Through the Looking Glass Children's Book Reviews
A Year at a Farm
Picture Book Series
For ages 5 to 9
Millbrook Press, 2009 ISBN: 978-1580137980
You might think that a farm must be a quiet sleepy place in wintertime. In actual fact farms are full of activity all year round, though at certain times of the year there definitely is more play going on than work. On the farm in this story we can see that all kinds of things are happening on a snowy January day. The animals are being fed, eggs are being collected, and both children and adults are having fun playing around outdoors.
In March there is less time to play and more work has to be done. The sheep are having their lambs (much to the delight of the local children), and the fields are being prepared. Just a few months later in June the farm folk are bringing in the hay and the sheep are being sheared.
This delightful book will give readers an interesting, appealing, and often amusing picture of what a year on a farm is like. Each of the fully illustrated double page spreads shows the same farm scene, but each one is at a different time of year. Cut-aways allow us to look into buildings so that we can see what is going on inside, and children will have fun seeing how things change as the months roll by. The wonderfully detailed illustrations in this book will keep readers of all ages happily engaged for a long time.
