Sonny Says Mine!, a lesson to learn and fun to be had

Board books have a baby reputation. Granted, it’s deservedly so unless I start seeing elementary school readers chewing on pages. Every board book is aimed at small children, yet their content can vary from simple concepts to an early introduction to quantum physics. Sonny Says Mine! is an interesting book because its page thickness is more board book, than an illustrated book, but has more in common with poster board than anything else. The content in the book is more narrative than most illustrated books and is certainly complemented by the book’s large pages. The result is an early illustrated book that offers pre-K and elementary ages a big kid book, that softly teaches them behavior that will behoove them as they gather around bigger groups.

Sonny, in Sonny Says Mine! is a well-meaning red fox who wears a teal outfit and hat. Sonny is impossibly cute, but is also a young child, and may not do the correct things as soon as they should. Meemo is a small dog, I think, Honey is a pig and Boo is a yellow rabbit. The four friends are at the park playing when Boo suddenly becomes very distressed because she’s lost her favorite toy. It’s a small plush pink rabbit that she’s named Suki. Unfortunately, Sonny found the toy and has already bonded with it. Now he’s hidden it under his bucket in the sandbox or behind his back. All the while his friends are looking around the playground.

Honey asks Sonny if he’s seen the toy, but he lies and says that he hasn’t. As the friends continue to look for it, Sonny is being entirely too kind to Boo, baking chocolate cake, playing dress-up, and more.  It’s akin to when friends are wrestling, one gets hurt a little bit and the other friend offers up a free punch to make it even.

To make things even more complicated for Sonny, Meemo is onto the fact that he has their friend’s doll and has kept it a secret. Personally, I credit that to Meemo’s acute sense of smell and his cool John McEnroe-style sweatbands.

Will Sonny do the right thing and cop up the fact that he has his friend’s toy that was lost on the playground? We won’t give away any punch lines here; but let’s just say that the big, durable pages combined with the bright colors and positive message will speak to those pre-K and kindergarten readers. Even though it teaches a message, the book is playful and kids will want to read it.

The text is oversized. When the characters speak they do so via colored speech bubbles. The narrative text is simple and is loaded with sight words. Sonny Says Mine! could be thought of as a long-form board book in a larger illustrated book format.  This format will provide confidence to young readers who want to move on from board books but secretly love their simple nature. For those readers, meet Sonny Says Mine!, it’s a book series that could easily be expanded to where he could say anything. He could say “thank you”, “I’m sorry”, “hello”, or any number of other things that children who are four or five years old could encounter.

Sonny Says Mine! is by Caryl Hart with illustrations by Zachariah Ohora and is available on Bloomsbury Children’s Books.

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