I am participating in the Diversity on the Shelf Reading Challenge hosted by the Englishist.

I read 17 books in May, a little better than April.  By age, there were 3 early chapter books, 4 middle grade books, 8 teen books (including the entire Raven Cycle on audio) and 3 adult books.

Six of these were by authors of color:

• To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before by Jenny Han
• P.S. I Still Love You by Jenny Han
• A Tiger for Malgudi and the Man-Eater of Malgudi by R. K. Narayan

• Forest of Wonders by Linda Sue Park
• Geeks, Girls and Secret Identities by Mike Jung
• Hooray for Anna Hibiscus by Atinuke

Two more had main characters of color:

• When Green Becomes Tomatoes by Julie Fogliano and Julie Morstad
• A Thousand Nights by E.K. Johnston

It sounded like some of the main characters of A Tangle of Gold by Jaclyn Moriarty were secretly mixed race, but I wasn’t sure if I read this right.

Bonus diversity points for gay and bi main characters in the Raven Boys books.  And my non-American, British or Canadian author diversity included Atinuke, Nigerian; Jaclyn Moriarty, Australian; and R.K. Narayan, Indian.

My total count for authors of color this year is now at 26, with an additional 15 books by white authors with main characters of color.

I just started Court of Fives (white author, brown heroine), which was on my planned reading for April, and Sorcerer to the Crown (author and characters of color) is up next.  I’m also currently (by request) trying to make a diverse girl-led read-aloud bibliography for 2/3s, similar to my Girl-Led Read-Alouds for 4/5s, and discovering that I need to read more diverse books to round out my 2/3 list.  Please let me know if you have favorite books suitable for reading aloud to 2/3s (a little more challenging than they’d read to themselves) with girls of color as protagonists!