Review Detail

CACTUS AND FLOWER is a picture book about friendship, loss, and grief. Cactus loves flower as they spend all their time together. One day, flower leaves, and cactus is sad and cannot be comforted- even by all the butterflies. The next spring, a bud appears and a new flower blooms. Cactus is happy once again with his new friend.

What I loved: The text in this book is relatively simple, and the pictures are full of color and are quite beautiful. This book also handles death and grief when flower dies, pointing out the life cycle. Flower's life is short, and it is replaced by a new flower the next blooming season.

What left me wanting more: I wanted a little bit more in terms of handling the grief, assuming that this was one of the main themes of the book. Either that or I would have liked to see how flower left a seed which could become a new cactus- something to take one of the themes a bit further.

Final verdict: Colorful and with life cycle messages, CACTUS AND FLOWER is a book of loss and change. Could be helpful for children who are dealing with loss.