About the Holiday
Universal Father’s Week is celebrated during the third week of June each year. All week long we give a special tribute to all the fathers (and father figures) who work hard, are caring, lovable, and funny, keep us on our toes as well as the right path, and are just awesome dads. To celebrate, make sure the dads in your life know how much they’re loved and needed!
Thank you to Orchard Books for sharing a digital copy of this book with me for review!
You Make the World
Written by Mượn Thị Văn | Illustrated by Phùng Nguyên Quang and Huỳnh Kim Liên
As the story begins, a father and his young child share a drink from a single mug outside their simple campsite—a small tent and a lantern, but a roaring campfire ringed by stones. The child’s father reveals the poetry of nature, how “the sun makes the world hum. / The clouds make the world blue. / The wind makes the world wild. / The rain makes the world new.” He then tells his child a secret—“But you know what else makes the world? You.”
Illustration © 2025 by Phùng Nguyên Quang and Huỳnh Kim Liên, text © 2025 by Mượn Thị Văn. Courtesy of Orchard Books/Scholastic.
The child takes this in, a bit surprised. Dad explains how every “hello,” “smile,” or “hug” creates a ripple effect of joy and love and how acceptance will “make the world grow.” In fact, the child, the world, the entire universe are so entwined that the child’s emotions are felt by all. Not only their feelings, but their actions have consequence. “When you forgive, you make the world kind,” the father says. “When you try, you make the world brave.” But even deeper than these single actions or feelings, the father imparts, the child’s very presence “. . . here where you belong . . . make(s) the world whole.”
Mượn Thị Văn introduces her story with a letter to her readers, revealing that You Make the World was inspired by one of her previous books, Wishes.
Illustration © 2025 by Phùng Nguyên Quang and Huỳnh Kim Liên, text © 2025 by Mượn Thị Văn. Courtesy of Orchard Books/Scholastic.
Phùng Nguyên Quang and Huỳnh Kim Liên’s stunning, color-saturated illustrations carry the father and child as they leave their campsite on a transformative adventure with familiar animals and fantastical beasts. An enormous yak kneels to accept kindness from the child before rainbow-winged birds transport father and child on a flight over fields and streams. Hippos ride the waves with them as they kayak on a raging sea, and the father and child soar into the twilight sky holding the tip of a breaching blue whale’s fin. Along the way, readers will see the growing gathering of shadowed animals keeping watch. As the sun finally sets, the child fills a lantern with starlight before falling to sleep in their father’s arms.
You Make the World is a book that parents, grandparents, teachers, and other caregivers will want to share again and again and one that children will ask for often. The book is a must addition to any home or library collection. It would make a much-loved gift for any occasion, especially for babies and new siblings.
Ages 4 – 8
Orchard Books, 2025 | ISBN 978-1338822045
About the Author
Mượn Thị Văn is the author of many acclaimed picture books. From her debut, In a Village by the Sea (2015), to her latest, If You Want to Be a Butterfly (2023), her books have earned many distinctions, including a California Book Award, an Irma Black Honor, and a Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection. Her recent book Wishes, with Victo Ngai, won the Margaret Wise Brown Prize and was named the #1 Best Picture Book of 2021 by BookPage. Her books have been translated into multiple languages, including Vietnamese, Nepali, Sepedi, and Tamil. Mượn Thị Văn lives and works in California. Visit her at muonthivan.com.
About the Illustrators
Phùng Nguyên Quang and Huỳnh Kim Liên are book creators who live and work together in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Quang and Liên are currently working on illustrations for a number of children’s titles to be published in Vietnam and Europe. Some of their acclaimed picture book projects include Hundred Years of Happiness and The First Journey. Visit them at kaaillustration.com. You’ll also find Huỳnh Kim Liên at kimlienhuynh.com and Phùng Nguyên Quang at phungnguyenquang.com.
Universal Father’s Day Activity
You Make the World Activity Sheets
Interact with the world around you with these fun activity sheets proved by Scholastic!
You Make the World Dot-to-Dot and Word Search Pages
You can purchase You Make the World from these booksellers
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Bookshop (discounted books and support for your local independent bookstore)
Picture Book Review
celebratepicturebooks.com 