Just to See: Picture Book

 

Publication date: May 3, 2022

Morgane de Cadier (author); Florian Pigé (illustrator)

My Thoughts:

My youngest grandson is going to be a fisherman. It was decided before birth. His relationship with the ocean is old. My granddaughter is going to be an artist and a boss lady. She knows what she wants and is resolute in her aesthetics. I think that is why I have been so attracted to the new picture books coming out this year as she turns one and two. With my boys, it was more about the rhythm of the text, the way the words played on the page more than the art of it. But for this girl, I have been paying attention to the colors and illustration techniques that create a mood beyond the words.

This book is that muted fantastical, somewhat bizarre smudginess reminiscent of the coming of age movie Moonrise Kingdom with Ed Norton and written by Wes Anderson and Roman Coppola.  This illustration, the way Pigé frames the scenery through the binoculars is so interestingly artistic.

It's difficult to read the text, but the little girl is in her tree house with her binoculars and her yellow rain coat and she sees this odd thing growing above the tree line. The text says: Wait, what is that? It wasn't there yesterday.

She promptly runs into the forest and finds a male deer who has never shed his antlers during the winter so the new "tree" is actually his antlers. As any girl boss, she asks if she can climb up his antlers "just to see." On this all day journey, she finds communities of wildlife living their life in these antlers. I am not sure how I feel about her leaving her green kerchief on the tip top end of his antler, but she will probably go again tomorrow "just to see."

From the Publisher:

There are wonders all around us……Why not go see what you can find?

Every day, perched high up in her tree house, a girl surveys the distant forest through her binoculars. She knows every plant and animal.

But look! A strange new tree appears, towering above all the others. Where did it come from? Is it really a tree?

Intrigued, the girl sets off to take a closer look. Just to see…

Whimsical illustrations bring humor to an inspirational story about staying curious, finding wonder in nature, and seeing the familiar in new and unexpected ways.

**thankful to Blue Dot Kids Press for making these advanced reader copies available. The quality of your artists is quite impressive and I have enjoyed this journey.