Posts Tagged: Eliza Woloson

My Friend Isabelle

My Friend Isabelle book cover art

I had a blast reading this book. It reminded me so much of my best friend and I, very different from each other and still the best of friends. For example, I am an ambivert with high energy most of the time while she is an introvert who likes to spend her free time catching up on her shows. She likes environmental sciences while I’m more geared towards exercise sciences. She is vegan while I eat meats almost daily. Yet we still go to church as many Sundays as we can. The hours we spend together feel like minutes filled with laughs and inside jokes. We share the same core beliefs and even apart, I know that we could never truly be separated.

This book is about a friendship such as ours. Isabelle is slow, Charlie is fast. Isabelle is short, Charlie is tall. They still spend time together and have lots of fun playing, going to the park, and eating delicious snacks. The book is wonderfully illustrated with just a sentence or two on each page. It highlights the many differences between the two kids just to show how the same things that should keep them apart is actually what brings them together. Charlie even says himself that “the world is more fun with friends like Isabelle.” I teared up at the end because not only was this a familiar feeling, but I was able to understand from the author’s simple words that Isabelle was not quite like the other kids. Sure enough but not directly mentioned by the author, I was able to piece together that Isabelle has Down syndrome. My favorite part about this book is how it showcased children’s unconditional love; their innocence and general acceptance of things and people that are different from them. This is a great book to educate young kids about differences between people, how they can learn from each other, and accept each other no matter what.

-Sybile


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