A Little Like Magic
by Sarah Kurpiel
Rocky Pond Books (Penguin Random House), 2024. 44 pages.
Review written February 28, 2025, from a library book.
Starred Review
2025 Schneider Family Award Winner, Younger Children
Here’s a gorgeous picture book that features a kid in a wheelchair.
The child and their mother (probably a little girl, but the gender is never specified) are headed to an ice festival to watch the sculptors work, but they don’t want to go.
I don’t like heavy coats
or itchy hats
or boots that don’t let me bend my ankles.
I don’t like cold wind
or icy roads.
Most of all, I don’t like going places that I’ve never been before.
Still, they go, bringing a special toy horse in their pocket. They watch the sculptors work, using chainsaws, drills, chisels, picks, torches and steaming irons.
They watch until they are too cold, then have hot chocolate together. The child isn’t convinced it’s worth it to make sculptures that are going to melt anyway.
And to their dismay, the little horse is no longer in their pocket when they get home.
But then the next day they go back after dark. Now the sculptures are finished, and they’re magical and wondrous.
The cold and crowd melt away. There is only light and ice and stars and Mom and me.
And, yes, they find their toy horse – along with a special surprise. That’s the best part of all.
In the end, they realize that even though the sculptures melted, they never really went away because they’ll always remember their magic.
This is one of those quiet, lovely, wonderful books that you love more each time you read it.
Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Picture_Books/little_like_magic.html
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Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.
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