TENDER MOMENTS IN THE WILD

The bonds of maternal love exist in the animal world as well as in the human one, touchingly illustrated by the double-paged photographs in this attractively designed work ideal for reading to a group. Each spread shows a photo of an animal mother caring for her baby in some way, with a total of 14 different animals interacting with their young. A brightly colored border around each shows that particular adult animal in a repeated silhouette pattern, with similar silhouettes repeated on bright gold endpapers. The simple text with rich, active vocabulary gives one sentence per spread following the same pattern of animal subject, caring action, and a descriptive phrase. (“A crocodile carries her babies carefully in her powerful jaws.”) Each sentence is printed in large, yellow type with the animal word distinguished in slightly larger, white type. Preschoolers will be fascinated by these spectacular photographs, including amazing views of a young pelican eating fish from the mother’s open mouth and an absolutely irresistible shot of a baby hippopotamus seeming to smile while splashing next to its mother. (Picture book. 2-6)