Family Is Forever: Always by Emma Dodd

SOMETIMES YOU'RE GOOD.

SOMETIMES YOU'RE BAD!

No little child is always perfect. They may be happy, sad, brave, or maybe misbehave They may get dirty or get clean; they might be thoughtful, or even mean!

But no matter what they are, Mom and Dad are always there to provide a big hug and plenty of love.

In what is perhaps Emma Dodd's most beautiful picture book, the new American edition of Always (Emma Dodd's Love You Books) (Templar Books, 2014), her simple rhyming quatrains show all the ways a little one sometimes can be, simple language that very young children can grasp. But it is in her illustrations that Dodd's premise shines forth, Dodd's up-close and personal African mother and baby move through the savannah scene in spare black line and stunning sky scenes, midnight blue sky setting off silver-foil, showing the plains and river, as mother and child swim and play in the sands. Baby gets dirty in the mudhole, is frightened by a mouse, and and recycles the fright by prankishly scaring a flamingo into flight, with mom always there to provide words of guidance and a guiding trunk. A perfect bedtime book for parent and child to share with a big hug.