A vibrant, joyful introduction to queer history and symbols for elementary school and younger. The illustrations are bold and engaging and the language is approachable. We read it multiple times and my 7 year old now cites Sappho, so I consider that a pretty serious win. For parents of littler readers, be prepared for a few things that may come up - including a reference to the Holocaust and the pink triangle symbol. The best children’s books encourage meaningful discussion and questions, and this one fits the bill. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the advance copy. All opinions are entirely my (and my three young readers’) own.

I really enjoyed this book! It is an easy breakdown of symbols that have represented the LGBTQIA+ community throughout our history<3
Thank you to the author and NetGalley for allowing me to read this book as ARC.

I received a complimentary copy of this book via Netgalley. Opinions expressed in this book are solely my own.

This book is a win. As a Cis female ally I try my hardest to learn about LGBTQIA2S+ and Jessica Kingsley did a fantastic educating me and the next generation. I firmly believe education is the basis for understanding, compassion, self understanding. Most importantly education aids with self-acceptance and accepting others who are not exactly like us because no one is exactly like us, yet we are all wonderfully human.

Thank-you for helping make the world a more acceptable one.

Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC!

This is such a nice little book about different queer symbols, and there were actually several I hadn't heard about before, so it was great to get to learn something new! It also made me really happy how diverse the book was. Not only do the pictures in the book show different types of people (though it could have easily been even more diverse), they also use LGBTQIA2S+ instead of just LGBT like too many books still do, and they even included symbols of asexuality! I was so happy when I got that part because people tend to forget aspec identities also exist.

I do wish the book had been longer, including more symbols, but I get that it's a book for kids so it can't be that long. Speaking of kids, I have no idea how this book would work for actual kids, since I never read picture books normally and am never around kids, but I think it could work well as long as there's an adult there to explain some things.

First of all, thank you to the author and NetGalley for allowing me to read this book as ARC.

This is a light-hearted yet informative book about LGBTQIA+ Symbolism, which explains some of the most common and used symbols in a clear yet simple and understandable manner. While the book is targeted to middle-grade / children, I believe it could be a nice introduction to the topic for everyone. The book is inclusive and includes less-represented categories. If there is anything I would change it would be to add even more symbols as I found the book to be on the short side.

Read if: you want to learn more about LGBT Symbolism and its origin
Don't read if: you are looking for an extensive explanation behind symbols, as the book is only scratching the surface.

I got quite an education reading this book. Surprise! I do not know everything (chuckle). Rainbows, Unicorns, and Triangles is such a treasure trove of information. Apparently, we rainbows even have a secret language and it’s not Klingon (that’s a joke, Klingon was never our language). Some symbols I knew about…okay, I confess there were very few which I was so surprised about. I just love this book for the knowledge alone.

Jen Milton’s illustrations are simplistic. The information is what grabbed my attention. I don’t think the drawings would attract a younger person. They don’t jump off the page. I did review this on a Kindle, on paper the illustrations could have more impact.

There are questions in the back to engage the young reader with so this is definitely a book that should be read with your young person. Overall, I love this book. I think it should be in your library and in the stacks of every library.

What a fantastic introduction for your little one to the LGBTQIA2s community and some of their history. The information and background are presented in an easily accessible way.

It is never too early to teach your child. Even as an adult I feel like I learned so much in this book around the LGBTQIA2s symbols that I didn’t know before.

This would be a great independent read and the questions at the end allow for a wider discussion afterwards with an adult or peer. You could also read this with your child to discuss the content as you go through it.

The illustrations are both eye catching and engaging and tie really well to the information being highlighted.

This is an utterly delightful book. The illustrations and text complement each other beautifully which allows the reader to easily understand the connections of the various symbols to the LGBTQIA2s+ history.

The historical content of this book a simply explained. Children are often able to reflect and share their thoughts and feelings via objects they can see and touch and use flowers, a ring, a bowtie are a great way of introducing LGBTQIA2s+ History. I would also recommend this book for those that find a large amounts of text a struggle.

As the acronym LGBTQIA2s+ is used within the introduction page and in the book I would have liked to have seen a page dedicated to represent/explain the Two Spirit part of the acronym but overall this is a wonderful little book that captures important parts of the LGBTQIA2S+ History.

“Rainbows, Unicorns, and triangles” is a good story for young children that introduces them to various queer symbols throughout history.
It includes many different identities throughout many different times and gives a short but clear description about what they mean, which is further explained and enhanced by colourful illustrations. I do not work with kids so would find it challenging to comment upon how understandable this book would be to its target audience, I can imagine that some parts would need to be explained a bit further by the person reading it to them, but I think this serves as a good conversation starter.

It did feel more like a list of different things than a connected story, but I think this is understandable and an inevitable part of the formatting of this book, especially as it tries to include different identities. I appreciate the range of identities that are included in this book, although I have seen some comments about the lack of mentioning Disabilities, which I think would be quite helpful and not that difficult to include for example the clear communication of lanyards or symbols like the forget-me-not flower. It is understandable that creating a comprehensive list of every symbol is not possible, but deciding which things (not) to include then becomes a difficult and possibly problematic task.

Overall I think this is a great book to exist and a very nice introduction to some of the symbols and ways of communication of queer identities throughout history.

I absolutely loved and adored the illustrations in this book, absolutely stunning!
This non-fiction book is a simple yet great introduction for children to so common symbols/icons from LGBTQIA+ history. It stays on an information level that children can grasp and it isn't too much of an information dump for little kids. I'm so excited to get niblings and read this book aloud to them.

I'm very grateful that NetGalley and Jessica Kingsley Publishers gave me the opportunity to read and review this as an e-arc.

This was so cool, I had no idea there were so many ways people could identify each other in the past or where the symbols came from. It was sad thinking they needed to, which I hope never happens again
Thanks to NetGalley for letting me read this

Quickly snagged this beauty after learning about the Big Book of Pride Flags in 2023.

I love these books. I think they are a great learning tool to shed some history/light on common symbols we see in day to day life nowadays.

In this second, very fresh publication, I can only find one minor fault. As a person interested in queer rights and history, in queer identities and expressions, I was nonetheless confused by the new abbreviation. I would have wished for a brief explanation of LGBTQIA2S+, as it is not yet established enough. Besides that, I once more adored the illustrations and the short, informative texts. Their compilation is immensely appealing to me and probably will be as well for younger readers as much as to their parents. I appreciate this concept, although I am not certain if the content matches the target group. I personally learned a lot but am not sure if these information are yet relevant for readers of books with only 40 pages.

Really informative book. There were definitely pieces of informaion I didn't know and enjoyed learning about.
Very accessible for young readers.

This book explains not only the history and meaning behind symbols used today, but also the symbols used earlier, symbols that had to be even more covert when people used a simple flower to show who they loved rather than waving a large flag. An excellent queer history of how people have navigated their way through an often hostile world.

This is a great primer for anyone of any age looking to get an overview about some of the symbology used throughout the years in the LGBTQIA2S+ community. I especially appreciated the inclusion of ace/asexual symbols as they can sometimes be left out of the conversation. The illustrations were well done though I would have liked to have seen some more diverse bodies and abilities represented.

This was a wonderful introduction to past and current symbols used by LGBTQIA+. I believe that while this book is suited for children it is an amazing introudction and resource for all ages. I would have liked it to be a little longer and or more detailed but I do understand this is a childrens introductory book.

I learned quite a bit myself and I liked how to book started in the 19th century and progressed over the years with the different symbols and or words created. The color of the book was stunning and reads well digitally. Cant wait to see this as a hardcover in my bookstore.

Rainbows, Unicorns, and Triangles tells the story of how LGBTQIA+ people have communicated without words throughout history. This book is beautiful and can be a great material to bring these ideas up to anyone looking to learn more about communicating without words or the history of this community.

This is a wonderful book. I really enjoyed it and learned a few things. The illustrations are charming and cheerful. They are a little diverse but definitely could have been more inclusive of races, abilities and body types. At only 40 pages, the book was unable to cover all queer symbols. I feel there was too much emphasis on historical symbols for gay men specifically, while completely leaving out many other groups of queer people that really could have been covered. However, this doesn’t take any stars off my rating, because there really is only so much that can be done in this format. What it does do, it does very well.

This short non-fiction children’s book is appropriate and informative for all ages. It is probably best suited for grade 3+, when children can best process some of the more complicated concepts, like why Nazis would force gay and lesbian people to wear triangles on their sleeves. For young children, this is a book intended to be read to them, as the reading level would be too advanced for most. It really is enjoyable, appropriate and educational for people of all ages. I received a temporary digital advanced review version from the publisher and will be purchasing a hard copy for my classroom.

Many thanks to NetGalley for letting me read an eARC of this book :)

This is a delightful little book with stunning illustrations by Jem Milton
I legitimately learned a lot, and enjoyed finding out the origins of queer symbols, and even language that has been adopted into common vernacular today! I'd love to know more about these symbols in great detail, but I'm aware that this isn't what this book is trying to achieve.

I've seen some people categorising this as a children's book - and though the writing style is clear and easy to understand from an adult perspective, I'm not sure kids would know what some of it means - such as mentions of laws and legal organisations. Perhaps this is more for older children/teens/young adults.

I imagine it would be a great coffee table book; it's a light read that has made me immensely interested in researching more queer history. Overall brilliant and beautiful.