SHARE!

Rhyming text from a little girl delivers an idealized vision of big sisterhood.

Sometimes her mother prompts her to share with her baby brother, and she does, but she’s understandably displeased by how he treats her favorite things. Nevertheless, she good-naturedly continues sharing; she even starts offering him some of her waffles and her drink, soon realizing that the baby can’t chew waffles and just makes a mess when he tries to drink from a cup. The siblings end up happily sharing a bath and then a snuggle in bed with their mom, resulting in a picture book that fails to deliver much of a story and instead provides an idealized glimpse of a day in the life of young children. Why does sister just go along with baby’s wishes? Readers don’t know. Flat, cartoonish art in bright colors reveals the sister’s subtly changing feelings throughout, but there’s little detail to help determine how and why her feelings, if not her actions, change from one interaction to the next. By day’s end, instead of feeling tuckered out and grouchy, the siblings are simply happy to snuggle with each other and their mom. While perhaps a nice vision, this risks seeming more like parental wish-fulfillment than typical earlychildhood sibling dynamics.

Not much to share or sink one’s teeth into here.