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Kevin’s Big Book of Emotions

First problem:  it’s a lift-the-flap book, and is not particularly sturdy in its construction, which makes it a poor choice for libraries.  Second problem, it’s definitely targeting the very youngest readers, which leaves it a limited audience in a school library.  The biggest problem is that it makes declarations that aren’t necessarily true: the first page says, “come with me to find out all the emotions we can feel!” but the range of human emotions is much more broad/complex than is going to be captured by a simple picture book; the page that describes anger states that if you take a breath and smell flowers then the next day you will feel really glad, but this presumes that all children’s issues are short-lived, which may not be true for some readers.  Yes, it’s a good idea to teach small children about emotions, and yes, the colors in this book are bright and eye-catching, but there are much better choices available:  This one is over-simplified and clunky.