I Love You Like Yellow

April 11, 2022
Beaty and Harrison pay tribute to unconditional love through seasons, weather, and times of day in this first-person ode. “I love you like yellow./ I love you like green./ Like flowery orchid/ and sweet tangerine,” opens the text alongside companionable colored pencil and digital scenes of a child and adult walking in the rain. Other vignettes showcase loving relationships between peers, intergenerational pairs, and groups depicted with varying abilities, body types, and skin tones. Sometimes abstract, Beaty’s analogies find a gentle partner in Harrison’s narrative illustrations, which offer semi-literal interpretations. Love that’s “like crunchy and crispy” is visualized by a trio eating popcorn, while “like stormy” love attends an image of a card game played during an urban rainstorm. As the examples build, a reassuring portrait of togetherness emerges. Ages 4–8.

July 29, 2022
Preschool-Grade 1 A mother and her little boy shelter under a yellow umbrella and play in the rain as they search for butterflies. Rhyming text expresses senses and emotions: after "I love you like sweet and like tart,"" (accompanying a pitcher of lemonade) comes, "I love you like crazy with all of my heart." (with an illustration of many large and small brown hands shaping a heart cookie together.) The soft digital illustrations in colored pencil include people of many races, genders, ages, and abilities, and depict fun activities--time at the beach, kite-flying with grandpa, stargazing with dad, singing, dancing and dressing up with Mama, and the ordinary happenings of family life, such as getting dressed for the day (in one spot-on depiction, a boy lies on his back, legs curled up, to pull up his socks). In a soothing ending, a warm bedtime kiss goodnight and cozy snuggle finish off the day. It's a full circle exploration of the numerous ways adults and children experience and share their unconditional love.

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July 1, 2022
This bear-hug of a picture book features a series of similes that serve as declarations of love in various forms. Constructed in a first-person narrative in which the "I" switches from speaker to speaker, readers meet mothers, fathers, and grandparents; siblings and soon-to-be siblings; children with and without disabilities; people of differing ethnicities -- a true diversity of characters. "I love you like yellow. / I love you like green," we read. An adult and child explore outdoors during and after rain showers, lemony yellows and rich greens on display. Other pairs or trios move through their days, bonding as a family (baking cookies); dealing with disappointment (a child finishes last in a race); playing games; exploring the outdoors; dancing and reveling. Beaty's rhyming couplets flow smoothly: "Like sunny. / Like shady. / Like gloomy. / Like gray. / From the breaking of dawn / till the end of the day." Harrison brings a vibrant palette, loving care, and a tight focus to these tableaux; viewers are right there with the families, witnessing their moments together. The last of these features a caretaker (it could be a mother, aunt, grandparent, or other), awash in shades of moonlight blues, sending a child off to sleep "with a hug and a kiss." Julie Danielson

(Copyright 2022 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

July 1, 2022
This bear-hug of a picture book features a series of similes that serve as declarations of love in various forms. Constructed in a first-person narrative in which the "I" switches from speaker to speaker, readers meet mothers, fathers, and grandparents; siblings and soon-to-be siblings; children with and without disabilities; people of differing ethnicities -- a true diversity of characters. "I love you like yellow. / I love you like green," we read. An adult and child explore outdoors during and after rain showers, lemony yellows and rich greens on display. Other pairs or trios move through their days, bonding as a family (baking cookies); dealing with disappointment (a child finishes last in a race); playing games; exploring the outdoors; dancing and reveling. Beaty's rhyming couplets flow smoothly: "Like sunny. / Like shady. / Like gloomy. / Like gray. / From the breaking of dawn / till the end of the day." Harrison brings a vibrant palette, loving care, and a tight focus to these tableaux; viewers are right there with the families, witnessing their moments together. The last of these features a caretaker (it could be a mother, aunt, grandparent, or other), awash in shades of moonlight blues, sending a child off to sleep "with a hug and a kiss."

(Copyright 2022 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)