by Moe Zilla

Created on: March 13, 2010

There's some wonderful, bright artwork - and a modern version of a familiar tale. Daniel Kirk is an experienced writer-illustrator, and he uses colorful and intriguing pictures in "Snow Dude" to enliven its very simple story. But he manages to tell that story in rhyme - and the rhythm of his words is perfect. While the story rushes along, its pictures and text both add an extra sense of playfulness.

For example, on the first page Kirk writes that "Nick and Kara Candlewick were working very hard to build a funny snow dude in their own backyard." But it's his picture that supply the details and the fun. There's smiling children, a bright yellow wintry sky - and an enormous round snow-head. And on the next page there's an even larger white head that's smiling down at them from the sky. It's the face of a gust of wind, and its grin suggest it's about to play a mischievous prank.

Suddenly their snowman has come to life, and it's taunting the children who made him. If this story needed an "elevator pitch," you'd describe it as Frosty the Snowman meets the Gingerbread Man. "He said, 'I'm a snow dude, as wild as wild can be. / Run as fast as you can run - you won't catch up with me!'"

But Kirk makes the story seem fresh, with his colors adding a cheerful note to his startling drawings of a giant snow creature running through the town. A nearby couple wants to adopt him, a circus wants to hire him, and there's even a baker who thinks the snow dude would be handy for cooling off pies. Kirk draws a line of people frantically chasing the fleeing Snow Dude - but the wintry sky always remains yellow, and the colors are always soft and bright.

And Kirk hides a secret joke inside one of his illustrations. As the baker rushes off to chase after the snow creature, there's an unexplained phenomenon in his shop. There's five gingerbread men in his display window which are now heading for the door. And even the bride on the top of a wedding cake seems to be helping her groom to escape!

But the revolt in the bakery shop is just part of the snow dude's fun. He soon rushes through the zoo, and past children playing on the hillside. Soon he's cornered by a frozen lake, but the children devise a way to save him from the clamorous mob. They suggest that everyone build a snow dude of their own!

And the face of the mischievous wind stares down at the town again...

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