Stina

Stina

Lani Yamamoto,  Stina.  V&A Publishing/Bloomsbury/Allen & Unwin,  Oct 2015. 44pp., $24.99 (hbk), ISBN9781851778584

Stina is a little girl who really, really doesn’t like the cold. Who does, one might ask. But Stina’s dislike means she misses out on games with other children, she won’t eat ice-cream and her safest, cosiest place is in bed.

The illustrations are in muted colours, mostly variants of green and brown. One double-page spread suggests scientific drawings as Stina tries to design ways ‘to protect herself from the cold’. These include long-handled tong, a bit like those used to pick up rubbish, so that she can take things from the refrigerator without getting too close. On a particularly cold day, two children knock on Stina’s door. When she lets them in, they enjoy their time together, drinking hot chocolate and knitting without needles. When they leave, Stina cannot sleep and ponders on her isolation. She turns her favourite white doona into a wonderful outdoor coat and ventures outside the next morning. To her surprise, she becomes quite warm with running about in the snow enjoying herself.

This is a delightful book about facing one’s fears and about the importance of friendship. The new warmth Stina feels is not just from running around and enjoying playing in the snow, but also from the knowledge that she now has friends to play with. This is in contrast to the poignant inside looking out illustration earlier in the book in which she is alone inside while others play happily together outside. Loneliness is not always expressed out loud  – or indeed necessarily recognised, but the feeling is strongly evoked in this particular illustration.

Other important themes are creativity and resourcefulness. Stina’s solutions to being cold are creative as are the activities she does with the children when they visit.  She shows resourcefulness and ingenuity as she devises so many methods of keeping the cold at bay and her imaginative solution to having a very warm coat is the highlight of her ability to use available resources.  Included at the back of the book are the recipe for Stina’s Hot Cocoa and instructions on how to knit without needles.

The layout of the book is varied and interesting with some double-page spreads, some with only an illustration and others with only written text. This is a whimsical, charming picture book which could also give rise to a great deal of discussion.

Reviewed by Margot Hillel

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