I Am Extraordinary

K-Gr 2–In his second picture book, NBA superstar Curry encourages young readers to recognize how their differences make them extraordinary. Zoe is starting a new school and is nervous to try out for the soccer team. She wears hearing aids and is afraid people will make fun of her. At first she tries to hide her hearing aids, but with positive encouragement from her new classmates, she realizes that what makes her different also makes her extraordinary. There are many picture books that already exist with similar messages, but this book will appeal to Curry’s fans. A mix of text blocks and speech bubbles give the story a comic-book style to match Bowers’s illustrations. Her colorful images have a style similar to manga, with large-eyed characters and an abundance of bright colors. Diversity is displayed throughout the book with characters who have many different skin tones; also in the pictures are people using wheelchairs or who have prosthetics. As in the previous book, Curry’s cartoon image appears at the end with a list of items to find hidden in the book.