Olivette Is You
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- $16.99
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- $16.99
Publisher Description
Meet Olivette, who wants kids to know that "all of it is YOU!" and to embrace every part of themselves. The brainchild of actor Nico Tortorella, this buoyant story is a celebration of all the many different parts of us.
Olivette is here to let you in on a secret: you can be anything you want to be. And even better, you can be all of it! Olivette is energetic, moody, and unique—just like you, Olivette contains multitudes.
Olivette Is You—all of it is you—is inspired by actor, musician, and author Nico Tortorella's own experience. Through this buoyant picture book, Nico shows you that you don’t have to choose who or what to be; you are already everything.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Employing uplifting first-person rhymes, performer Tortorella pays tribute to every individual's uniqueness. The verses' speaker is a pale-skinned child whose self-assurance models empowerment: "My name is Olivette,/ And all of it is me./ I have special powers/ To be all I want to be." From emotions and gender to clothing choices and activities, Olivette asserts the right to be, like water, "fluid" and "ever-changing." Further lines reinforce a message of acceptance and kinship: "We are all connected,/ Part of this great big universe./ Each one made by a higher power:/ No one better, no one worse." Kashiwagi's animation-style digital renderings depict an inclusive range of figural representations, including people of varying abilities, body types, and skin tones. When a final visual presents the speaker as a spectral cloud filled with a multitude of others, it aptly reinforces the book's positive message of oneness with the world: "I am Olivette,/ And all of it is me!// All of it is you./ And all love,/ It is you." Includes an author's note. Ages 4–8.
