The Horn Book Guide

PICTURE BOOKS

Cooper, Susan

The Shortest Day

32 pp. | Candlewick | October, 2019 | Trade ISBN 978-0-7636-8698-7 $17.99

(1) K-3 Illustrated by Carson Ellis. "So the shortest day came, and the year died, / And everywhere down the centuries of the snow-white world / Came people singing, dancing / To drive the dark away." Cooper's powerful celebration-of-the-solstice poem, performed annually at the Christmas Revels, delves into humankind's profound relationship with Earth's cycles, so, too, do Ellis's stunning gouache paintings. An author's note and the poem's full text are appended.

Reviewer: Martha V. Parravano | Horn Book Magazine Issue: November, 2019