black is brown is tan

Brown-skinned mama, the color of chocolate milk and pumpkin pie. White-skinned daddy, not the color of milk or snow, but light with pinks and tiny tans. And their two children, the beautiful colors of both.

For an all-American family, full of joy, warmth, and love, this is the way it is for us / this is the way we are

When it was first published in 1973, black is brown is tan featured the first interracial family in children's books. Decades later, Arnold Adoff's and Emily Arnold McCully's picture book continues to offer a joyous and loving celebration of all the colors of the race, now newly embellished with bright watercolor paintings that depict a contemporary family of the twenty-first century.

And the chorus rings true as ever:

black is brown is tan
is girl is boy
is nose is face
is all the colors of the race

Brown-skinned momma, the color of chocolate milk and coffee pumpkin pie, whose face gets ginger red when she puffs and yells the children into bed. White-skinned daddy, not white like milk or snow, lighter than brown, With pinks and tiny tans, whose face gets tomato red when he puffs and yells their children into bed. Children who are all the colors of the race, growing up happy in a house full of love. This is the way it is for them; this is the way they are, but the joy they feel extends to every reader of this book.

Black is brown is tan is a story poem about being, a beautiful true song about a family delighting in each other and in the good things of the earth.

“Fragmented verse lovingly explores the colors of multicultural families.” - School Library Journal (starred review)

“McCully has completely redesigned and reillustrated this new edition….the full-color paintings of an interracial family are warm and joyful.” - Horn Book Magazine