Then the abuelas come over with understanding smiles. In a joyous moment, he spreads the tails of his suit jacket and the two of them imagine themselves borne aloft as butterflies. He gives Marisol his dress shirt, which extends past her waist, and ties some fluttering willow boughs around her shoulders to fall down her back.
They find a willow tree that Julián declares “a fairy house,” but while he is draping himself in its swooping branches, Marisol is running around with the brides’ dog, and dirties her dress beyond redemption. All-Black same-sex couples are unfortunately rare in picture books, and this expression of their love feels like much-needed representation.Īt the reception, Julián and Marisol grow as bored as any two young children at a grown-up party, and sneak off to find amusement-but not before Marisol places her crown of flowers on Julián’s head, with a look indicating that she realizes it suits him better than her.
During the ceremony, they kiss as Julián and Marisol stand by. We meet the two brides, both Black women, one in a white dress with flowers throughout her Afro and the other with locs and a white suit. He’s not showing up in a trim masculine suit with pants and a tie.Īs they arrive at the wedding, they meet Marisol, a young girl whose own abuela is switching out Marisol’s baseball cap for a crown of flowers-another moment in which gender expression shows itself and that we’ll return to later. I like that Love went for something different here, but one that still feels true to what we know of Julián’s self-expression from the first book. There are happily now a growing number of books about gender creative boys who wear dresses or skirts, but gender creativity can take many forms. His sense of fashion has a distinctly feminine flair-but there are many ways to convey that. The tails of his suit flare at the waist, almost skirt-like. As the story opens, we see Julián and his grandmother, both Afro-Latinx (as Love has stated), preparing to be in a wedding, which is “a party for love.” Today, he is wearing a lavender suit with shorts, along with fuchsia shoes that match his abuela’s dress and a fuchsia ribbon tied at his throat. Julián at the Wedding, by Jessica Love (Candlewick), is as beautiful as its Stonewall Award-winning predecessor, with Love’s watercolor, gouache, and ink illustrations on warm tan kraft paper driving the story forward, helped by the few well-chosen words. Julián is back! In the sequel to the acclaimed 2019 picture book, Julián Is a Mermaid, Julián and his abuela are attending a wedding, where Julián meets a new friend and shows that he’s still full of imagination and a creative sense of style.
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