How To Be A Lion

"How to Be a Lion by Ed Vere This is a beautiful, kind of sensory experience, with a textured paper on the cover. It’s a great book about challenging people’s perceptions. It’s a story of acceptance, a story of respect and encouraging children to think for themselves and be themselves. That whole thing about how we make assumptions about what a lion is, and what a lion should do – Leonard the lion is not like that. And his friend Marianne, the duck, is not a friend that you would expect a lion to have. They teach each other, they learn from each other. And they’re gentle, and accepting, and brave – brave in a very different way. Yes. If you were going to set out to write a book about challenging people’s perceptions, and encouraging children to have the courage to be themselves, I think it’s so creative to take this notion of a lion and a duck, who together work out how they’re going to convince people that it’s okay for them to be themselves. I think it’s a very clever book. This book is for children turning four . There are more words on the page than there are for some of the books for the younger ones. But it’s still a book that is driven by the illustrations. Ed Vere does a lot of draw along sessions . His illustrations are really easy to replicate and he works with children to do it for themselves. He’s a really engaging author. I love the theme of the book and I love the colours, and it speaks to what the Imagination Library represents. Yes, so simple, and yet, there’s so much in it. It’s a really multifaceted book. Yes, that whole thing about leaving it open-ended to talk about with the child is really important."

"The spirit of Ferdinand the Bull is a alive and well in How to Be a Lion. Leonard loves so much of life, from reading poems to befriending ducks, but these aren’t lionlike behaviors. After building a case, the book asks “Is there just one way to be a lion? I don’t think so … do you?” I love turning over the conversation to the readers — start critical reading early — while meeting a marvelous orange lion. (For ages 3 to 7)"