by Jacqueline Woodson, illustrated by Leo Espinosa, is the perfect book to kick off summer! Woodson’s sunny book basks in her memories of growing up in Brooklyn where, as soon as school let out for the summer, the neighborhood sidewalks became a playground. On hot days, someone would always turn on the fire hydrant and spray cool water like a fountain all over the street. Kids would jump rope, build forts out of boxes, and play street baseball in hopes of becoming just like the kid from the neighborhood who went on to play for the Mets. Woodson’s writing conjures up the jingle of ice cream trucks, the dimming of city streetlights in the summer twilight, and the feeling of being a kid as “free as summer.”