Jill Biden

This picture book was written by a stepmother of a deployed soldier. The author is also the Nana to two military children, who experienced the anxiety of the near instant separation of their father and the stress of worry about their father.. In her story, neighbors and friends are supportive. They shovel snow, and send pizza to help lighten the burden. This is not the experience for all of our military families. During
my two year recall beginning on 9/11 my family had no assistance. The author points out that only 1 percent of the population serve in the military. This rareness creates a disassociation between the civilian population and the hardships experienced by the military families within their community. The adage "Out of sight out of mind" is a common refrain that leaves military families isolated.in parts of the nation where active-duty bases are far and few. In recognition of this disparity the author offers resources to the Civilian Community on how to reach out to the children of military and support their families. Raul Colon support Jill's text with art that provides a window into the various emotion the children and mother experience throughout their father's deployment. Each image is not sharp, like a perfectly exposed photograph. Rather, the imagery is hazy as if to draw attention to the emotional whirl and stress time plays on the mind when flooded with emotions of separation and fear of the unknown. In contrast, Jill's words and lettering in the Resources section at the end of the book has Bolded titles and is enclosed in a double red line border, as if to say "BE BRAVE" Read and act to the community.
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Overall, this book mostly felt very surface-level. The one exception was when the author discussed the loss of her son, Beau. She covers her early life, how she and Joe Biden met and began dating, the fact that she quickly became very close with his two sons and eventually became "mom" to them. She goes over the timeline of when she took time off of work to adjust to becoming a mother and then again when her daughter was born. She talks about hosting family dinners and about her work with military families. It feels like there's a lot unsaid.

The structure of the book felt haphazard - she jumped around in time quite a bit.



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