From School Library Journal
Kindergarten-Grade 3—Sara is visiting her grandparents at their lakeside cottage. When she hears Granddad getting up early in the morning, she jumps up, too, and inquires where he's going. Fishing with his buddy, he says, and Sara convinces him to take her along. As they row across the lake, Sara keeps looking for the buddy, but Granddad just waves to all the other fishermen. She masters her angling skills, with the exception of putting the worm on the hook (she uses a piece of licorice instead). A heron appears and plucks a fish out of the water. Granddad instructs Sara to row over to it and they both start catching fish. When the bird moves to a new location, they follow. Sara realizes that Granddad's fishing buddy is the heron; he stirs up the fish as he wades through the shallows. By the book's end, Granddad has a new fishing buddy: Sara, of course. Done in pencil, watercolor, and gouache, the illustrations are perfect for the tone of the story. The early-morning lake scene is suitably foggy and clears up as the day progresses. The characters, with their bright clothing and smiling faces, stand out nicely from the green and gray tones of the watery backdrops. A pleasing choice for intergenerational sharing.—
Ieva Bates, Ann Arbor District Library, MI Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
When Sara stays with her grandparents at their lakeside cottage, she awakens early and convinces her grandfather that she's old enough to go fishing with him. Curious about his reference to "my fishing buddy," she sits in the rowboat fishing with Granddad until a blue heron lands in the nearby shallows. Wherever the heron moves, that's where Granddad wants to fish, allowing Sara to soon figure out the "buddy's" identity. Dotted with childlike details, such as baiting a hook with a length of red licorice rather than a worm, the story unfolds in a quiet but absorbing way. Jorisch's delicate pencil drawings, washed with watercolors and gouache, create likeable characters in evocative settings. Even as it celebrates the comfortable companionship of Sara and her grandfather, this pleasant picture book also depicts the appeal of fishing, a pastime that often seems static as represented in picture books. Phelan, Carolyn
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
