Will You Be My Friend?

Awards:

• The Irish Book Awards (Short-listed)

Reviews:

Jeram’s spacious, pale-toned, naturalistic outdoor scenes create a properly idyllic setting for this cozy development in a tender child-caregiver relationship—which hasn’t lost a bit of its appealing intimacy in the more than 25 years since its first appearance. As in the first, Big Nutbrown Hare is ungendered, facilitating pleasingly flexible readings. Readers are likely to love it to the moon and back. ~Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

Twenty-five years after publishing evergreen bestseller Guess How Much I Love You, the collaborators offer a similarly resonant sequel in which Little Nutbrown Hare goes exploring alone when Big Nutbrown Hare is preoccupied...McBratney’s strategically spare narrative leaves ample space for children to personalize the tale, whose affecting affirmation of independence and friendship plays out with corresponding authenticity in Jeram’s airy ink and watercolor paintings. ~Publishers Weekly (starred review)

Recommended for purchase, this is a loving portrayal of a young child’s growing independence and the absolute bliss of finding a new friend. ~School Library Journal