I love what Garoche does with cut paper and light. This book is gorgeous. Also a whimsical story about a magical bunny made of snow who rescues two girls from being stuck in the snowy woods. Also, disabled protagonist! Here's to representation! ( )

I do not like this book at all. It has no words which is fine because there are other books that have no pictures but are great. This book just doesn't make sense to me. I think that this is why I don't like the book. Maybe if I understood it I would like it. It just doesn't make sense to me. The bunny that the little girl made out of snow comes to life and helps get them back home. They needed help getting back home because the little girl's wheelchair got stuck in the snow. I mean I understand that part but the book in general just doesn't make sense to me. ( )

I hadn't associated Camille Garoche with Princess CamCam, author of the beautiful Fox's Garden, but the lovely paper cuttings immediately gave me a clue.

Two sisters are watching the snow in a wonderful, moonlit world. One goes outside and creates a snow rabbit, which she brings inside. Only then do we see her sister is in a wheelchair. They both venture out to explore the snowy world, but the second sister's wheelchair gets stuck in the snow. Alone and frightened, they think they are lost in the woods but the snow rabbit they set free returns, more magical than ever, to rescue them.

Garoche's delicate, three-dimensional cut paper illustrations are so, so magical. The reader feels like they have drifted into a silent, snowy world of moonlight and magic, where anything can, and will happen. The sweet, wordless interaction of the sisters is beautifully conveyed in their gentle care for each other and their delicate movements.

Verdict: So, so lovely. If you buy only one wordless book this year, make it this one.

ISBN: 9781592701810; Published 2015 by Enchanted Lion Books; Borrowed from another library in my consortium

Beautiful ( )

Two sisters look out on a wintry landscape at the beginning of this wordless picture-book by Camille Garoche, who, as Princesse Camcam, also produced Fox's Garden. While one ventures out, discovering a little white snow rabbit, the other continues to watch, something that is explained when the more venturesome girl brings the rabbit indoors, and her sister is revealed in a wheelchair. Eventually, both sisters venture out into the snow, following the rabbit when it escapes. When the wheelchair-bound girl becomes stuck, and darkness begins to fall, the rabbit, who has grown magically larger, helps her to get home...

Every bit as lovely as Fox's Garden, with the same contrasting of indoor warmth and light with cool winter vistas, The Snow Rabbit is graced with the same cut-paper style artwork, which somehow manages both to appear flat, and yet also to give a sense of depth. There is a great enchantment to Garoche's illustrations, which, with their white-papered elements, seem to work especially well with winter settings. As someone who finds wintry landscapes particularly appealing to begin with, this style was practically guaranteed to speak to me, although I would be curious to see what the artist does with a spring or summer-time tale. The story depicted in the artwork is an intriguing one, with the same ambiguity - is it a journey of the imagination, in which the wheelchair-bound girl gets to experience freedom of movement, on the back of the snow rabbit; or perhaps some sort of meditation on the healing powers of nature? - that gave Garoche's earlier title such power. I was reminded a bit of Astrid Lindgren's story, In the Land of Twilight, which sees a young boy, confined to his bed by an unspecified illness, perhaps never to walk again, being taken on a magical journey through the night. My initial impulse to wonder, in such cases, whether there is something cruel about the idea of 'rescuing' a disabled child from the constraints of their disability, is tempered by the knowledge that we all dream of escaping the confines of our bodies, whether disabled or not. Isn't that what the ubiquitous fantasy of flying reveals…? However that may be, this is a beautiful tale, one which is admirably conveyed by the artwork alone - always an achievement! - and one that I would recommend to readers looking for stories which capture the beauty and mystery of winter evenings. ( )