Product Description
A heartfelt picture book about the versatile beauty and power of friendship
This hopeful picture book touts empathy and friendship. It’s normal to feel sad sometimes, but our friends can be the best antidote. Karl Newson’s simple text and Clara Anganuzzi’s heartwarming illustrations present the perfect example of how being a good friend means learning how to support and listen to those we care about most.
From School Library Journal
PreS-Gr 3-Everyone deals with life's stresses in his or her own way. "Some friends need a great big hug…some prefer to be alone." "Some friends want to watch TV, while others need to laugh." This story, simply delivered in rhyming couplets, is accompanied by vibrant illustrations of a girl who has brown skin interacting with animal friends-a polar bear, an elephant, lemurs, and the like-in a variety of scenes ranging from her living room to Antarctic ice floes. The message: everyone is different. What makes one feel better may not work for another, and vice versa. Rather than focusing on intrinsic physical or personality traits, this book focuses on needs and behavioral proclivities, bringing a fresh take to the "it's okay to be who you are" theme for young readers. While the focus of the story is on how different friends might react in a time of need, young readers will be introduced to a buffet of calming and self-regulation techniques, perhaps even finding things they can already relate to themselves. The most surprising lesson? "Some friends don't want anything except to just feel sad." And that's okay. VERDICT This book would surely be on Mister Rogers's shelves, and is recommended for any SEL collection where books about empathy, understanding, and friendship are needed.-Jennifer Noonanα(c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review
A fresh take to the “it’s okay to be who you are” theme for young readers. While the focus of the story is on how different friends might react in a time of need, young readers will be introduced to a buffet of calming and self-regulation techniques, perhaps even finding things they can already relate to themselves. . . This book would surely be on Mister Rogers’s shelves, and is recommended for any SEL collection where books about empathy, understanding, and friendship are needed.
—School Library Journal
About the Author
Karl Newson writes for the children’s book blog The Mudwaffler Club and contributes to The Creative Attic, an online publication of illustrated poetry. He is the author of For All the Stars Across the Sky, illustrated by Chiaki Okada, Little Owl’s Bedtime, illustrated by Migy Blanco, The Same But Different Too, illustrated by Kate Hindley, and A Bear Is a Bear (except when he’s not), illustrated by Anuska Allepuz. He lives in England.
Clara Anganuzzi would draw on every surface she could find as a child growing up in Seychelles. She enjoys using a mixture of traditional techniques to create narrative images and characters with subtle, gentle humor. She lives in Bristol, England.
