ALA Booklist

In an inspiring bilingual collection of short poems, Alarcon shares his dreams of peace, community building, and a bright future for children of all cultures. The works are charming in their simplicity and transcend cliche with beautifully unsophisticated imagery ("I feel / like one / happy onion."). The rhythm and cadence work well in both the Spanish and the English entries, and Barragan's illustrations are a fine complement to the text. Flat, bright colors and simple shapes give them the look of classroom paper cutouts, but the compositions are as intricate as Mexican mural paintings. The book delivers a strong message with a very gentle touch, a rare quality that will appeal to children as well as adults.

Horn Book

These seventeen bilingual poems, in both Spanish and English, celebrate family, friends, and the Latino experience. The collection has a strong social conscience, but a few of the pieces seem like didactic exercises. The stylized illustrations provide a rich palette heavy on blues and green. Alarcón's introductory autobiographical note encourages readers to "keep on dreaming for good!"

Kirkus Reviews

In these free verse, mostly unpunctuated poems, Alarcon explores the world of both sleeping and waking dreams and his hope for a better world of tolerance and peace. Family members working together in their garden constitute a vision of cooperative society; people who exclude the dreams of others create a nightmare. In one poem, the young narrator imagines buffalo roaming free, whales singing opera and people living together peacefully. In another, he wants to be a happy onion who makes people sing instead of cry. Alarcon's short lines are worked around Barragan's richly colored, cut-and-paste style illustrations, which use silhouettes, small but exaggerated details and childishly thick figures to embody Alarcon's utopian longings. Includes both English and Spanish versions of the poems. (Poetry. 7-11)

School Library Journal

Gr 2-5 Alarcón has a knack for tapping into the experiences and emotions of childhood. This vibrant collection of 17 short, bilingual verses is about dreamsboth the day and the night varietyas well as the hopes and aspirations of individuals, families, and humanity at large. Rooted in the everyday world of children, the poems feature a family garden, a photo album, favorite fruits, going to school, and household chores. They also touch on larger life lessons, protecting the environment, and dreams for the future. With simple elegance, the verses read aloud beautifully and the poetic images are at once accessible and inspiring. The boldly colored, mixed-media artwork serves as a perfect complement. The art is varied and engaging, and the layout at times displays the Spanish text on top and the English underneath; at other times, side-by-side on the page; and still others on opposite sides of a spread. Overall, this is a dreamy choice for schools and libraries.