The Blue Giant By Katie Cottle
Published by Pavilion, 2020
Mom's Review
The art. The story. The message. All of it is spectacular, so where do I start?
The art: rich colors and minute details
As a follow-up to The Green Giant, The Blue Giant includes Bea Green and her grandfather in one of the illustrations. T and I were both charmed to see the characters from the previous book.
The story: at once fantastical and realistic
T loves monsters, so a water giant who wants to protect the ocean and the life it holds has particular appeal. The little girl Meera and her mother are invited by the blue giant to help clean up the plastic pollution and rescue the sea creatures. They do, setting off a chain reaction of environmentalist actions throughout their community, many of which T could identify with.
The message: a clear cry to prevent further damage to the earth, packaged in an inviting story
The Blue Giant inspires readers to make simple, effective changes in their lives – a list of easy ways to eliminate single-use plastics is included in the back. I've now lost count of how many times we've read The Blue Giant (and The Green Giant, since T wants them together), and I stopped reading the list at the back at some point. This was not okay with T. He likes hearing the list and saying, "We do that," for the actions we already perform, like taking reusable bags to the store and carrying refillable water bottles. The message to protect our world resonates with T and he thoroughly enjoys the package it comes in.
I have much praise, but also one small criticism, for The Blue Giant. If you are looking carefully at the illustration of "friends of friends" cleaning up the beach, you will notice a boy in a wheelchair that could not normally traverse sand. A speciality wheelchair with extra-large bulbous wheels is needed. I would have liked to see more accurate representation. Frankly, if you aren't in the know about them already, there's no reason to consider their existence in a world filled with ramps and door-opening push buttons. Including the speciality equipment would be a great way to introduce and normalize what would otherwise look odd to children. I know I've now devoted quite a bit of space to this one detail, but it is a small portion of my reaction to The Blue Giant.
I unreservedly recommend The Blue Giant for all readers.
Son's Review
(Age: 5)
The Green Giant comes first, cuz they [from Green Giant] are in this book [The Blue Giant], but those guys [from Blue Giant] aren't in this book [The Green Giant]. I think they add all together. The Blue Giant is more of a story. I think there'll be more colors, like the Orange Giant, for pumpkins.
It seems like the characters that meet the giants are only girls. That's fine with books, that's fine with me.
Poor crab and poor fish and poor whale. I liked how you could see how, where the crab needed help and where the fishes needed help and how they all they did it all together.
The book was a good one. Do you want to know one of the giant stories that I do not like to read? "Jack and the Beanstalk." The giant is not nice and he's not a color giant. That's the thing that's different from the friends [blue and green giants].
Note: A review copy was provided in exchange for an honest review.
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