Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Bookmarks: Celebrating Black Voices’ On Netflix, Where Children’s Books By Black Authors Are Read To Little Audiences

The idea behind Bookmarks: Celebrating Black Voices, executive produced by Jesse Collins, is to bring to life children’s books written by Black authors, illustrated by Black artists and featuring Black characters (many of whom are female). The setting is straightforward, with either a celebrity or the book’s author reading the book in front of a green screen that shows the book’s illustrations, or them performing the reading from their homes. 

BOOKMARKS: CELEBRATING BLACK VOICES: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: Host Marley Dias, who started the #1000BlackGirlBooks movement, introduces the first book in the Bookmarks series, I Love My Hair!, which is being read by Tiffany Haddish.

The Gist: The books featured: ABC’s For Girls Like Me, Anti-Racist Baby, Brown Boy Joy, Crown: An Ode to the Fresh Cut, Firebird, I Am Enough, I Am Perfectly Designed, I Love My Hair, Let’s Talk About Race, Pretty Brown Face, Sulwe, The Day You Begin, and We March.

In the case of I Love My Hair, Haddish reads the book with her own Haddish-esque commentary about how painful it was when her mother did her hair and how much she liked wearing beads. She models an afro wig, then doffs her straight wig at the end of her reading to show off her recently-shorn head.

Marsai Martin jumps around the set while reading ABCs For Girls Like Me, and Lupita Nyong’o passionately reads her own book Sulwe. Actress Grace Byers explains why she wrote her own book I Am Enough, and Jacqueline Woodson tells kids why her book The Day You Begin has rulers all over it.

Other readers are Common, Caleb McLaughlin, Karamo Brown, Jill Scott, Misty Copeland, Kendrick Sampson and Dias.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Reading Rainbow, but with books that many kids can relate to, whether they’re Black, Brown or Caucasian.

Our Take: Bookmarks: Celebrating Black Voices fills a public need, which is exposing parents and kids to books they may or may not be aware of, about kids and people whom many Black kids haven’t seen in kids’ books, at least not the ones they find at the library or read at school.

It’s part of an effort on Netflix’s part to give parents help to find books by Black authors and about Black kids; the website associated with the show gives parents book recommendations for kids of all ages that go beyond the 11 that are read during the first season.

As with most reading series, the readers bring the books to life, either through funny asides like Haddish does or just by voicing what was going on in their heads when they wrote the books themselves. The episodes I watched were mostly reading of books I have at home and read to my 5 year-old; it was illustrative, for instance, to see how Nyong’o interprets her own writing in Sulwe using her Oscar-winning acting skills, or seeing how Byers intended the prose in I Am Enough to read when she wrote it.

But I also appreciated readings done by celebs instead of authors. Anything that brings awareness to these books is amazing, and the series’ sparse productions let the books and the illustrations in them shine.

What Age Group Is This For?: The books covered are for all ages from 0-12, and this should at least work for that age group.

Parting Shot: I appreciated that Haddish, at the end of her reading, took off her wig and let her peach-fuzz-laden head shine.

Sleeper Star: Martin is always the sleeper star, because I’m always amazed at the teen’s poise and maturity. If she’s like this at 16, what is she going to be like in 10 years? And I appreciate Dias’ maturity; she’s about five months younger than Martin and holds the camera’s attention just as much as Martin does.

Most Pilot-y Line: None.

Our Call: STREAM IT. Bookmarks: Celebrating Black Voices introduces kids to books they may not know about, or brings life to books that kids may already know. Either way, it’s a good series to show your kids if you’re tired of them watching Super Monsters or one of Netflix’s less-than-educational kids’ shows.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, VanityFair.com, Playboy.com, Fast Company’s Co.Create and elsewhere.

Stream Bookmarks: Celebrating Black Voices On Netflix