Little Bird Laila

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Author(s)

Kelly Yang

Publisher

Dial Books for Young Readers

Genre(s)

Age Range

Release Date

April 15, 2025

ISBN

978-0593407110

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From New York Times bestselling author and illustrator, Kelly Yang and Xindi Yan, is a joyful story of a Chinese American girl translating for her immigrant parents

Laila knows how clever, kind, and funny her Mama and Baba are—but sometimes they need her help translating things from English. With English classes being too expensive, Laila decides to become her parents’ teacher, even though she’s just learning the language too. There’s lots that Laila knows (like you don’t pronounce the t in ballet) but there’s so much she doesn’t know too. Together, they embrace the joy and struggles of learning a new language.

Editor review

1 review

"Add oil!"

May 12, 2025 (Updated: June 30, 2026)

Overall rating

4.0

Plot

4.0

Characters

4.0

Writing Style

4.0

Illustrations/Photos (if applicable)

4.0

Laila helps her parents when they struggle with everyday tasks involving the English language, and even translates for her teacher at conferences, not always telling the truth! She feels important, and Mama and Baba are proud of her. She feels bad when other students make fun of the fact that her parents' English skills aren't great, because she knows how many interesting things they DO know. Since language classes are expensive, Laila decides that she will become her parents' teacher. While Laila still struggles herself with some idiomatic language, she works hard with her parents to increase their knowledge. Soon, the family is sharing jokes in both English and Chinese, and Laila's mother is able to understand Laila's teacher at conferences and tell her that she is proud of Laila.

Good Points

Yang, whose middle grade Front Desk has been hugely popular, and who has written several Young Adult novels as well, brings her own childhood experiences to add a personal touch to this familiar tale of children helping out parents who struggle with language. My community has more Somali, Nepali, and Yemeni immigrants, but Laila's tale is not dependent upon a particular language. I did enjoy the fact that there were some Chinese store signs and words included. "Add oil" is a refrain in the book; it means to keep going, because everything moves faster with oil. It reminded me a bit of the old phrase "Now you're cooking with gas"!

The artwork is delightful, and Laila and her parents are shown in a variety of settings. They go to shops, the bank, school, and spend time in their apartment. There's plenty of white space on the page so the words are very clear, and there aren't too many sentences on each page. This makes it perfect for classroom story times, and I can see this being used to help build empathy.

It's great to see young children wanting to help out in books like Compestine's The Chinese New Year Helper, and Laila and her parents efforts to learn a new language will ring true with readers who were invested in titles like Amy Wu and the Warm Welcome, by Zhang and Chua, Drawn Together, by Lê and Santat, Vo's Gibberish, and Wang and Yum's Luli and the Language of Tea.