Call Me Gray

Written by Andrew Larsen and Bells Larsen

Illustrated by Tallulah Fontaine

Kids Can Press

978-1-5253-1135-2

32 pp.

Ages 4-8

October 2025 

 

For a four-letter word, "gray" packs a lot of meaning. It can mean the colour that is between black and white, the two sides that allow no middle ground. It can mean the dullness of a cloudy day with the absence of sun pulling a pall over everything. It can also reflect a feeling of detachment or depression, far more profound than the blues of sadness. But, for the child in Andrew Larsen and Bells Larsen's story, it's a name that holds colour and brightness, sunshine and joy.

From Call Me Gray, written by Andrew Larsen and Bells Larsen, illustrated by Tallulah Fontaine

It's the beginning of winter, and an unnamed child is looking forward to some wonderful traditions that they and their father partake in, starting with the building of their ice rink. But this year, this child knows something has changed.

But this year feels different.

 

It's not the snow

and it's not the cold.

 

It's me. 

 (pg. 6)

 

From Call Me Gray, written by Andrew Larsen and Bells Larsen, illustrated by Tallulah Fontaine

As they build their ice rink, the child hesitantly tries to gain some clarity to their feelings. A  recent incident, in which their best friend doesn't invite them to her sleepover because it's only for girls, has them saddened and perplexed. Talking to their dad, the child asks some very big questions including, "Do you ever feel mixed up about who you are?" (pg.12) Their dad tries to answer this and other questions but it's obvious that he's not grasping exactly what his child is asking. Still, as their work progresses, there is one statement that makes their dad stop and think and appreciate what his child is saying. 

"I look like a boy but

sometimes I feel more

like a girl."  

   (pg. 15)

And with that meaningful communication,  a subtle but monumental change begins to take place in the midst of enduring winter traditions.

From Call Me Gray, written by Andrew Larsen and Bells Larsen, illustrated by Tallulah Fontaine

I have reviewed so many Andrew Larsen books, both picture books and middle-grade fiction, including Goodnight, Hockey Fans (2017),  Dingus (2017), and Me, Toma and the Concrete Jungle (2019), and each one seems deeply personal. Call Me Gray has that same overtone, perhaps because Andrew Larsen has written it with his son, and the two have spoken of Bells Larsen's own experiences as a transgender person. I don't know if Andrew Larsen and Bells Larsen built ice rinks together and enjoyed hot chocolate afterwards, but the relationship between father and child in Call Me Gray is a touching one without being saccharine. In fact, it's quite real. They speak, they interact, and they question as they try to understand themselves and the other. And it's obviously a safe space in which to question and to make choices. 

From Call Me Gray, written by Andrew Larsen and Bells Larsen, illustrated by Tallulah Fontaine

This is the first children's picture book that Edmonton's Tallulah Fontaine has illustrated,  though her work has been featured on advertising displays and in numerous publications including the New Yorker, the New York Times, and The Economist. Rendered in gouache and finished digitally, her illustrations focus on that which is important: the relationship between the child and their father, as well as others. Tallulah Fontaine shows them pounding stakes, shovelling snow, and chatting while they work. She shows them putting on their skates and skating and always interacting, either in silence or in important conversations. Their work, together to build rink or to build understanding, is the goal. And Tallulah Fontaine always conveys much in the faces of her characters, whether it be disappointment, confusion, contentment, or hope.

Call Me Gray may become a wonderful story starter for challenging conversations about gender identities or about encouraging self-expression or about building an ice rink. It might help children share their feelings, or help their parents establish safe spaces to discuss big issues. But Call Me Gray may also take "gray" out of the unfavourable realm and move it into one of inclusivity and association and positive change.

Sapphire the Great and the Meaning of Life

Written by Beverley Brenna

Illustrated by Tara Anderson

Pajama Press

978-1-77278-069-7

128 pp.

Ages 7-10

February 2019

Finding one’s own purpose in life is not an easy task and one which many of us never find. Imagine being a hamster in a cage in a pet store and wondering about what life holds for you. Is it just anticipating fresh bedding? Is it waiting for extra peanuts? Is it to find a forever home? Is it to be free?  But with the hamster’s adoption by nine-year-old Jeannie, the hamster, first known as Harvey Owens and then Sapphire, looks for that meaning and finds it with the help of a rich collection of characters and a few nibbles on fingers.

Told in the alternating voices of Sapphire and Jeannie, Beverley Brenna begins Sapphire the Great and the Meaning of Life with a long-awaited trip to the pet store for Jeannie’s promised Christmas gift of a hamster.  Though the visit almost doesn’t happen as Jeannie’s mother deems her daughter’s behaviour at the mall as inappropriate, Jeannie picks out the white hamster with the navy blue eyes and purchases all the materials to make his home perfect. But the hamster, whom she originally names Harvey Owens after her father who has moved out of the house, is frightened by the new sounds, smells and temperatures and lashes out by biting, even more so after they are involved in a car accident. Jeannie, who is dealing with her own stresses that include not being heard, a father who seems to be off with a new life and a mother struggling with two young children and trying to deal with her own grief and anger about her marriage, recognizes that the little guy bites when scared or surprised, and helps educate all who come near him to be considerate. And since he is such a great comfort to all of them–Jeannie, her brother Alistair, her mom and others–once they learn how to be kind to him, he has much to offer them back. And it makes no difference when he is identified as a her.

Sapphire the Great and the Meaning of Life is far greater than a story about a girl getting a pet hamster. It’s about struggling to find your place. Jeannie is a pretty good caregiver for Sapphire but she’s trying to figure out why her father isn’t keeping in touch, whether her parents are “getting put back together” (pg. 40), why her little brother seems stressed, how to be a friend, why her Mom’s new friend Anna Conda seems reserved though really cool, and the questions that kids want answered but no one will respect them enough to tell them the truth. Meanwhile Sapphire is recognizing how nice her new home is, singing when pleased, and beginning to understand freedom, especially after a dangerous escape outdoors in frigid January.

It seems to me that Free is just a little bit too big to think about for very long. (pg. 67)

It’s perfect that Jeannie’s story and Sapphire’s come together to become something bigger and better. Just as the two are better for having each other in their lives, Beverley Brenna’s text is enhanced with the adorable illustrations by Tara Anderson which head each of the forty-two chapters. Her pencil sketches of Sapphire make up the majority of these illustrations and show the little hamster eating, playing, sleeping, hiding and just being all-around cute. I had some trepidation about an animal story, especially one which begins in a pet store, but Tara Anderson’s charming artwork reassured me that Sapphire’s story would turn out well.

A perfect early reader for kids who love animals, Sapphire the Great and the Meaning of Life is actually more about giving significance to managing our own stories. It may require a nip or a bite or some yelling to be heard, or perhaps a snuggle or a quiet voice might be in order, but it's about finding the meaning of your own life, even if only for the time being.

From Sapphire the Great and the Meaning of Life by Beverley Brenna,               illustrated by Tara Anderson

Sugar and Snails

Written by Sarah Tsiang

Illustrated by Sonja Wimmer

Annick Press

978-1-77321-005-6

32 pp.

Ages 4-7

March 2018

Though many nursery rhymes have some dark meaning behind them,  I like to think the old English nursery rhyme about boys being made of “frogs and snails and puppy dog tails” and girls being made of “sugar and spice and everything nice” was an innocent poem people may have used to poke fun at the differences between boys and girls.  Then again, maybe not.  But Sarah Tsiang takes the sexism out of that nursery rhyme and shows us that boys and girls can be just about anything they want to be.

From Sugar and Snails

by Sarah Tsiang 

illus. by Sonja Wimmer

Sugar and Snails begins with an embroidered piece of stitchery with the old rhyme on it, and then page by page a grandfather unravels that saying for his grandchildren after the boy wonders about sweet boys such as himself.  The elderly man suggests a myriad of things boys and girls could be as he pretends to recall how the rhyme goes.  But as he suggests things, the grandchildren recognize that they just don't fit.  She doesn't like dresses, and he doesn't like frogs.  There's rocks and butterfly socks, rain boots and whales, and even dirt and lemon dessert.  Any of these could be assigned to either child or both.  It's an equal opportunity rhyme of a menagerie of delights, which ends with the grandfather proclaiming to them, "Dangnamit, I give up.  What in the heck are you made of?" and the stitches of the embroidery being unravelled by little hands.

From Sugar and Snails

by Sarah Tsiang 

illus. by Sonja Wimmer

Sarah Tsiang makes Sugar and Snails a wacky speculative poem that attempts, amusingly though foolishly, to differentiate between boys and girls.  But it's German artist Sonja Wimmer's surreal illustrations that bring that outrageousness to the forefront.  Sonja Wimmer, who illustrated Belle DeMont's wonderful I Love My Purse (Annick, 2017), lends wonderful fluidity and connectedness between the children and that which might define either of them, with a frisson of humour and folly. 

From Sugar and Snails

by Sarah Tsiang 

illus. by Sonja Wimmer

If Sugar and Snails teaches us anything, it's that labelling is restrictive and inappropriate, and children, girls, boys or non-binary, should just be themselves, no matter what an old rhyme proposes.

Honouring all gender identities and sexualities: Cultural competence with diverse youngCanLit

Today's post, the forth in seven, continues the series of booklists I compiled and presented at the Ontario Library Association's Superconference in Toronto recently to help individuals, schools and other institutions become culturally competent.

Today's post will focus on...

(You) set me on fire
by Mariko Tamaki
Razorbill, 2012
304 pp.
Ages 14+
2012
Popularity, sexuality, same-sex relationship, coming of age

Asha’s Mums
by Rosamund Elwin and Michele Paulse
Illus. by Dawn Lee
Women’s Literary Press
24 pp.
Ages 5-9
1990
Same-sex parents

Chance to Dance for You
by Gail Sidonie Sobat
Great Plains Teen Fiction
172 pp.
Ages 14+
2011
Homophobia, sexuality, same-sex relationships
Review here

Crush
by Carrie Mac
Orca Book Publishers
136 pp.
Ages 14-17
2006
Sexuality, same-sex relationship

Homophobia: Deal with it and turn prejudice into pride
by Steven Solomon
Illus. by Nick Johnson
Lorimer
32 pp.
Ages 12-14
2013
Nonfiction, LGBTQ, prejudice, acceptance

Money Boy
by Paul Yee
Groundwood Books
192 pp.
Ages 13+
2011
Chinese immigrants, sexuality,  homelessness

Moon at Nine
by Deborah Ellis
Pajama Press
224 pp.
Ages 14+
2014
Iran, Islam, sexuality, same-sex relationship
Review here

One in Every Crowd
by Ivan Coyote
Arsenal Pulp Press
238 pp.
Ages 14-17
2012
Short stories, identity, sexuality, LGBTQ

Pride: Celebrating Diversity and Community
by Robin Stevenson
Orca Book Publishers
120 pp.
Ages 9-13
2016
Nonfiction, LGBTQ

Skim
by Mariko Tamaki
Illus. by Jillian Tamaki
Groundwood Books
144 pp.
Ages 14+
2008
Coming of age, sexuality, fitting in

Swimming in the Monsoon Sea
by Shyam Selvadurai
Tundra Books
280 pp.
Ages 16+
2007
Coming of age, same-sex relationships, sexuality, Sri Lanka

Switch
by Douglas Davey
Red Deer Press
 252 pp.
Ages 14+
2014
Coming of age, fitting in, bisexuality
Review here

This One Summer
by Mariko Tamaki
Illus. by Jillian Tamaki
Groundwood Biooks
141 pp.
Ages 14+
2014
Coming of age, sexuality, fitting in
Review here

Transphobia:  Deal with it and Be a Gender Transcender
by J. Wallace Skelton
Illus. by Nick Johnson
Lorimer
32 pp.
Ages 11-14
2016
Nonfiction, transgender, acceptance, diversity

Way to Go
by Tom Ryan
Orca Book Publishers
224 pp.
Ages 12+
2012
Sexuality, coming of age, Cape Breton, post-secondary
Review here

What We Hide
by Marthe Jocelyn
Tundra Books
275 pp.
Ages 14+
2014
1960s, England, sexuality, coming of age
Review here

When Everything Feels Like the Movies
by Raziel Reid
Arsenal Pulp Press
176 pp.
Ages 14+
2014
Popularity, same-sex relationships, high school, film


I would love to add an upcoming YA novel, A Boy Like Her by Carrie Mac (Knopf) coming out in 2019, because I think it'll be a ground-breaking novel but, with few publication details, I think we'll have to wait on that one. But make sure to tuck that nugget away on your list, somewhere.

Downloadable book list here