I'm a Girl!

February 22, 2016
Who says that everything fun, fast, messy, noisy, and competitive is the domain of boys? A young rabbit is flabbergasted and furious that when she acts true to herself, she is consistently mistaken for a boy. She strips down to her underpants and impulsively jumps into a pool—a scene Ismail (Specs for Rex) depicts with a marvelous amalgam of devil-may-care splatters and splotches—and a grown-up on a lounge chair shouts, “Hey! Watch out, young man!” She pulls ahead in a footrace, and a bystander says, “Mommy, look. He’s going to win.” “I’m a girl! I’m a girl... I’m a girl!” the rabbit says in a refrain, a sentiment made all the more resounding by bold, hand-drawn typography. By story’s end, she has met a comrade in arms: a lion who is equally eager to define boyhood on his own terms. “Being us is super!” they shout. “We’re us!” Ismail acknowledges that boys face social pressures of their own, but this is a girl’s story, and Ismail’s exuberant watercolors beautifully capture her heroine’s energy and doughty spirit. Ages 3–6. Agent: Vicki Willden-Lebrecht, Bright Literary Agency.