Review - A Warm Friendship

A Warm Friendship
by Ellen DeLange
illustrated by Jacqueline Molnár
Date: 2019
Publisher: Clavis
Reading level: C
Book type: picture book
Pages: 32
Format: e-book
Source: NetGalley

Squirrel and Snowman are the best of friends. Will their friendship last forever?

A warm story about making friends and letting them go. For friends ages 5 years and up.

(synopsis from Goodreads)

This book makes little sense. It's all about a snowman who's cold. That's the first problem right there. A snowman should be cold! He's made of snow. From there, it gets a bit ridiculous...

See, the animals all bring scarves and blankets to warm the snowman up. Then they all snuggle in together to sleep. For whatever reason, this doesn't melt the snowman.

But the sun does. One morning, the animals discover nothing but a pile of blankets and scarves in the middle of the forest. The snowman is gone. Some of the animals are upset. Owl, thinking he's probably helping, tells Squirrel not to be sad. (Yeah, kids. Don't be sad when your best friend dies! Just don't.) I understand Owl's point about remembering the good times, but telling children not to have emotions after a loss just doesn't sit right with me.

There was only one way this story could end, really, but I'm still confused as to why the animals spent the first part of the book trying to warm up the snowman if they didn't want him to melt! There's a failure of logic here...

The illustrations are okay. They're colourful and there's plenty to look at, but I don't really like the style. Your mileage may vary, of course.

Overall, I found this one rather disappointing. I wouldn't have minded a story about forest animals having to deal with the loss of their snowman friend... but the fact that they spent the first part of the book trying to warm up a snowman--that they didn't want to melt--didn't make a whole lot of sense.

Thank you to NetGalley and Clavis for providing a digital ARC.

Premise: 2/5
Meter: n/a
Writing: 3/5
Illustrations: 3/5
Originality: 2/5

Enjoyment: 2/5

Overall: 2.33 out of 5