Diana-Huang
2026 Read Your World Book Review
I was gifted Hannah Edwards: Secrets of Riverway novel by publisher Fabled Films Press that came out 2025. This 268 page book borders on middle grade into young adult. The reading level is 4-7th grade but the subject matter involves a mystery of a missing person that turns into a crime with paranormal elements. It was a fast entertaining read as it starts out as lighthearted and funny. The Scooby-Doo-like mystery is a stage to explore the inner world of Hannah.
It is written in the first person as a journal of high school student Hannah. She describes her situation, how she perceives the world, how she feels, and how she thinks. There are parts of the novel where she describes being in a classroom. Things like the high pitch whining of the fluorescent lights driving her crazy is something I didn't know about. “You can hear that?” is common thing with ADHD people. They pick up all the sounds as their hearing is cranked up higher than most others. From this story I also learned there is a hierarchy of what they think is important, they fixate on that, making it hard to focus on other things. They can focus on what they think is high priority. The story explores the masking of symptoms out of fear of being rejected by everyone as not-normal. This is a source of anxiety and stress for a lot of people.
This novel is a great vehicle to explore and talk about this particular type of neuro-divergent brain. ADHD is very common in a lot of different people and often it is not handled well by others. Not everyone understands or accepts that everyone is wired a little differently. So I would highly recommend this book to anyone.
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Read Your World 2026 (1/29/26) is in its 14th year! Valarie Budayr and Mia Wenjen founded this non-profit children’s literacy initiative; they are two diverse book-loving moms who saw a need to shine the spotlight on all of the multicultural diverse books and authors on the market while also working to get those books into the hands of young readers and educators.
Read Your World’s mission is to raise awareness of the need to include kids’ books celebrating diversity in homes and school bookshelves. Read about our Mission and history HERE.
Read Your World is honored to be Supported by these Medallion:
FOUNDER’S CIRCLE: Mia Wenjen (Pragmaticmom) and Valarie Budayr (Audreypress.com)
🏅 Super Platinum Sponsor: Author Deedee Cummings and Make A Way Media
🏅 Platinum Sponsors: Language Lizard Bilingual Books in 60 Languages and Jeanne Walker Harvey
🏅 Gold Sponsors: Publisher Spotlight
🏅 Silver Sponsors: Red Comet Press
🏅 Silver Corporate Sponsor: Kathy Choi
🏅 Bronze Sponsors: Fabled Films Press
🏅 Corporate Sponsor: Crayola Education
Read Your World is honored to be Supported by these Author Sponsors!
Authors: Audrey Barbakoff, Federico Erebia, Teddi Ahrens, Stephanie M. Wildman, Maritza M. Mejia, Authors J.C. Kato and J.C.², Eugenia Chu, Dorktales Storytime Podcast, Josh Funk, Frances Díaz Evans, Gaia Cornwall, Eric Clock, Maria Wen Adcock, Diana Huang, Gwen Jackson, Gea Meijering, Amanda Hsiung-Blodgett, Ismee Williams, Karin Fisher-Golton, Kathleen Burkinshaw, Tami Lehman-Wilzig, Daria Marmaluk-Hajioannou, Nancy Tupper Ling, Teresa Robeson, Crystal Z. Lee, Karen Leggett Abouraya, Elly Swartz, Robbin Miller, Shifa Safadi, Tonya Ellis,Lisa Stringfellow, Sylvia Liu, Kimberly Biddle, Robbin Miller, Tonya Ellis, Nadine Pressley, Natahsa Yim Carter, and Lisa Chong.
Read Your World is Honored to be Supported by our CoHosts and Global CoHosts and by our Partner Organizations!
Check out RYW’s Multicultural Books for Kids Pinterest Board!
📌 FREE RESOURCES from Read Your World Day
FREE RYW2026 Poster
FREE Building Community with Bilingual Books 2026 Classroom Kit
FREE Mental Health Support for Stressful Times Classroom Kit
FREE Diversity Book Lists & Activities for Teachers and Parents
FREE Teacher Classroom Physical and Developmental Challenges Kit
📌 Register for the Read Your World Virtual Party: https://readyourworld.org/virtualparty
Join us on Thursday, January 29, 2026, at 8 pm EST celebrating 14 years of Read Your World Day Virtual Party! Register here.
This epically fun and fast-paced hour includes multicultural book discussions, addressing timely issues, diverse book recommendations, & reading ideas.
We will be giving away a 10-Book Bundle during the virtual party plus Bonus Prizes as well! *** US and Global participants are welcome. **
Follow the hashtag #ReadYourWorld to join the conversation, and connect with like-minded parts, authors, publishers, educators, organizations, and librarians. We look forward to seeing you all on January 29, 2026, at our virtual party!
AAPI Panel Discussion
I was one of the panelists talking on this panel. I talked about how science fiction and fantasy can make it easier to talk about very difficult experiences like bullying as an introvert/quiet kid. We accumulate enormous amounts of stress inside. Watch it here:
ReadYourWorld IG Live Interview
This 25 minute interview was filmed last Thursday. I talk about my art background, who I was as a kid, and why I started making books.
2025 MCBD Book Reviews
This year I was gifted two books for MCBD.
The first one was Dragon Surf from author D.G. Driver and Jeni Bautista. It is a 205 page middle grade novel about Eric Long, a 15 year old Chinese American boy growing up in Southern California coastal city's beach and surf culture. The boy is annoyed by his mother's obsession with Chinese dragons as she made a career of painting them. He admires his dad, though, who is a competitive professional surfer. He was excited to go with his father to northern California for summer surfing competitions.
Through the eyes of Eric, we also get to hang around, learn about surfing, and make new friends. At first the boy is a skeptic but he started seeing things while getting into trouble in coastal waters and gets rescued by something. This is a fun read that touches upon Chinese mythology and history as part of the immigration movement into California during the 1800s.
I can understand Eric's attitude towards his mom. It comes from wanting to develop his own American identity away from the heritage his mom wants him to embrace. He didn't think his mom was cool, but his dad was. The desire to come off as cool and have great friends is a common desire. This story shows his growth and change in his attitude about his own heritage.
A thing that bothers me about this book is the repeated usage of the word kimono, a Japanese word for a specific type of traditional Japanese clothing, to refer to the traditional clothes of the clearly stated Chinese garment pieces. This takes me out because there are different Asian cultures and languages. We are not a monolith, the specific parts of our languages, cultures, and histories are not interchangeable like this. Any non-Asian reading this book needs to be aware of this, please. Take everything with a grain of salt. Otherwise this is an interesting story with ideas to explore.
The second book I was gifted is Solstice: Around the World on the Longest, Shortest Day a chapter book written by Jen Breach and illustrated by 14 different artists from around the world. It is a 60 page 14 chapter book with each chapter a story told from the point of view of a kid living in that specific latitude and their culture's relationship with the sun. The regions covered are Antarctica, Argentina, Australia, South Africa, Ecuador, Indonesia, Nigeria, Nepal, Morocco, China, Turkey, North West United States, United Kingdom, and Norway.
It is a colorful, fun, well put together book that teaches a lot of things. Each chapter comes with a circled map to show us where on Earth each story is about. They also tell us average temperatures and daylight hours. I like how each region's story teaches about ordinary people whose lives are not 100% rosy perfect as they hint at messier darker histories of their regions. This book helps to paint a bigger picture of how geography determines the daily lives, rituals, and special events of various cultures including a handful of words from their language. Highly recommended for any educational library.
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Read Your World 2025 (1/30/25) is in its 13th year! Valarie Budayr and Mia Wenjen founded this non-profit children’s literacy initiative; they are two diverse book-loving moms who saw a need to shine the spotlight on all of the multicultural diverse books and authors on the market while also working to get those books into the hands of young readers and educators.
Read Your World’s mission is to raise awareness of the need to include kids’ books celebrating diversity in homes and school bookshelves. Read about our Mission and history HERE.
Read Your World is honored to be Supported by these Medallion:
FOUNDER’S CIRCLE: Mia Wenjen (Pragmaticmom) and Valarie Budayr (Audreypress.com)
🏅 Super Platinum Sponsor: Author Deedee Cummings and Make A Way Media
🏅 Platinum Sponsors: Publisher Spotlight and Language Lizard Bilingual Books in 60 Languages
🏅 Gold Sponsors: Third State Books
🏅 Silver Sponsors: The Quarto Group, Red Comet Press and Lerner Books
🏅 Silver Corporate Sponsor: Scholastic Books
🏅 Bronze Sponsors: Lee and Low and Star Bright Books
🏅 Bronze Corporate Sponsor: Crayola Education
🏅 Ruby Corporate Sponsor: MagicBlox
Read Your World is honored to be Supported by these Author Sponsors!
Authors: Stephanie M. Wildman, Martha Seif Simpson, Anna Jennings, Gwen Jackson, Afsaneh Moradian, Joaquín Camp, Rahana Dariah, Ziggy Hanaor, Josh Funk, Nancy Tupper Ling, Kathleen Burkinshaw, Gea Meijering, Eugenia Chu, Dorktales Story Time, Amanda Hsiung-Blodgett, Authors J.C. Kato and J.C.², Cynthia Levinson, Diana Huang, Rochelle Melander, Lisa Chong, Lisa Stringfellow, Brunella Costaglioga, Lindsey Rowe Parker, Rachel C. Katz, Tonya Duncan Ellis, Shifa Safadi, Lisa Rogers, Sylvia Liu, Eva Clarke, Crystal Murakami, Teddi Ahrens
Read Your World is Honored to be Supported by our CoHosts and Global CoHosts and by our Partner Organizations!
Check out RYW’s Multicultural Books for Kids Pinterest Board!
📌 FREE RESOURCES from Read Your World Day
📌 Register for the Read Your World Virtual Party: https://readyourworld.org/virtualparty
Join us on Thursday, January 30, 2025, at 9 pm EST celebrating 13 years of Read Your World Day Virtual Party! Register here.
This epically fun and fast-paced hour includes multicultural book discussions, addressing timely issues, diverse book recommendations, & reading ideas.
We will be giving away a 10-Book Bundle during the virtual party plus Bonus Prizes as well! *** US and Global participants are welcome. **
Follow the hashtag #ReadYourWorld to join the conversation, and connect with like-minded parts, authors, publishers, educators, organizations, and librarians. We look forward to seeing you all on January 30, 2025, at our virtual party!
Go here to buy the book -> https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B0DM6FDZQ3