Nina West was introduced to me by RuPaul’s Drag Race. She was a contestant that was both loud and proud and actually had a dimmer switch. She would go from 1000 to 999 in 30 minutes or so. In other words, she was/is a Queen among Queens.
And when I found that they had written a book, I was wondering which personality will they present?
Nina West at 10,000 flew off the pages in The You Kind of Kind. Nina West is the stage name of Andrew Levitt, but I think we are getting 100% Nina and not Andrew (though I wonder how much Nina is Andrew and visa versa). I mean we get a bold, loud person who wants to let you know that kindness is the ultimate. And the only kind of kindness is the kind you kind! I mean, the kind that you do. It is as wonderful and special as you are, as you’re the only one who can give it.
The character Nina is loud, bold, proud, and makes up fun words to explain their larger-than-life feelings. They grab their trusty backpack with a few of their favorite tings and off they go to show us kindness. And that ranges from cleaning up your park, to planting trees, to saying hello, to being silly and entertaining friends to so much more. She also shows how loving yourself and other is a form of kindness. We see all types of people. The colors of people, the types of people, and the hues of it all just burst loudly off the page. The only small issue I have with the story overall is that there is an almost out of the blue unkind moment. It stopped the flow of the story and was not a great fit in my personal opinion. And though I know it is a kids book, at the very least I expected the image on the bottom to say, Be Kind, Damn it! (Or something more grown up? Maybe if West does an adult version…?)
I was looking for the word to explain Hayden Evans’s illustrations and the word boisterous came from the publisher’s description. And that is certainly the way to describe them. Everything is boisterous. From Nina to details to the spaces between the words. I had this child about aged seven in my head hollering out because they have so much muchness that it had to pop out. And Evans continues that hopped up on sugar, caffeine and about 10 Red Bulls feeling.
Modern in tone and its concept, this is a nice book about well, niceness. It is an all-ages book, but not necessarily for everyone.