Another Tongue – Perfect Picture Book Friday

Yevgenia Nayberg’s illustrative style has always been eye-catching, but in this book her spare, wry narration that speaks directly to the reader also captures the attention. But before we plunge into the narrative, lets admire the front end papers!

I LOVE LOVE LOVE how the soup pot is speaking (alphabet soup!), using the Cyrillic letters of Yevgenia’s original language, Russian. What a fabulous precursor to a book about learning a new language, one that will help kids who’ve never faced this challenge feel empathy for those who have, while also helping those who’ve struggled to learn a new language feel seen.

The end papers, and the cover, also announce that this book is going to be playful, not boring.

This “tongue” spread, for example, follows suit. Nayberg’s colors, her way with a distorted line, and her—ah—”tongue-in-cheek” humor are so distinctive!

Notice how all of these tongues are Russian….And then….

we switch to English and get this marvelous stylized depiction of a mother-to-be singing in the shower. The water flows like song, and the baby is awash in language.

The next few spreads briefly and humorously describe how language is learned and that different countries have different “mother tongues.” The images that have been playful and fairly light-filled up through this point suddenly darken as the speaker’s world becomes a bit more uncertain.

This, my friends, is a stunning visual metaphor for how it feels to be in a strange land, surrounded by an ocean of undecipherable sound. And a perfect spread for generating empathy for kids (and anyone else) who have had to face this disorienting and scary challenge. I would also venture to say this feeling could be extrapolated to any child with auditory or reading learning challenges, if they have difficulty decoding what’s being said or written.

And it feels like “the dark night of the soul” for this book, because everything that follows becomes lighter and more humorous. Like when words are misspoken or misheard. Saying “chicken” instead of “kitchen,” for example, or “the vampire state building” instead of….I’ll let you figure it out.

So now that I’ve given you a taste of this book, I hope you will discover the rest of its wonders for yourself. The author’s note explains how Nayberg came to the U.S. at age nineteen, and was immediately adrift. But she describes how slowly “like a reel of film developing in a darkroom, the new language started to reveal itself.” And instead of learning how to create a “perfectly translated version” of herself, “a new me emerged…”

This metaphor ingeniously applies to books in translation, as well, for they are truly never a word-for-word translation, but the essence of the old told in the language of the new.

Please suggest ANOTHER TONGUE to your library, if they don’t already include it in their collection. Tell your local indie about it. Donate a copy to your neighborhood school. And share this lovely book with all of the kids and adults in your life. I promise it will bring smiles and perhaps some shared understanding in a world that increasingly needs to be mended with empathy.

Activities:

Pair this book with WE ALL LOVE by Julie Flett. And use this link to listen to and learn words spoken in Cree.

Draw a picture, using abstract shapes and colors, that shows how you would feel if you were locked outside your home, and you really wanted to get inside. Then draw a cartoon or write a poem about how language is a key that can unlock the door to the house.

Read picture books that were written in another language and then translated into English. In what ways do they seem different than many of the picture books that were published in English in the U.S.?

Title: Another Tongue

Author/Illustrator: Yevgenia Nayberg

Publisher: Neal Porter Books/Holiday House, 2026

Ages: Pre-K and up

Themes: language acquisition, immigration

For more perfect picture book recommendations, please visit Susanna Hill’s website.