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Summary
Summary
This poignant and heartwarming story explores the many faces of sadness and addresses the importance of mental health in a child-friendly way.
A small boy creates a shelter for his sadness so that he can visit it whenever he needs to, and the two of them can cry, talk, or just sit. The boy knows that one day his sadness may come out of the shelter, and together they will look out at the world and see how beautiful it is.
In this timely consideration of emotional wellbeing, Anne Booth has created a beautiful depiction of allowing time and attention for difficult feelings. Stunningly atmospheric illustrations by David Litchfield personify sadness as a living being, allowing young readers to more easily connect with the story's themes of emotional literacy.
Author Notes
Anne Booth worked in many roles before becoming a children's writer, from teaching English in Italy to organizing arts and crafts in a nursing home. Now Anne writes highly acclaimed children's fiction and picture books; Girl with a White Dog was shortlisted for the Waterstones Children's Book Prize and nominated for the Carnegie. Anne lives with her family in a charming village in England.
David Litchfield is a multi-award-winning author and illustrator. His work has been exhibited in shows across Europe and America and has also appeared in newspapers and magazines. His picture book, The Bear & the Piano, was nominated for the CLIP Kate Greenaway medal and was also a Waterstones Best Illustrated Children's Book. He lives with his family in England.
Reviews (3)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 1--5--This story imagines sadness as a fuzzy blob with stick arms and legs that lives right outside the child, a metaphor intended to help readers accept and cope with sadness. Booth and Litchfield propose not only accepting sadness, but actually trying to take care of it by building a shelter and keeping it safe. The shelter has sensory items that sadness might find pleasant, e.g., a candle, lamplight, or the scent of roses. There are also times to leave sadness alone and to go experience other feelings. The art work is simple but evocative, in an atmospheric palette befitting the story's content. This would be an excellent conversation starter for readers who are grappling with strong emotions or for lessons on SEL. VERDICT An excellent choice for collections needing resources on social emotional learning, aimed at those students who already think abstractly. --Debbie Tanner, S. D. Spady Montessori Elem., FL
Kirkus Review
A child tends to their sadness. "I am building a shelter for my sadness and welcoming it inside," declares a skinny White child with brown hair. They begin to pile sticks in a clearing, surrounded by tall, thin tree trunks rich with twinkling lights. Illuminating the scene in a pale teal glow is their sadness, an oval-shaped cluster of sketch lines that might be mistaken for Humpty Dumpty's ghost. Throughout, forest and light frame the sadness as its human caretaker "giv[es] it a space" to do "anything it needs to." It can be loud or quiet, it can run or stand still, it can sit in darkness or light, "or anything in between." It can even "breath in" (a regrettable typo) the smell of roses that bloom around the shelter that the child lovingly maintains. The sadness is as cute as a pensive figure can be, and the decorative whimsy of Litchfield's illustrations softens the melancholy. Psychologically, it seems useful and healthy to visualize compassion and acceptance toward one's own feelings, and these meditative scenes provide gentle emotional prompts in that direction. Still, the metaphor plods on a bit longer than is compelling; by the time the child starts visiting their sadness every day with tea, the point feels belabored beyond meaning. The pair's final walk into the sunset reinforces the complex, necessary idea that beautiful and difficult emotions can coexist. Moody contemplation made engaging with luminous artwork. (Picture book. 4-8) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
ldquo;Sadness has come to live with me, and I am building it a shelter" begins this reflective picture book. Depicted as a conical structure made with tree branches and twigs, the shelter features a window, curtains, and lights. It sits in the garden, where changing seasons will bring winter storms, nesting birds, blooming roses, and falling leaves. Though never named or explained, the sadness is recognized and accepted by the narrator, who is portrayed in the illustrations as a thoughtful boy. He sometimes gives his sadness some space, but each one is there for the other when needed. Sometimes they hug and cry and talk, but often they just sit quietly or walk outside the shelter, looking at the world and discovering its beauty together. Created with pen-and-ink, watercolor, acrylic, and digital elements. Litchfield's illustrations depict sadness imaginatively as a large, rounded, semi-transparent being with long, thin legs and arms and an expressive face. Inspired by the writings of a Holocaust survivor, Booth's graceful, understated text is open to interpretation according to the listener's experiences, but the fundamental theme of accepting one's sadness can resonate at any age. The use of present-tense narration makes the story all the more poignant and powerful. A beautiful, moving picture book.
