.
-there’s a discussion of a cousin who was possibly obese and that he dieted to avoid diabetes- I didn’t care for that.

Overall, I would buy this book for my child, and I would probably add in other things about Beto and just not read the page about Gonzalo. I don’t see anything wrong with explaining that a child with special needs might require extra help and go to a special class; this is often true for special needs children and it needs to be talked about if we’d ever like the bullying around it to go away.. but I do wish Beto had additional traits and that Gonzalo’s weight wasn’t mentioned in that way.

21 Cousins is a book that shows diversity within a family. I enjoyed how it shows everyone can be so different and still be close and love one another. 21 Cousins highlights a multitude of differences people can have and shows how it is an amazing, unique characteristic. I really enjoyed this title for the intended purpose.

I just reviewed 21 Cousins by Diane De Anda. #21Cousins #NetGalley

It’s great to see a book that I can really relate to. Coming from a big family, sometimes it’s hard to remember people. The book allowed be to see beyond the names and remember people based on who they are and maybe how they make me feel to. ;)

Fantastic concept celebrating differences with great integration of Spanish words into a primarily English text. However, there is a strong focus on physical characteristics and accomplishments, rather than social and emotional attributes like kindness or generosity. The end result is some problematic stereotypes. A portion on Beto, a child with Downs syndrome, mainly portrays him in terms of disability and “needing help” which is disappointing. The focus on a “special diet” for Gonzalo (it is incredibly rare for a child to be placed on a “diet”) and use of his weight as his defining characteristic is immensely problematic.

This book has a great premise, but there are a few misses among the hits. While the depiction of a child who uses a wheelchair was handled well, the cousin who has down syndrome is described almost entirely in terms of his disability, for example. The illustrations were really wonderful, but the content was not always on par.

I was disappointed by this book. It lacks a real story and the descriptions of the cousins are sometimes painful to read. It hurts to write this review. I have more first cousins than I can count and I really wanted to love this book.

I loved the illustrations and the idea of this story but found a couple of parts to be a little problematic. Overall it was okay. I will not be purchasing this one for my classroom, though.

I like the premise of this book - that we are all the same and we are all different. There were a couple of pages that made me feel uncomfortable. As a parent of a child with an eating disorder - the page where if focuses on the cousin's weight was uncomfortable to me. I feel like it would have been better to show a picture showing his weight but not have this as the feature that defined him. Similarly with the children with disabilities - the defining feature of the child with downs syndrome was that he attended a special class the way that Maricela was depicted in a wheelchair but not as her defining feature was much better I felt.
Aside from this it was a nice book to talk about how we are the same and different - I think I would just skip those 2 pages when reading.

Beautifully illustrated children's book explaining that families are a mixture of people who all look different and come from the same place. It shows a variety of interests and is extremely relatable.
My 5 year old loved it.

This books had a lot of details about what makes up a family. However, I felt there were some stereotypes. This book does have all different types of people and disabilities, but there were some stereotypes.

21 Cousins by Diane De Anda shares the beauty of a big family and celebrates the unique gifts of 21 cousins from a Latino family. We are introduced to cousins of different ages, appearances, interests, and challenges. Rather than their differences dividing them, they seem to unify them as a strong family. The whole family comes together the end to celebrate a special occasion.

I am almost certain children who read this book will find a cousin or two to relate to strongly. The illustrations are colorful and detailed. My almost four year old loved this book. The sentence length and wait to turn each page was a little much for him, but the pictures definitely retained his interest.

I was provided a free advance reader copy from Star Bright Books in exchange for my honest review on Net Galley. The opinions shared in this review are my own.