Ezra Jack Keats (1916–1983)

Pete has a new baby sister . . . her name is Susie. And Pete is not sure he is happy about it. His parents painted his cradle, his high chair, and his crib pink for Susie. Now they’re going to paint his chair. So Pete grabs it and runs to his room.

Then Pete and his dog, Willie, run away.

What will happen when Pete’s parents discover that both Pete and Willie are gone?

Colorful illustrations highlight this gentle tale, a story many young readers will relate to and will readily empathize show more with Pete’s frustrations. It’s a perfect platform for a discussion between parent and child, reminding them that a new baby does not take the place of the older child.

The targeted audience, young readers ages three through seven [preschool through second grade], are sure to relate to Pete’s feelings. Ostensibly, the story is about Pete's sibling rivalry, but, in truth, it speaks more to Pete’s feelings about change and his baby sister than it does to any sense of rivalry. Some readers may cringe at what many consider the gender stereotype of Pete’s furniture being blue and then painted pink for Susie, but young readers are likely to be accepting of this as the norm in their world. This charming story is a sweet tale of love and accommodation and family.

Young readers will chuckle at Pete’s solution to his problem and the ending is perfect for the telling of this tale.

Highly recommended. show less

Keats has a knack for dropping the reader into the story with no preamble, and the world-building is only in the pictures. So much outside the story doesn't matter. So much is left to the reader to work out and decide for themself. This story will haunt me; it might be my personal favorite by the author.

Yes, meeting a blind man is scary. But what I work out for my own interpretation is that he is the one who is scared. Note how the colors of the music change.... (I wonder if Keats had show more synesthesia....) show less

It is a snowy day and the kids do snowy day things. How excited you feel about that will presumably directly correlate with your level of childhood snowy day nostalgia. Also, I hate that I need to mention that the main kid is black like that's a big showy point in this book's favour, but it is because the kids' book world is whiter than a snowy day man.

Waking up one wintry morning to a world covered in snow, young Peter puts on his red snowsuit in this iconic picture book from 1962, heading out to spend a day playing in a city transformed. Crunching through the snow and making various tracks, hitting a tree with a stick to dislodge the snow, making a snowman and snow angels, sliding down snowy hills—there were many things he did before heading home...

A childhood favorite of many friends, The Snowy Day is one of those books I have always show more known about—it won the Caldecott Medal in 1963, and is considered a ground-breaking title for its depiction of a young African American boy and his day of fun—but never actually read as a child. I suspect that, had I done so, it would have been a favorite. I too loved to play outside in the snow, and could spend hours amusing myself. I thought the artwork here, unsurprisingly, given the accolades it won, was lovely: simple but charming, with wonderful use of color and form. I loved the pinkish-blueish snowflakes! All in all, a wonderful book, one deserving of its status as a classic, that I would recommend to all picture book audiences looking for wintry tales. show less