Children's books: Parents: "Always Carry Me with You", "I Love You", and "Call Your Mother"

Always Carry Me with You by Hervé Éparvier, illustrated by Fred Benaglia (Ivy Kids Echo)
I Love You by Mary Murphy (Happy Yak)
Call Your Mother by Tracy C. Gold, illustrated by Vivian Mineker (Familius)

Always Carry Me with You
I'm not sure if this is a science lesson hidden within a love letter or a love letter hidden within a science lesson, but either way, it works. In Always Carry Me with You, a father tells his daughter all sorts of cool things about rocks...and then compares his love for her to a rock, something she can carry in her pocket as a reminder that it's there.

It's sweet any way you slice it, but honestly, the first audience I thought about for this was children whose parents are terminally ill or otherwise facing an uncertain future. I don't mean this in a maudlin way (and obviously the book is perfectly appropriate in happier contexts!), but I imagine that one thing you'd want to do in that scenario is find ways to support your kid even after you're gone...which might include giving them a way to carry your love with them. (Just, uh. Make sure they know that it's not just one specific pebble that'll do the job. Kids lose things. Adults lose things.)

The drawings are playful (and somehow feel very French?), with more than enough whimsy to keep kids looking. The font feels like an afterthought, but that seems like a pretty minor objection, all things considered.

I Love You
What a sweet book. Reminiscent of "My Favorite Things" from "The Sound of Music", I Love You shows an adult and a baby panda romping through fun activities—each of which is a new way to tell the baby panda that it is loved. I love you like / a crayon drawing dragons, promises the book, and in turn I love the creativity that has gone into each choice.

The illustrations here are simple but high-contrast, with enough detail to keep readers entertained...and pandas that look truly snuggly. This is definitely one to be read aloud—young readers might enjoy it alone, of course, but it'll be at its best when it's not a solo endeavor; I'm willing to bet that the author made a point to read this aloud throughout the process of writing to check the flow and rhythm of the book. An excellent addition to an early reader's bookshelf.

Call Your Mother
You know the refrain here already: Call Your Mother. This deceptively simple picture book takes readers through a series of times a child might call its mother—from infancy (I don't have kids, but the exhausted mother stumbling in in the wee hours of the morning made me laugh with sympathy) through to schoolday nerves (my gosh that hug looks cozy) and into adulthood.

I think parts of this will resonate better with adults, who can perhaps remember each of these sorts of incidents better than a young reader can imagine, but I can also easily see it as a way to remind an anxious kid that their parent(s) will (...barring the unexpected, but maybe an anxious five-year-old doesn't need to hear that...) be there for them as they grow and age, in good times and in bad. My favorite illustration, far and away, is a variation on the cover illustration, but the whole thing is neatly done, with clean and soft lines. Would absolutely put this one on a young kid's shelves.

Thanks to the authors and publishers for providing review copies through NetGalley.