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Caroline Brewer Author · Artist · Literacy Advocate

Blog

  • Teaching a tough subject with poetry and love

    Teaching a tough subject with poetry and love

    Children’s book by Caroline Brewer spotlights a fictional girl protesting violence by police and others.

    Perspective by Cortland Milloy for The Washington Post

    (PHOTO: Amari Russell, 6, examines a copy of Caroline Brewer’s “Say Their Names” at a signing in Washington. Photo by Courtland Milloy/TWP)

    At the Potter’s House community center in Adams Morgan, an audience gathered recently to hear children’s book author Caroline Brewer read from her latest work, “Say Their Names.” The book is a poem about a fictional 7-year-old girl named Aliya who leads a demonstration against violence, including police shootings, in her neighborhood.

    Brewer asked the audience to repeat after her as she read from the book. The children responded enthusiastically.

    Read more from The Washington Post

  • SAY THEIR NAMES – FREE Guide for Parents, Teachers, Youth Leaders

    SAY THEIR NAMES – FREE Guide for Parents, Teachers, Youth Leaders

    AUTHOR CREATES SAY THEIR NAMES
    IMAGINATION GUIDE

     

    NEW picture book offers many gifts,
    including a Positive Identity

    Author Caroline Brewer is leading highly inter-active and musical conversations with students, educators, parents and community groups about her new book  Say Their Names, with Reycraft Books.  In Say Their Names, a fictional 7-year-old Aliya responds to the aftermath of George Floyd’s death with poetry, history, and an invitation to a love-inspired future. Brewer says the book comes with more than 30 “gifts” for children, such as hope, courage, and empowerment, which all work together to form a positive identity. (See page 5 for the list and student-youth engagement opportunities).

    “As we have seen, especially since September 11, 2001, traumatic incidents, such as school shootings, natural disasters, terrorist attacks, racist and religious attacks, wars, pandemics, and the like, keep happening, seemingly with greater frequency, here and all over the world,” said Brewer, “In the face of the world’s ugliness, we’ll be counting on today’s youth to one day stand tall and lead our families, communities, and countries. So it’s critical that we – and they — are equipped with the confidence, language, empathy, mental and emotional stamina to handle the hard stuff. If I could give a child any gift, it would be the gift of a positive identity, and that’s what Say Their Names is all about,” says Brewer.

    **
    Goals of the picture book, Say Their Names: To be a channel for children’s agency, positive identity, strength, intellectual stimulation, healthy, self-actualized communication, to expand supportive communities, to be a source of hope, and a tool for imagining ways forward.

    Click here to get your FREE Imagination Guide!

     

  • Midwest Stop – Say Their Names – Four Events in Three Days!

    Midwest Stop – Say Their Names – Four Events in Three Days!

    WE’RE CELEBRATING THE LAUNCH OF SAY THEIR NAMES
    and DARIUS DANIELS: GAME ON!
    IN THE MIDWEST
    At three Fort Wayne, Indiana locations, November 25, 26, and 27 — Join Us!
    FRIDAY, NOV. 25 – 4-6 pm – Family Event- Invitation-Only Event – Contact Joanne or Liz for details.
    SATURDAY, NOV. 26 – 11 am – 12 noon —Brief talk and autograph session for Say Their Names and Darius Daniels: Game On!

    BIPOC Business Weekend, sponsored by Clydia Early.
    3402 Fairfield Ave, Fort Wayne, IN 46807-1823

    SATURDAY, NOV. 26 – 2 pm – 5 pm —Bring the children for an inter-active musical presentation of
    Say Their Names and Darius Daniels: Game On!, plus powerful writing activity, Q & A, and autographing session. Refreshments will be available for purchase during our break.

    BIPOC Business Weekend
    3402 Fairfield Ave, Fort Wayne, IN 46807-1823

    PLEASE ORDER YOUR BOOKS IN ADVANCE TODAYfrom websites or stores below or Amazon.

    EMAIL poadec.comm@gmail.com for more details on Saturday’s events – Sponsored by the People of African Descent Elders Council

    SUNDAY, NOV. 27 – 10:30 am – UNITARIAN UNIVERSALIST CHURCH, 5310 Old Mill Rd, Fort Wayne, IN 46807 – Delivering the morning’s sermon: Why We Say Their Names, followed by Q and A, and book-signing.

    READ The Washington Post’s feature story here!

    Watch television news coverage of

    Say Their Names here!

    Photo courtesy of MF Photography

  • SAY THEIR NAMES DMV LAUNCH EVENTS NOV. 5, 2022

    SAY THEIR NAMES DMV LAUNCH EVENTS NOV. 5, 2022

    WE’RE CELEBRATING THE LAUNCH OF SAY THEIR NAMES IN THE DMV
    At two locations, November 5 — Join US!
    1 pm – 2 pm — Say Their Names * Potter’s House Cafe/Bookstore — I’ll do an inter-active, musical reading
    of Say Their Names, Q & A, and autograph books. 
    Potter’s House, www.pottershousedc.org, 1658 Columbia Road NW WASHINGTON, DC, 20009
    5 pm – 6 pm – Say Their Names * Mahogany Books
    I’ll do an inter-active, musical reading of Say Their Names, Q & A, and autograph books.
    1231 Good Hope Rd., S.E. Washington, DC 20020 * Phone: 1 (844) 279-6239
    PLEASE RSVP TO caroline@carolinebrewerbooks.com
    Watch new coverage of Say Their Names here!
  • ‘Say Their Names’ Is a Tool for Imagining New Ways Forward

    ‘Say Their Names’ Is a Tool for Imagining New Ways Forward

    ‘Say Their Names’ Is a Tool for Imagining New Ways Forward

    News Alert – August 22, 2022

    Contact Caroline Brewer, caroline@carolinebrewerbooks.com for review copies and links to photos and video or Allison Lambert, alambert@benchmarkeducation.com, Marketing Manager for review copies and marketing information

    Washington, D.C. – Reycraft Books and D.C. Author Caroline Brewer announced the August 22, 2022 release of a new 24-page picture book* conceived on Black Lives Matter Plaza, in front of the White House, and written from a child’s perspective.

    In Say Their Names, 7-year-old Aliya responds to the aftermath of George Floyd’s death with poetry, history, and an invitation to a love-inspired future.  “We love this book!,” says Reycraft Editor Eileen Robinson. “We have not seen anything like it. It’s a fresh take on this movement, and we believe it’s going to spark the kinds of conversations – and actions — that our world needs now…And if you ever have the honor of hearing a live reading of Say Their Names, be prepared, it will electrify your soul.”

    Brewer, who became active in promoting solutions to police and racial violence after the son of one of her closest friends was killed by police in 2003, says the book is a meditation, a mini-dissertation, and a tool for tapping into our imaginations to find new ways forward. The story came to her after a June 2020 visit to Black Lives Matter Plaza, in the shadow of the White House, just minutes from her home.

    “After I arrived at Black Lives Matter Plaza, I started to meditate on everything that surrounded me – the people, the posters, the artwork, the boarded-up buildings, and the black iron fence barring people from getting close to the White House. I took pictures and went home, planning to do short social media posts. But, instead, a poem came out, and soon I heard the voice of a child,” said Brewer, a literacy consultant, former teacher, and former journalist. “When Aliya spoke, she kept saying ‘Imagine. Imagine.’ So, in Say Their Names, Aliya invites us to consider the technologies that humankind has imagined to make life more convenient and entertaining. And she invites us to consider the technology of imagination to make human engagement non-violent.”

    Brewer added that the child in this story helps remind us that police and racial violence have impacts on children. Indeed, some of the victims in recent years have been children, such as Aiyana Stanley-Jones and Tamir Rice. The child’s voice in this story helps remind us that it’s critical that adults help children process these events and invite them into conversations to imagine ways forward that heal and unite us. The leadership presence of the child in Say Their Names also reminds us of the roles that children have played in social justice movements. There were yesterday’s young civil rights leaders, such as then-6-year-old Ruby Bridges and the teens of the Little Rock Nine. In 2012, we had Malala Yousafzai, of Pakistan, raising her voice, and there are today’s climate leaders, such as Jerome Foster II, of D.C., and Greta Thunberg, of Sweden.

    ##

    Say Their Names is now available for ordering at all bookstores and Reycraft Books.

    Learn more about Reycraft Books and Caroline Brewer via these sites:

    www.carolinebrewerbooks.com * facebook.com/carolinebrewerbooks * twitter.com/brewercaroline

    instagram.com/carolinebrewerbooks

    www.reycraftbooks.com

    www.facebook.com/reycraftbooks

    www.instagram.com/reycraftbooks

    www.twitter.com/reycraftbooks