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PRESCHOOL
Pendziwol, Jean E.

I Found Hope in a Cherry Tree

32 pp. | Groundwood | September, 2020 | Trade ISBN 978-1-77306-220-4 $18.95
(2) PS Illustrated by Nathalie Dion. Pendziwol's quiet, first-person text references the natural world to express a wide range of emotions--hope, yes, and also loss, fear, bravery, and sadness. More mood piece than story, the text throughout creates a contemplative space for savoring lyrical language and reflecting on painterly, softly textured, striking art. The pictures' style is representative, yet eminently expressive, and readers will find much to explore within them as they shift between distant and close-up perspectives and interior and exterior settings. When the book opens, a cat (never mentioned in the text) accompanies the solitary child narrator from spread to spread as she plays indoors with her shadow ("sometimes / it disappears... / But it always comes back"). The scenes move to wintry outdoor settings, with the child making poetic observations: "I can hear the wind tell stories, / whispering / to the trees, / making them / laugh / and / sigh." Sometimes "the stories / howl / like wolves," threatening the tranquility, but the girl (now shown in a Red Riding Hood–like cloak) uses her own storytelling ability to keep the wolves at bay. Herein lies hope, as surely as it can be found in the titular cherry tree and the close companionship of a friendly cat.
Reviewer: Megan Dowd Lambert | Horn Book Magazine Issue: September, 2020

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