Winter Friends (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: Winter Friends Deborah Stevenson Quattlebaum, Mary Winter Friends; illus. by Hiroe Nakata. Doubleday, 2005 [32p] Library ed. ISBN 0-385-90868-7$17.99 Trade ed. ISBN 0-385-74626-1$15.95 Reviewed from galleys R 5-7 yrs A sequence of eighteen poems tells of a little girl's experiences on a snowy late-winter day. After waking up to the new-fallen snow ("After the Storm"), she ventures out into the icy world, finding a lost mitten ("Lost and Found") and encountering its owner ("Greeting"); the two play together ("Sledding") until it's time to come inside and warm up ("Recipe for a Party"), after which she and her new friend peer out the window and watch the advent of a new layer ("More Snow"). The verse forms vary from deft rhymes (often in short, bouncy lines) to free verse to eloquent haiku, with the poetry inviting young listeners through strong emphasis on sound (internal rhymes and alliteration are rife) as it stretches their imagination through creative imagery ("The wind/ is/ whispering/ a thousand/ tiny/ promises"). Nakata's rosy watercolors retain sufficient particularity of detail to ensure that their optimism remains crisp and fresh rather than soggily sweet; sly humor playfully enhances the sunny scenes (a bird slides down a tree branch as the kids sled down the hill; the young cooks make a realistic mess as well as a pot of hot chocolate) without undercutting their warm good fellowship. This may help remind adult readers-aloud of the snowy magic to which long experience blinds them, and it will certainly make youngsters chafe with eagerness for the next good snowfall. Copyright © 2005 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois