Go Ahead and Dream

Gr 2–4—NFL Quarterback Smith and author Kingsbury cowrote this semiautobiographical picture book about the sports star's path to success. The story tracks friends Alex and Bobby, who follow Alex's grandfather's advice to "Go ahead and dream." It takes readers from the boys' elementary school days to their later successes as an NFL football player and a pilot. The message is hard to miss, with the stock character of the grandfather repeating his mantra every few pages. The illustrations have a too-perfect plastic quality and depict Alex's stable nuclear family complete with a mother in a dress serving pie to her Caucasian family while Bobby is described as a "foster child" and is illustrated as a brown person of ambiguous ethnicity. While this story may appeal to voracious football fans, the book does little to bring new light to the tired trope of "follow your dreams."—Nora Clancy, Teachers College Community School, New York City