The Day You Begin by Jacqueline Woodson

Jacqueline Woodson is a bright light for everyone in the young adult literature scene, and now she has written a book for children.
"The Day You Begin

started with a poem in Brown Girl Dreaming about my great grandfather who was the only black child in an all-white school," Woodson told an interviewer. "My mom used to tell us there’d be moments when we walked into a room and no one there was like us. I’ve walked into those rooms many times during my childhood and beyond so I had the sense that this was true of most people and began writing the story."
And that, in a nutshell, is what the book is about.  First the sense of alienation, and then, when you take a risk, that it can all work out well, that people are more alike than they are different.  And it is beautifully illustrated.