Shy Willow

November 23, 2020
A timid bunny named Willow must venture outside her comfort zone in Min’s quiet, whimsical debut. In an abandoned mailbox decorated with taped-on sketches and flora, shy Willow hides from the noisy and chaotic world outside, her long ears occasionally poking through the mail slot. When an envelope is slipped into her cozy home, Willow discovers it’s a letter to the moon from a boy hoping to arrange a surprise for his mother’s birthday. Moved by the boy’s thoughtfulness, Willow determines to help deliver the message, even if the long journey means she’ll need to travel far from the mailbox’s security. To reach the moon, she tries jumping, climbing, and even catching a ride on a magnificent phoenixlike bird, until in an act of selflessness, Willow makes a final, improbable attempt that proves successful, slowly propelling the tale to a heartening, if predictable, conclusion. Employing watercolor and colored pencil, Min creates gentle scenes—the most striking of which are wordless—that radiate with hints of sunset pink, lending a luminous quality that befits this earnest tale of bravery begetting self-realization. Ages 4–7. Agent: Maria Vicente, P.S. Literary.

December 1, 2020

PreS-K-Willow, a white rabbit, lives in an abandoned mailbox where she draws sketches and feels safe from the world. When a letter drops in the mailbox with a special birthday request addressed to the moon from a boy named Theo, Willow knows she must deliver it in spite of her fears. Willow ventures out, testing her courage and making many failed attempts to reach the moon, jumping high, climbing a mountain, and even hitching a ride on a bird. Finally, she sacrifices pages from her sketchbook to fashion a balloon to float up to the moon and successfully deliver the letter. The moon rewards her by fulfilling the request to shine brilliantly for Theo's mother. Willow basks in her deed, and "the warmth of the moonlight spread through Willow's chest." Pencil illustrations provide detail, while soft washes of watercolor in twilight colors of pink, blue, and lavender create a soothing palette, though the outline of Willow in red strikes an odd note. Sketches from Willow's notebook adorn the endpapers and provide a window into Willow's fears and newfound friendship with Theo. VERDICT A shy rabbit shows bravery and ingenuity in a story that addresses shyness and determination. An additional purchase.-Ramarie Beaver, formerly at Plano P.L., TX

Copyright 2020 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from December 15, 2020
Preschool-Grade 1 *Starred Review* Willow is a timid white rabbit who prefers staying home--an abandoned mailbox--where it's cozy and quiet. There she sketches and dreams, but her comfortable routine is interrupted when a letter flutters through the mail slot one day. It turns out to be a letter from a boy to the moon, asking it to shine brightly for his mother's birthday. Touched, Willow decides to deliver the letter to the moon, despite the scary prospect of being so far from home. A charming sequence of illustrations shows Willow's varied attempts to reach the moon, with success finally found in a balloon constructed of pages from the rabbit's sketchbook. Min layers colored pencil and watercolor to create whimsical, rainbow-slicked scenes where the story's more fantastical elements feel right at home. Young readers will be fully absorbed in Willow's dreamlike adventure and appreciate her bravery as she ventures outside of her comfort zone. Not only does Willow succeed in her birthday mission, she becomes braver in her daily life, too, signified by a friendship with the boy she helped and by her sketches changing from graphite to color drawings by story's end. A warm and wondrous adventure for armchair, or high chair, travelers.

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March 1, 2021
Willow, a painfully shy rabbit who lives in an abandoned mailbox, plucks up her courage to journey on the grandest adventure ever. The outdoors can be scary for a small rabbit, and Willow's favorite quiet and cozy place to be is inside her cheerily multihued mailbox, where her pencil drawings are tacked all over the walls. One day, a letter flutters in through the slot--a letter addressed to the moon. In it, a child's scrawl asks the moon to please shine big and bright for his mother's birthday tomorrow. Alas, who will deliver the letter to the moon on such short notice? Could Willow do it? Min's sweet illustrations convey Willow's hesitation, her determination, her fear--and her dejection as the moon proves difficult to reach. Even after a wondrous soaring flight on birdback (so hopeful!) is thwarted by a gust of wind, she perseveres, voyaging to the moon in a way only she and her trusty sketchbook together could have achieved. Willow is a white rabbit, and the few humans depicted have light skin and cartoony features with dots for eyes. But Min's soft, colorful illustrations (as well as a rabbit protagonist making her way in a human world) give readers a magical feeling from the beginning, and the climax is lovely to behold. They make this otherwise slight story worth a look. Whimsical and charming illustrations (literally) elevate this simple tale. (Picture book. 3-7)

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