(2) K-3 Illustrated by Andrea Blinick. This imaginative and informative take on the water cycle begins with the fact that all living things are made mostly of water. “Why don’t you slosh when you run? Because all that water is held in your cells.” A child with long red hair and round turquoise glasses joyfully accompanies readers along water’s journey from the ocean up to the sky, down to the ground, and into our homes and our bodies…and back out into the atmosphere via our breath, sweat, tears, and urine. Blinick’s playful digital illustrations include such fanciful scenes as our young guide taking a refreshing drink of water, their flowing hair having morphed into ocean waves supporting a pink octopus, a mermaid, a surfer, and a sea monster, among other things. Alary’s breezy text encourages readers to consider not only how important this precious resource is but also the fact that “all the water that is is all that ever was.” Our drinking water, for example, “has been many things in many places at many times”—even snowflakes on the coat of a woolly mammoth. Alary doesn’t delve too deeply into these mind-expanding concepts, but the message about the importance of water to life on Earth is crystal clear. An appended author’s note provides more information and a gentle conservation message.

Reviewer: Kitty Flynn | Horn Book Magazine Issue: July, 2025