The Colors of Us

Seven-year-old Lena is going to paint a picture of herself. She wants to use brown paint for her skin. But when she and her mother take a walk through the neighborhood, Lena learns that brown comes in many different shades.

Through the eyes of a little girl who begins to see her familiar world in a new way, this book celebrates the differences and similarities that connect all people.

Karen Katz has been an illustrator and a graphic designer for many years. Her first book, Over the Moon, tells the story of the adoption of her daughter, Lena, from Guatemala. Lena was also the inspiration for this book, which Ms. Katz says she wrote in affirmation of Lena and her friends, and the diversity that surrounds them. Ms. Katz and her family divide their time between New York City and Woodstock, New York.