Book Buzz: New children's book about John Lewis inspired by young activist
Tybre Faw poses with his civil rights hero, the late Congressman John Lewis. The young activist has also inspired a new children’s book. | Credit: Courtesy Leigh Weaver
By EEW Magazine Online // Book Buzz
If you don’t know about ten-year-old Tybre Faw, the inspiration behind best-selling author Andrea Davis Pinkney’s new book about late civil rights activist John Lewis, you should.
Because of You, John Lewis, published by Scholastic, introduces the world to the heartwarming story of Faw who is obsessed with history and the civil rights movement and devours every book he can find on the subject. When he learns of Congressman John Lewis's harrowing and heroic march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in the fight for the right to vote, Faw is determined to meet him.
Andrea Davis Pinkney is the best-selling children’s book author of ‘Because of You, John Lewis’ from Scholastic, Inc. (EEW Magazine)
Faw’s two grandmothers take him on the seven-hour drive to Selma in 2018. After the two meet and become fast friends, Faw joins Lewis for the annual walk across the Edmund Pettus Bridge.
When Lewis is laid to rest, Faw is invited to read Lewis's favorite poem, "Invictus," at the funeral service.
In Because of You, Pinkney masterfully weaves this story of a boy with a dream with the story of Lewis, a true-life hero who himself was inspired by Martin Luther King, Jr. when he was a boy. Both Lewis and King have left indelible marks on future generations. Will Faw be next to carry the mantle?
"I was in tears," said Faw, now 14, recalling the emotional experience of first meeting Lewis in an interview with People. "He said, 'Just make sure you keep straight A's, and be a good student, and make sure you get in good trouble,’ which I will always try to do in my entire life."
Then 12-year-old Tybre Faw at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta during the service to celebrate Lewis' life by reciting one of the lawmaker's favorite poems, "Invictus," by William Ernest Henley. (Pool via EEW Magazine)
Good trouble is one of Lewis’s signature phrases. In December 2019, when the Library of Congress opened an extensive Rosa Parks exhibition, Congressman Lewis spoke.
He said, “Rosa Parks inspired us to get in trouble. And I’ve been getting in trouble ever since. She inspired us to find a way, to get in the way, to get in what I call good trouble, necessary trouble.”
Pinkney, a children’s book publisher and editor, who has been awarded multiple Coretta Scott King Book Awards, NAACP Image Award nominations, Parenting Publication Gold Medals, and American Library Association Notable Book citations, told People, "One of the key threads of the book is that John Lewis wanted to meet Martin Luther King Jr. more than anything.”
She continued, "He wrote a letter, and they became friends. Tybre wanted to meet John Lewis. He reached out, went to Selma and they met. So, it's just amazing how history has repeated itself literally in every way. John Lewis met his civil rights hero, Tybre Faw met his, and Tybre will be the hero for some other young person who's coming up next."
Pinkney added, "Know that any child can wake up, can wish, can march toward a brighter tomorrow and follow in any footsteps they want."
Because of You, John Lewis, with illustrations by Keith Henry Brown, is available now.