Crafting spring flowers as unusual as snowflakes, Carin Berger (Stardines) introduces youngest readers to the harbingers of a long-awaited season.
It's Maurice the cub's first spring, and he can't wait to find out more about it. While his mother hunkers down to hibernate and falls asleep, her cub wanders out to satisfy his curiosity. Squirrel, Rabbit, Deer and Robin counsel patience, explaining that it's not quite time for spring yet. But is it any wonder that, in a forest of tall pines, Maurice mistakes a snowflake for spring? Berger crafts meticulous snowflakes in a three-dimensional blizzard that young readers will almost believe they could enter into along with Maurice. The innocent cub collects the flakes in a ball, thinking he's captured spring, then settles in beside his mother. When he wakes at last, his snowball memento is gone, but something of greater moment has arrived.
Young children will savor knowing more about spring than the hero does and will pour over Berger's compositions. She incorporates nature's glories as dioramas, with her cutout components casting shadows that emphasize elements of the big wondrous world little Maurice investigates. --Jennifer M. Brown, children's editor, Shelf Awareness