As The Winter Bird opens, author Kate Banks cleverly invites young readers to put their inference skills to work as she describes the change in seasons. “It was the time of year when the sun went to bed early,” she writes. “The big brown bear lumbered off to its winter den. . . . And the birds prepared to fly south.” But a nightingale, a spring bird, remains stranded on the ground by a broken wing. “What will happen to me?” it sings. 

A nearby barn owl tells the nightingale that it will have to stay behind and learn the ways of winter. Over the months that follow, the nightingale sees snow for the first time, a rabbit invites the bird to take shelter in its burrow, and squirrels share their food with the bird. Eventually, the nightingale learns how to keep warm on its own and to forage for its own food. It even survives a blizzard with the other creatures, breaking the storm’s “eerie hush” with a song of “summer’s sweetness” and then an ode to “winter’s wonders.”

Banks’ satisfying prose is evocative and filled with figurative language. Cold creeps “in on icy feet,” and the blizzard covers “the world in a shimmering blanket.” Meanwhile, in full-bleed spreads, illustrator Suzie Mason effectively brings winter to the page. Her color palette grows increasingly dark as the season sets in and the animals retreat. In two spreads, she places readers behind the rabbit and nightingale in the rabbit’s burrow, looking out at the falling snow along with the wide-eyed creatures. As spring arrives, Mason punctuates snowy spreads with vivid greens, and by the final spread, green sings from every inch of the pages. 

The Winter Bird is an earnest anthropomorphized tale. Its creatures support and encourage one another, forming a kind and tightknit community that transforms the nightingale. As Banks reflects, “It was a spring bird, but it had become a winter bird, too.” 

In So Much Snow, author Kristen Schroeder and illustrator Sarah Jacoby take readers through the days of the week by exploring the joys of a big winter snowfall in the woods. 

“On Monday, it starts to snow,” the book opens as a tiny mouse watches huge three snowflakes fall to the grass. “How high will it go?” More snow falls on Tuesday, and a rabbit pops up from behind a log to delight in the promise of winter weather. Once again, the text asks: “How high will it go?” Schroeder repeats this phrase throughout the book as the snow continues to fall all the way up until Sunday. “The end of the snow. Brilliant blanketing. SO MUCH SNOW!”

Writing with an elegant economy, Schroeder fills the book with punchy, alliterative sentences starring vivid active verbs. Flakes float, hilltops hide, drifts dance and more. Jacoby depicts foxes, wolves and deer in motion—leaping, jumping and sniffing the air as the color palette becomes progressively whiter. By the book’s climax, amid snow drifts and high winds, Jacoby’s compositions become wonders of line and movement. 

In the book’s second half, as readers pause to appreciate the stillness of wintry days, it’s a new week and the animals reappear: “On Monday, the sun starts to show.” Schroeder’s text encourages readers to notice shrinking shapes and thawing things, and to greet the creatures (“Look, it’s Moose. Hello!”).” Rabbit even waves directly at readers while venturing out in the melting snow. By Saturday, it’s “snow’s new low.” Spring seems to have arrived. “NO MORE SNOW!” 

This cozy winter adventure closes with a delightful twist that’s true to its title. So Much Snow is so much joy. 

Poor Nubby. The plush toy rabbit has been “carried, buried, dropped, dragged, torn, worn, chewed on, sat on, and even used as a nose wipe. Repeatedly.” What a life! No wonder Nubby decides to head off in search of a place where he’ll be far more appreciated than he is at home. 

First, Nubby tries making friends with the real rabbits in the yard, but they ignore him. Next, he joins a neighbor child’s magic show in the hope of achieving stardom, but that doesn’t work out either. Finally, Nubby decides that wealth must be the answer, but he soon discovers that there is no greater treasure than being truly loved.

Nubby is filled with hilarious illustrations and well-written prose that begs to be read aloud. Illustrator Shanda McCloskey excels at creating emotions from simple lines and shapes. Nubby exudes dour displeasure as he’s picked and pulled at, his angry unibrow a single thick squiggle. He can’t speak to protest his rough treatment, since his mouth is merely a thin vertical line descending from a pink triangle nose. Despite the many injustices Nubby endures, there’s also buoyant joy in McCloskey’s illustrations, from the dog who is all too happy to run around the neighborhood with Nubby in his mouth to the gratitude of the boy who hugs Nubby tightly upon his return and, yes, still sometimes uses our hero as a hankie.

Author Dan Richards doesn’t miss a moment for humor in his writing, using repetition and grandiosity to give the story a dramatic flair. This approach might go over the heads of the youngest of readers, who may also be troubled by an image of Nubby lying on the ground, tattered and surrounded by white stuffing, accompanied by text that describes how “the pain in his chest cut deep, deeper than torn cloth and strewn stuffing.” Yet the story’s wit and dramatic tension are sure to make it a crowd pleaser among a slightly older and more worldly readership.

Nubby is a worthy tribute to all the beleaguered, beloved toys who serve as constant, comforting companions through childhood.

As the sun sets and a full moon rises, three children venture outside, ostensibly to find their runaway dog but mostly to frolic in the nocturnal world beyond their gate. Author Dianne White and illustrator Felicita Sala’s Dark on Light is lyrical, charming and wonderful. 

White’s text is more like a poem than a straightforward story. In lieu of lengthy descriptions, she creates a vivid world through concise statements that form rhymed couplets: “Silent the owl. Still the night. / Dark the meadow beneath its flight.” Once every four lines, the couplets resolve by using the book’s title as a refrain. This repetition, along with the text’s soothing, cohesive meter, lends Dark on Light the mood of a calming lullaby. It calls to mind the way we feel compelled to whisper among shadows, to hush our voices as we explore the realm of nighttime. It’s magical and awe-inducing, but never eerie or foreboding. 

Sala’s illustrations do much of the narrative work. We see the children run through flowery fields, traipse through a forest, turn cartwheels in the grass and eventually find their dog and make their way home to bed. Sala’s artwork has a classical look, with soft shapes and muted hues that are familiar, joyful and full of life. And while night is often a source of fear for children, Sala’s dark forest is beautiful and deep, populated with gentle, curious creatures, including a doe and her fawn, a fox and a squirrel nestled in the hollow of a tree. Enchanting details—the Canis Major constellation highlighted in the starry sky, a teddy bear peeking out from under a bed—give readers a further sense of security. This is a safe book for imagination and dreams. 

Everything about Dark on Light makes it perfect for cozy time or bedtime. Actually, everything about Dark on Light makes it just about perfect.