Title: The Snow Angel
Author: Lauren St. John
Type: Fiction
Page Count/Review Word Count: 337
Rating 3.5/5
This was pretty good for what it was, and the first thing that springs to mind is how beautiful this book is. That’s because I picked up the hardback edition with illustrations by Catherine Hyde, and she did a great job of capturing the story through the visuals she created. She just nailed the vibe, you know?
I also like how Lauren St. John’s books have a theme of animal conservation, with this one covering foxes and having a vegetarian protagonist. It also touched on the Ebola virus and the plight of orphans and albinos in third-world countries. That, combined with the fact that it’s a children’s book, made it a good one to give to kids to help to expand their horizons and to be more empathetic.
I started out reading this as one of my bedtime books, because I didn’t think I was going to enjoy it as much as I did. But as an adult, I whizzed through the pages and pretty quickly ended up getting into the story, at which point I switched it out and made it my main book. It was a good decision.
Lauren St. John is an underrated writer in my opinion, purely because the books that she writes seem so much better than some of the other children’s books that end up taking the headlines. I also appreciate that she highlights these causes, and that she also followed the story up with a short note that explained what people can do to get involved.
In all then, I’m glad that I read this, and if I ever have kids then I can imagine reading it to them too. It’s one of those books that adults can enjoy just as much as children, and while there were a few clichés here and there, they worked in the context of a middle grade book. Happy reading.
