Picture Book Spotlight: Oliver

Picture Book Spotlight is an original weekly post that will highlight relevant and/or popular picture books and suggest age groups and storytime themes for them. It will also include a mini-review.

Title: Oliver Authors: Birgitta Sir Pages:40 Audience: K-2 Themes: friends

Summary:                                                         
Oliver is different. He enjoys his solitude. He likes playing with his friends, who are puppets, stuffed animals, and other toys. With his rich imagination, Oliver’s day is never dull. There are bridges to cross, sharks to fight, and treasures to find! But maybe toys don’t always give a boy everything he needs. Maybe he needs another kind of companion. Will Oliver discover a way to be, well, different? When his tennis ball rolls across the lawn into the yard of the girl next door, he just might be surprised.

My Thoughts: I adored this book. The muted color scheme, yet rich, detailed illustration style was really appealing. The story of a somewhat quirky and lonely boy finding a lonely, quirky friend is something most children will be able to understand and relate to. Finding Oliver on each page could be fun for storytime, and I liked the way the text needs the pictures to tell the whole story and show how rich Oliver's imagination is.  He will be climbing a "mountain" but we know it is a hill.  This is a very interactive story and would be great for dialogic reading.