Churro and the Magician

by Gaston Caba

[annieb123]

Originally posted on my blog: Nonstop Reader.

Churro and the Magician is a sweetly whimsical illustrated story for the youngest readers by Gastón Caba. Released 15th Feb 2022 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt on their Clarion imprint, it's 32 pages and is available in hardcover, paperback, and ebook (comiXology) formats.

This is a nice wordless fully illustrated story in panels of a young bunny who is a huge fan of magic and who unexpectedly finds himself in possession of a real magician's wand. General shapes, clouds, trains, light posts, and more come to life with unexpected results when he waves the wand around. There is no text in the story, so it would be a good choice for the very youngest: babies up through early reading years. It would be great for story time or bedtime reading. The people in the story are anthropomorphized bunnies and are drawn interacting with their world and suddenly real magic with predictable confusion and alarm.

The art is simple and easy to understand. I like how the artist/author uses the outline shapes of things to show the similarity to living things; a light post becomes the neck and head of a dinosaur, a train with lots of train cars turns into a caterpillar, etc. This could be used with youngsters in so many ways to tie into observation and art exercises in a home or classroom setting.

Lots of fun for the youngest.

Four stars.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.