Wait­ing for the dough to rise is part of bak­ing bread. In Ris­ing, a pic­ture book by Sidu­ra Lud­wig and Sophia Vin­cent Guy, it is also a metaphor for patience and cre­ativ­i­ty. A Jew­ish moth­er and her daugh­ter enjoy their close­ness with one anoth­er as they pre­pare for Shab­bat by care­ful­ly bak­ing chal­lah for their family’s meal. The qui­et beau­ty of both text and words is com­posed of spe­cif­ic moments that cul­mi­nate in a joy­ous cel­e­bra­tion of tradition.

There is noth­ing bela­bored about the sim­ple state­ment of the girl as the book begins; ​“I rise with Ima in the ear­ly morn­ing.” Bak­ing is an act of cre­ativ­i­ty, a part of being human. Extend­ing the metaphor fur­ther, the moth­er is preg­nant. She and her daugh­ter embrace in their kitchen, in antic­i­pa­tion of their day togeth­er. Each detail of the text builds a visu­al pic­ture, accom­pa­nied by mixed-media illus­tra­tions with soft col­ors and art­ful­ly com­posed graph­ics. ​“My hot choco­late and her tea sit beside it,” the girl observes about the plac­ing of a mix­ing bowl on the counter, ​“steam from both our cups ris­ing.” In the equiv­a­lent of a short poem, the author has dis­tilled the moth­er-daugh­ter rela­tion­ship to its essence.

The har­mo­ny between words and images is excep­tion­al. Knead­ing the chal­lah is a coop­er­a­tive task. The girl stands in front of her moth­er as all four of their hands work togeth­er. Under the counter the girl’s feet rest on a bright red step­stool, empha­siz­ing her youth as well as her pur­pose­ful par­tic­i­pa­tion in an adult task. The next step is braid­ing the dough. Wrap­ping the dough in a tow­el, the girl observes that the still unbaked chal­lah resem­bles ​“a baby sleep­ing.” Her arms around her mother’s stom­ach rein­force this recognition.

As Shab­bat approach­es, the pages grad­u­al­ly fill with more peo­ple, objects, and set­tings. The girl bends down to watch the two loaves bak­ing in an oven. She changes her clothes, although this family’s Shab­bat out­fits are relaxed and casu­al. Final­ly, the inter­ac­tion between moth­er and daugh­ter expands to a Shab­bat table where her extend­ed fam­i­ly is seat­ed: par­ents, grand­par­ents, a sin­gle woman who could be an aunt. Every­one turns towards one anoth­er, recit­ing the bless­ings that express grat­i­tude, per­form­ing the rit­u­als that enact togetherness.

When the new baby arrives, the father puts on his apron and the girl holds out the bowl toward him, as the moth­er looks on. A close-knit fam­i­ly, laced togeth­er like the strands of the chal­lah, is ​“ready to rise again” in this love­ly affir­ma­tion of Jew­ish life.