Sweet People are Everywhere

Summary of Book

Sweet People Are Everywhere, an illustrated picture book featuring a poem by internationally renowned writer and activist Alice Walker, is a powerful celebration of humanity. The poem addresses a young boy getting his first passport, taking the boy––and the reader––on a journey through a series of countries around the globe where “sweet people” can be found.


They are all over the globe. Sweet people can be found from Canada to Congo to Cuba, from Afghanistan to Australia, from Ireland to Iraq…there are sweet people in the thirty-seven places listed in these pages and almost everywhere else on the planet. Take a trip through the lines of this large-hearted poem by Alice Walker and meet some of them!

An ode to humanity, Walker’s heartening message is celebrated through Quim Torres’ deeply felt illustrations.

Author Biography

Alice Walker is a distinguished author and activist who has written dozens of books, including novels, poems, essays, short stories, and children’s books. She was the first African American woman to win a Pulitzer Prize for fiction for her novel The Color Purple, which also won the National Book Award in 1983. Walker’s other books include The Third Life of Grange Copeland, The Temple of My Familiar, and Possessing the Secret of Joy. More than fifteen million copies of her books have been sold, and her work has been translated into more than two dozen languages. As an activist, Walker focuses on issues of inequality, poverty, and social injustice.

Illustrator Biography

Quim Torres is an award-winning illustrator and author based in Barcelona. He has illustrated several children’s books, including the recent titles La noche más noche, Alera i Perot, How Grandpa Disappeared, Quel mari pour Jolie souris?, Contes et légendes d'Espagne, and Tant de gust senyor Calders, and he is the author of the middle grade novel Constel·lacions. He has studied art therapy and Gestalt psychology, and he teaches workshops in which drawing becomes a means of self-discovery.