Heart of a Snowman
Grade 1-3–Every Christmas Eve, Owen builds a snowman that melts on Christmas Day. This year, after he goes to bed, he and his snowman are transported by a space vessel to a factory where talking animals remake the snowman in a perfect frozen environment. When Owen is asked to put a snowball heart in its chest, this snowman melts too. The animals then discover that &When; a boy makes a snowman, he gives it a heart, it gets so warm inside, the snowman can't last. The animals and Owen realize that the only place a snowman would last forever is in a boy's heart. Yelchin's imaginative, dreamlike, and somewhat surreal paintings cannot save this lengthy, ambiguous tale with a contrived message. There is no clear transition in the illustrations or text from reality to the fantasy and back, causing confusion. The intended audience is also unclear, because the basic idea of the story seems to be for very young children, but too much of it is implied rather than explained, and will only be understandable to older children or adults.–Maureen Wade, Los Angeles Public LibraryEND