Bitter Tea and Rock Candy

K-Gr 2–In this charming story, Waipo, which is Mandarin for maternal grandmother, makes liangcha, a traditional Chinese herbal health tea for Mimi. After multiple humorous attempts of avoiding drinking the bitter concoction (pouring it down the drain, feeding the dog), Mimi gets caught refusing the tea and thus begins an intergenerational conversation of Waipo’s first time drinking the bitter tea and Mimi’s learning about the love and effort put into the drink. There are roughly 25 words per page and the story is conveyed through third-person description and dialogue between the two characters. Employing a full-color comic-style artwork with a halftone gradient, the illustrations set the story in a cozy house with a vegetable garden, a lotus pond with fish, and trees. Elements of Chinese culture are shown within the illustrations, such as the grandmother’s traditional dress, the bowl used for drinking tea, the wok and the paper fan.