The Dream Builder's Blueprint: Dr. King's Message to Young People

Common Sense Media/Common Sense Selection for Families

This riveting found poem for kids based on Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Street Sweeper” speech is creatively interpreted in this nonfiction picture book written by acclaimed author Alice Faye Duncan, accompanied by gorgeous artwork by award-winning illustrator E. B. Lewis.

★ Publishers Weekly, starred review
★ Booklist, starred review
★ School Library Journal, starred review
★ Youth Services Book Review, starred review

In a speech delivered in 1967, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. provided his young audience with life lessons:

• You count.
• Black is beautiful.
• Achieve excellence.
• Make a better world.
• Believe in nonviolence.
• Keep going!

Today, award-winning author Alice Faye Duncan reinterprets King’s speech as a motivational erasure poem in The Dream Builder’s Blueprint, accompanied by spirited and inspired art by Philadelphia-born illustrator E. B. Lewis. Highlighting principles of excellence, activism, and compassion that remain relevant and necessary today, this book has a universal message that’s ideal for parents, librarians, and teachers looking for a book that distills Dr. King's principles to a level that kids can understand.

Included in the book is an author’s note that explains found poetry forms like the erasure poem and provides background information on the Civil Rights movement and Dr. King’s inspiring speech at Philadelphia’s Barratt Junior High School.

Alice Faye Duncan is the author of Memphis, Martin, and the Mountaintop, which received a 2019 Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor and five starred reviews; Coretta’s Journey, which was a 2023 Horn Book Fanfare Book and a Eureka! Nonfiction Childrens’ Honor Book; Traveling Shoes, and many more books for young readers.

Caldecott Honor and five-time Coretta Scott King award-winner E. B. Lewis is the illustrator of more than seventy books for children. His recent titles include Invincible, which was nominated for the Keystone to Reading Elementary Book Awards, Everywhere Beauty Is Harlem, which received four starred reviews and was a Kirkus Most Anticipated Book of 2024, and The Soldier’s Friend.