The Author Behind “The Crossing” Has Seen the Real Stakes of Care Up Close

  Diana L. Malkin brings clinical expertise, global awareness, and literary restraint to a children’s book with unusual depth. Some children’s books arrive polished but airless, as if they were developed in a conference room dedicated to relevance. Their themes are correct, their messaging vetted, their prose obedient. Diana L. Malkin’s The Crossing belongs to another category entirely: the book that feels shaped by a life. One senses, page after page, not just expertise but encounter, travel, work, observation, the accumulated texture of listening to people explain what they carry and why. Malkin is a Ph. D.-trained public health professional, a registered dietitian nutritionist, and a certified diabetes care and education specialist living and working in New York, where she serves high-risk pregnant women, adults, and children in a resource-poor community. She has traveled and worked in many countries. She loves animals. Any one of those details might have stayed separate in ano...