(2) K-3 Illustrated by Cindy Derby. A gorilla approaches a young boy after the death of the boy's mother ("Your mother's garden is beautiful. May I help?") and stays with him as the boy begins to process what happened and work through his grief. Sometimes the gorilla answers direct questions ("Where did Mom go?" "No one knows for sure"); at other moments, it simply provides affirmation ("Sometimes I want to be alone." "That's all right. Everyone needs quiet time"). Gorgeous collage illustrations, splotchy and watery almost as if tear-stained, follow the boy and gorilla from garden to beach to playground to classroom to treetop as the conversation continues, always (after the first introduction) initiated by the boy. As time passes and with the gorilla's help and gentle encouragement, the boy approaches his father--who has been present in the background, but silent and separate--and as the two begin to talk about their mutual grief and to comfort each other, the gorilla departs. Kramer's text is understated and powerful, and Derby's art, whether depicting a glorious seascape or a mundane school-bus interior, is invested with emotion. The gorilla--enormous in comparison to its surroundings, standing out on each spread in deep colors of purple, blue, and gray--is both a reassuring presence and a symbol of the immensity of the boy's grief. [See the similarly themed Bear Island, reviewed on page 53.]

Reviewer: Martha V. Parravano | Horn Book Magazine Issue: March, 2021

(2) K-3 Illustrated by Cindy Derby. The intersection of outside and inside is creatively explored in this reflection on nature and its gentle persistence and ever-presence. The story begins in nature, as a young girl explores an impressionistic forest. "Once we were part of Outside and Outside was part of us. There was nothing between us." After a few page-turns, the girl is riding in a car, with contemplative text observing, "Now sometimes even when we're outside...we're inside. We forget Outside is there." But the outside always makes itself known in subtle and miraculous ways. Airy and translucent jewel-hued watercolors create a luminous canvas for powdered graphite details that delineate how the Outside sneaks In. From the sunlight that "flashes through the window" to the "warm bread and berries" on the kitchen table to the "wooden chairs, once trees," the natural world organically weaves its way into the girl's home, creating daily rhythms ("Outside shows us there is a time to rest and a time to start fresh") and routines ("a spider seeking shelter, a boxelder bug in the bath"). Visible brushstrokes and splashes create texture, reflecting the outside's raw, sensory, and uninhibited beauty--a beauty that (on the last spread) summons the girl out of her house and into the golden outdoors, reminding readers of the majesty that is always there, waiting just outside.

Reviewer: Emmie Stuart | Horn Book Magazine Issue: September, 2020