> Comic bestiary
One hundred fifty-two pages and seven chapters: it looks more like a work for the third year program than a book for 3-year-olds, and yet… Blasted Animal Expressions is a real hit with very young audiences. This collection of stories is fun to embroider wacky explanations around expressions such as “gentle as a lamb”, “short-sighted as a mole” or “dumb as a goose”. Did you know ? These waterfowl were very clever until the day when, by dint of using machines to make their lives easier, they no longer knew how to do anything themselves. Do not look for the shade of serious information here, everything is just jokes. Not enough to become smart as a monkey, but, at 3 years old, we still have time before the patent.
“Burned Animal Expressions”, by Marianne Boilève and Magali Le Huche. Gautier-Languereau, 152 pages, €15.95. From 3 years old.
> Bruised rhinoceros
Be careful, risk of shedding a few tears! This album tells the true story of Sudan, a young white rhinoceros who grows up happily in Africa with his loving mother… until poachers kill the latter to seize his horn. Sudan is then captured to be sent to a zoo in Czechoslovakia (the story begins in the 1970s) where he spent many years before being repatriated to a reserve in Kenya. He leads a peaceful end of life there, but without his horn, which is cut off to protect him from poachers. The illustrations reflect the emotional intensity of this story which tells of grief, resilience and the frightening erosion of biodiversity.
My Name is Sudan by Dai Yun and Li Xingming. Hongfei, 52 pages, €15.90. From 5 years old.
> Delighted dog
A dog’s life is not so bad. Such is the reflection inspired by this almost textless album, which adopts the point of view of César, a friendly doggie. In doing so, we get rid of existential questions and go to the essentials: watching the loved one (his mistress) get up, walk with her in the flower garden, have his ears scratched, take a nap in the sweetness of a spring afternoon, frolicking with the garden hose, going home together. César’s love for his mistress can be seen on all the pages, through the colorful illustrations where festive nature unfolds in lush, pointillist double pages like a painting by Georges Seurat. With César the mutt, all is order and beauty.
“A dog in a garden”, by Patricia Storms and Nathalie Dion. From them, 36 p., €15. From 2 years old.