Preparing for storm season was routine for Sara Echenique and her family while growing up in Puerto Rico. But after September 2017, she never thought of hurricanes the same way again.
That was the year when Hurricanes Irma and Maria struck the island with devastating force, landing as a Category 5 and 4 respectively.
Irma damaged thousands of buildings and took out power for more than a million residents. Just two weeks later, while the island was still recovering, Maria made landfall — killing at least 3,000 people and causing its power grid to collapse. The recovery efforts were complicated and lengthy.
"I visited Puerto Rico that December ... and while I was there, I was really struck by the sea of blue tarp roofs that we saw literally everywhere," Echenique said.
Not long after, Echenique read a story about a little kid who hadn’t been able to speak since the hurricanes hit.
“I just couldn't get that kid out of my mind,” Echenique said. “I couldn't stop thinking about them and what they had gone through, especially because they were around the same age as my children.”
That’s when the idea for her children’s picture book, Our Roof is Blue, was born. The book tells the story of two young Puerto Rican siblings on the island during and after a hurricane. The brother, Antonio, stops speaking after the natural disaster and his sister is determined to help him find his voice again.
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“I felt like I needed to get it out in order to process the trauma that child was experiencing, and that so many of the children on the island were experiencing at the same time,” Echenique said.
As the characters in the book prepare for a hurricane, readers can learn more about the process of putting up protections on homes and stocking up on water, food, batteries, flashlights and toilet paper.
Now, her book has been chosen as the Florida Youth Pick to be recognized at the 2024 Library of Congress National Book Festival — which will be held in Washington, D.C. on August 24.
“I'm just incredibly humbled and honored to have a part of Puerto Rico's story and also Florida’s story be something that's so representative of this wonderful state that we call home,” Echenique said.
Our Roof is Blue is also available in Spanish. Echenique said that when her publisher suggested the idea, she couldn’t resist.
"I felt like I needed to get it out in order to process the trauma that child was experiencing, and that so many of the children on the island were experiencing at the same time."Sara Echenique
“Language is really one of the many keys to culture,” Echenique said. “It's in the music that we dance to, the stories we pass on from generation to generation and it can really provide an instant connection to others.”
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She added that she wants her three children to feel connected to their inherited cultures — Puerto Rican from Echenique and Cuban and Slovak from her husband.
“I think our children deserve access to the same level of rich literature as everyone else,” she said.
Echenique also hopes Our Roof is Blue will empower children to know they can help decrease the effects of climate change and as a result, perhaps lessen the impact of the powerful storms.
Among the tips at the end of the book are: planting vegetables, fruits, flowers and trees; recycling and using less energy; showing that you care by advocating for the environment; and creating innovative solutions to reduce our carbon footprint and address the effects of climate change.
“I think especially with something like climate change, it's very easy for even adults to feel powerless and passive and like there's nothing you can do,” Echenique said. “I really wanted [readers] to see that they have agency… and give them that sense of control over something that often feels uncontrollable.”
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