Bea Reviews Argyle Fox by Marie Letourneau

Publisher: Tanglewood
Source: the publisher in exchange for an honest review
Release Date: March 14th, 2017
Buying Links: Amazon* | Book Depository* | Tanglewood | Barnes & Noble
* affiliate links; the blog receives a small commission from purchases made through these links.

Blurb from goodreads:

Argyle Fox, with his signature style, wants to play outside on a springtime day, but the wind is wreaking havoc with his fun and games. As soon as he builds a card tower, climbs into a giant spider web, or takes up his pirate sword, here comes the wind: Woosh!

Mama Fox tells grumpy Argyle that if he thinks long enough, he will come up with something to do. Following his mother’s suggestion and inspired by her knitting, he works all the pieces of his day together and creates the perfect solution.

The story of Argyle teaches that failure is often a path to success and celebrates perseverance, creative thinking, and an old-fashioned springtime activity.

My Thoughts:

Eh, "Argyle Fox" was a meh book. It's not awful, though more of a message story than I usually prefer. The artwork is delightful, full of life in spring medium shades, nothing bright. The line work is simple but evocative.

Argyle Fox simply wants to play outside and enjoy the beautiful spring weather. Sounds simple, right? Yeah, not so much. The wind keeps interfering with his attempts to play outside. Although he has good ideas for his outside play, he fails to account for the wind and thus his plans fall apart. We see his frustration and his sadness at his repeated failure to play in the wind. His mother offers advice which he ponders and finally, he just may have a found a way to play outside without the wind interfering. The style was not preachy, but still too much of a message story for my liking. Some children will enjoy the games and ideas that Argyle comes up with and may laugh at the wind's behavior. Others may wonder what takes him so long to come up with an answer to his problem.