THE KWANZAA STORY: Celebrating Culture through Community, get one now in time for the celebration

THE KWANZAA STORY: Celebrating Culture through Community
ALLIAH L. AGOSTINI (Illus. Olivia H. Smith)
becker&mayer! kids (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$18.99 all editions, available now

Rating: 5* of five

The Publisher Says: Discover the history and importance of Kwanzaa, a week-long December holiday celebrated in Black, African, and African American culture.

In The Kwanzaa Story, little Alliah (of The Juneteenth Story fame) is all grown up and, along with her husband LeVaur, teaches their children Daphne and Alistair why they celebrate Kwanzaa as a family and as a community. This beautifully illustrated storybook shares the origins of the holiday—rooted in Africa, born in Los Angeles—giving historical and cultural context on how a joyful celebration was birthed after the Watts Rebellion and during the Civil Rights Movement. The journey includes:

The history of the holiday, complete with timeline

Key figures of the Civil Rights Movement and their part in the creation of Kwanzaa

The seven guiding principles of Kwanzaa, known as Nguza Saba

The seven core symbols used during Kwanzaa rituals, including the kinara (candle holder) and the mishumaa saba (the seven candles in red, green, and black)

How Kwanzaa is celebrated today

And more!

2025 marks the 60th observance of Kwanzaa. The Kwanzaa Story offers Black, African, and African American children the opportunity to connect with their culture and the holiday in a meaningful way, and to see themselves and their family traditions represented on the page with accuracy and joy. This book also exposes children of different backgrounds to a new end-of-year cultural celebration, taking them on an engaging and educational journey about the principles and traditions of the holiday. This visually captivating guide to understanding Kwanzaa encourages young readers to connect with the holiday and its social impact.

Follow along as Alliah and her family discover the cultural significance of Kwanzaa's principles and symbols, providing a tangible element to the holiday that will allow kids and family members to fully and joyfully participate in its celebration. Readers of all ages will love learning about the amazing history and traditions of Kwanzaa through the wise and educational storytelling in The Kwanzaa Story.

The Holiday Celebration series from becker&mayer! kids honors the diverse holidays and milestones that shape the cultural fabric of the United States. Though these traditions may have originated elsewhere, brought to our shores by ancestors from around the world, they have endured and evolved to weave the vibrant tapestry of American life. The series includes picture books and their companion kid-friendly cookbooks that share stories uniquely representative of the American experience--an experience that is multilayered, eclectic, inclusive, and joyfully beautiful.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: Handsome artwork complements the story of how this celebration of the importance, centrality, and personal relevance of community building and membership to the Black American, and broader African diaspora, cultures came to be. 2025 marks the sixtieth celebration of the seven principles:

...restated here for your newly-independent reader. These expressions of the principles, like the text more generally, are pitched at that spot where some things will require some adult input about their meanings, while most will be readily decodable for the seven- or eight-year-old just starting independent reading. Most would challenge an average six-year-old reader unless they're quite advanced.

begin at the beginning

typical text/art spreads

There is a very helpful, quite concise, timeline of the Black cultural holidays and their origins:

The author invites readers to make, or consider how, their own connection to Kwanzaa is or was formed:

A lovely gift for a young Black child, a family needing to explain their holiday tradition to a child, or just a seeker after more satisfying ritual acknowledgments of the irreplaceable bonds of community membership.