Nadia's Hands

"Nadia’s Hands" by Karen English tells of young Nadia, whose excitement over being chosen to be the flower girl is marred by the embarrassment of wearing traditional mehndi hand decorations. Nadia worries, “it wouldn’t wash off, and she didn’t want to go to school like that on Monday.” This book deals with the same issue as "My Name is Bilal". That is, the children fear that they will not fit in because their religion is not the same as others’. Nadia realizes how happy the decorations make her family and learns to have pride in them.
This book is necessary for the collection because it touches on such an important theme (having pride in one’s identity). Part of what makes it valuable is that it is about a young girl (opposed to the male protagonist in "My Name is Bilal"). Girls in the classroom may be able to relate to the excitement of the flower girl role. All can sympathize with Nadia as her patience is tried (waiting for the mehndi to dry).
"Nadia’s Hands" is a book with characters that have dimension (her cousins, for example, analyze Nadia’s aisle performance with a sneering scrutiny after warning her about what they did wrong). The story does not drag, even with the incorporation of some vocabulary terms (defined on the front pages). The fact that the characters are so human is especially important in this post-9/11 America. The earlier that children can develop an open mind, the easier it is for them to learn tolerance and acceptance.