The Moon over Star

The Moon over Star

By Dianna Hutts Aston and Jerry Pinkney

This book was a Coretta Scott King Award Honor book.

A girl named Mae remembers the summer of 1969 when the first moon landing occurred and she was nine years old. This book reminded me of my experience of that summer also, where I was and how it felt to see the TV showing of the astronauts landing while outdoors at night at summer camp. We had the TV set up outside so we could see the coverage of the landing and the moon at the same time. It has always seemed to me that the moon was full that night, although I have found out since that it wasn’t.

It is interesting to me that Mr. Pinkney illustrated this book with pictures of an African American family; while the text does not specifically state anything that would indicate that the author intended such a family. I wondered if the author and the illustrator communicated and decided to make it so, or whether it was the decision of the illustrator only. I have done some exploring to see what the answer to my question is, but have not yet found anything definitive.

Any family in America at the time could have had such an experience as is described in this story. Perhaps the fact that it could have been anybody makes this an even more powerful book. The point of the story is that if we can land men on the moon, we can achieve anything else we decide to accomplish, no matter our culture or family situation.

Aston, D. H., & Pinkney, J. (2008). The Moon over Star. New York: Dial Books for Young Readers.