Through the Looking Glass Children's Book Reviews
It's a Seashell Day
Illustrator: Elliot Kreloff
Picture Book
For ages 4 to 6
Blue Apple Books, 2015 ISBN: 978-1609055301
It is beautiful sunny morning, and a little boy’s mother announces that its “a seashell day.” Soon the mother, her little son, and the family dog are heading for the beach. When they get there they see that herring gulls are gathered on the shore. The little boy finds what he thinks is a shell, but it turns out to be a rock.
Soon enough though he has quite a collection of shells to play with, shells that he has found in the “muck.” The little boy’s mother finds a shell too, but the shell is still occupied by a little animal, and so they put it back in the water where it belong.
As the sun rises high in the sky, and then begins to lower again, the little boy collects seashell treasures in all shapes and sizes, and by the time the sun is dipping into the ocean, he has a grand collection to take home with him.
Looking for (and finding) treasures in nature is something that many children enjoy doing. The beach in particular lends itself to such treasure hunts, yielding up pretty rocks, driftwood, sea glass, and of course, shells. This picture book perfectly captures the simple joy that a child feels when he or she goes shell hunting on a beach.
Throughout the book, multimedia illustrations are paired with rhyming verse, and at the back of the book the author provides her readers with more information about seashells and the creatures that make them.
