BOO

An Irish girl must confront her fear of dogs in Young’s illustrated children’s holiday story.

Abby doesn’t mind Halloween, but she doesn’t want to go trick-or-treating because some people let their dogs out on their porches. However, Olivia, her identical twin, doesn’t mind this. While Olivia and the girls’ mother are out on Halloween night, they find someone giving away a litter of puppies. They come home with a small white West Highland terrier they’ve named Boo, and Abby panics and hides in her room. That night, she even has nightmares. But one day, she’s left alone with Boo and has to feed him. This makes her remember a traumatic event when she was younger: an encounter with a dog that growled in her face. But when she successfully feeds Boo without incident, it changes everything. The bundle of fur becomes her trusted friend and helps her to get over her fears. This meandering tale has some poetic turns of phrase, and Abby’s voice feels very adult in tone, as though she’s recalling events of her childhood. The unusual sentence structure can be challenging at times, which may stymie newly independent readers: “I was chill with Halloween, just not barking four-legged creatures behind doors, some even on front steps unchained.” There are several asides that add flavor to the story but feel somewhat digressive, as when Abby notes that dogs order their day “around eating and going for a walk (not unlike my grandpa).” Quiroz’s highly textured full-color paintings realistically capture the family saga, revealing Boo’s exuberance and Abby’s melancholy. A final image of the pair snuggling is a pleasant snapshot of family joy and calm.

A quirky tale that’s best suited for reading aloud.