A rose pushes up through a crack in the sidewalk on a loud city street. Nobody planted it. Nobody watered it. It grows anyway, because something inside it refuses to quit. That picture is the whole story of this book, and it is the story Mario has been living since he was seven years old.
A Dream Defended was written for the youngest dreamers in the room, the ones who are still deciding whether the thing they imagine for themselves is allowed to be real. It gives parents, teachers, and mentors a simple way to start that conversation at the kitchen table or on the classroom carpet.
