Another Tongue

A rollicking, relatable introduction to the joys and frustrations of learning a new language.

Your first language is often called your “mother tongue.” It’s solid and familiar, just like the tongue inside your mouth; it feels like home.  

But what happens when you go to a new place, with a different mother tongue? Muddling through words you can’t understand can be mystifying, overwhelming. Sentences sound strange, letters may even look different. But don’t give up: with plenty of practice and a lot of mistakes, you can end up with two tongues! 

Yevgenia Nayberg’s humor-infused prose and larger-than-life illustrations speak playfully to the complexity of learning a language, a process she went through herself when she emigrated from Ukraine. Kids who are currently finding their way in a new language will surely see themselves in Another Tongue, but no kid will be left out of this funny, approachable take on the way the words we use, and the way we use them, changes how we see the world.

Author Biography

Yevgenia Nayberg is an award-winning illustrator, painter, and set and costume designer. She has received multiple awards for her picture book illustrations, including three Sydney Taylor Medals. She is the author/illustrator of the picture books A Party for Florine, Anya’s Secret Society, Typewriter, Mona Lisa In New York, and I Hate Borsch!, and the illustrator of Drop by Drop by Jacqueline Jules, among other titles. Born and raised in Kyiv, Ukraine, she now lives in New York City.