After her family moves to the U.S. from Mexico, a girl learns English at school, but she feels shy and reluctant to speak in class. Fascinated by butterflies' migration to and from Mexico and alarmed by their dwindling numbers, she researches monarchs and wants to help them, but how? After some encouraging words from her school librarian ("It's surprising what such a tiny creature can do"), she presents a monarch report to her classmates. This leads to a long-term, school-wide initiative: creating a garden of milkweed and nectar-rich flowers as a way station for migrating monarchs. The girl's first-person narrative has a thoughtful tone as she records events throughout the year and realizes that, like the developing butterflies, she is growing and changing. The colorful artwork captures the spirit of the text while creating a light, airy, spontaneous look. Within the narrative, four double-page spreads, visually represented as open books, provide detailed information about monarchs. Well-integrated into the appealing story, these pages focus on the butterflies, their life cycle, and their amazing 3,000-mile migration. The back matter includes a number of resources and practical ideas for readers inspired to create their own monarch way stations. This beautiful picture book unites fiction with facts while quietly promoting environmental activism.

A young monarch butterfly enthusiast recounts her first year in a new school in a new country, where she "didn't like to stand out or be noticed" as she was learning English and becoming familiar with a new community. Through the seasons, as the girl gains confidence in her language skills, and with encouragement from the school librarian, she deepens her knowledge about butterfly science. The girl alternates between sharing her own story and presenting factual details about butterfly migration, life cycles, feeding habits, and alarming declines in the monarch population. The creative illustrations parallel the shifts in tone, with scientific information presented as if on the pages of a textbook, in contrast to glowing illustrations of an idyllic neighborhood filled with people, colorful buildings, and a community garden. The girl comes into her own in a triumphant class presentation on the monarch butterfly, where her plan to build a monarch way station is eagerly adopted by her schoolmates and community. "Once, I tried to hide. But a caterpillar never stays the same for long...It emerges as something new, unexpected, surprising. Just like me." Readers inspired by the girl's activism can find additional resources on monarchs and environmental activism in the book's closing pages. Danielle J. Ford January/February 2021 p.79(c) Copyright 2021. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Following an earlier, similarly structured collaboration by this team (Follow the Moon Home) about a child gaining self-assurance while working on an environmental project, Hopkinson and So introduce a brown-skinned girl whose confidence grows as she organizes her class to start a milkweed garden for migrating monarchs. "That's me in the back," the girl says, holding up her class picture; "I was a little like a caterpillar then:/ quiet and almost invisible." A librarian gives her illustrated books about monarchs whose imagined pages interleave with the girl's own story, and the butterflies' migration path mirrors her own ("I wondered if monarch butterflies belonged here. Sometimes I wondered if we did, too"). A research poster she makes about monarchs inspires her classmates, and--with input from experts, a budget, and presentations to the school and beyond--a school monarch way station takes shape. So's delicate mixed-media drawings capture the girl's classmates and portrays the protagonist as she journeys from lonely newcomer to poised leader. An author's note and bibliography tell readers how to make their own gardens. Ages 5--8. Author's agent: Steven Malk, Writers House. Illustrator's agent: Sally Heflin, Heflinreps. (Aug.)