NEW FRIENDS AND LEMONADE

The old adage of making lemons into lemonade gets sweetened by friendship in Pax’s picture book.

Hartford the hedgehog thinks he doesn’t have much to offer new friends. He’s missing spines, and he thinks this makes him look funny. But when he meets Scuttle, a seal who can’t swim, Hartford immediately offers to help, and Scuttle’s own embarrassment fades in the presence of a new friend. The pair meets up with a nearsighted penguin, Porridge, and a short-spotted cheetah named Chili. All of them realize how precious it is to find people who “did not see flaws, just the good in each other.” Together, the group visits Miss Mary’s Make Your Own Lemonade shop to literally turn lemons into lemonade together. Pax’s rhyming couplets scan well, with some fun vocabulary and turns of phrase that never obscure the story’s meaning: Most of our friends see their own flaws the most clearly and are likely to forgive the flaws in others. Illustrator Saavi K places the insecure cartoon creatures in a town that looks almost like a quaint Hollywood set, with studio flat fronts; their artificiality reinforces the idea that it’s not appearance that matters. While most of the animals eschew clothing, the doctor (who may be a bear or an otter) is fully dressed.

A poetic explanation of an old saying, with an emphasis on reducing self-criticism.