Greet the Dawn: The Lakota Way

Written and Illustrated by S.D. Nelson

With swaying lyricism, Greet the Dawn is a lovely book that combines a number of visual influences with the prayers and chants of the Lakota native peoples as they worship the natural elements throughout the day. The illustrative style contains traces of primitive cave paintings, Impressionism, some notes of Picasso’s blue period and a few cartoonish touches to keep its style within the reach of its target audience, all played out in

an array of vibrant pastels. Greet the Dawn isn’t a story so much as a celebration of the natural world and the pleasure of observing a passing day. I particularly loved the inclusion of Lakota chants in their own language along with the translation. If I had a fun time trying to pronounce “Anpe wi kon miye yelo” I imagine kids will love it. This book would be a great companion for a lesson plan on Native Americans, or for early readers to show them that sounding out words is the same in many different languages. I could also imagine this book being converted into a great little class play with all the different animal parts to act out.  There are far too few picture books about the practices of aboriginal cultures, but Greet the Dawn proves a fine example of why there should be more.