One April morning, debut author Cheryl Lawton Malone and her dog had a real-life encounter with a noticeably curious whale while walking on the beach in Provincetown, Mass. This breathtaking picture book was inspired by that profound interaction.
A Brazilian mother and her son--and a whale and her new calf--live parallel lives. The humans are on Cape Cod because the mother is a seasonal cook at the Salty Cod. The whales are off Cape Cod because that's where North Atlantic right whales go in the spring before they migrate in May. (An author's note provides all the details.) Dario, who speaks Portuguese, awkwardly tries to make friends on the beach. As he's accidentally bumping into a girl's sand castle (" 'Desculpe,' Dario says, turning pink"), the whale is playfully bumping a green turtle, which swims away. When Dario launches a kite, the whale launches himself. And then, "Dario sees the whale. The whale sees Dario." The almost holy wonder of looking into a whale's eye is sublimely captured here in Bulgarian-born illustrator Bistra Masseva's (My Dad) beautiful, dramatic spread showing a giant whale's head looming large, with the boy dwarfed on the shore. Every day after that, the boy races to the beach to see his whale, which spouts when the boy whistles, and breaches when he waves.
It is a dream, to be seen by and make friends with a whale, and the author quietly captures the heart-quickening excitement akin to what she must have felt herself that April day. Dario and the Whale may well inspire a new pod of marine biologists. --Karin Snelson, children's & YA editor, Shelf Awareness