A Lot of Otters

I brought our son home from China when he was 3 ½. He loved this book from the minute he saw and heard it in nursery school. While I enjoyed the illustrations, I was hesitant about the story. I was reading it as a practical adult. What about the baby? How were he and Mom going to be reconnected? Was the baby really a star? A human? No, he was a Moonlet. And through my son's eyes I relearned how to enjoy stories again for what's not in the words. The story is what it is, for the moment, for the beauty, the safety, the comfort and the calm. It doesn't have to be anything else. Children love this book to an extent that I still can't fully understand. But then, I don't have to, do I? Now, almost 7 years after giving my son his own copy of the book, he got it out last night and read it to me while we snuggled in bed. He is 10 ½ now, fifth grade. As he read, he gently told me the story through his eyes. "You see the baby? That's me. And the Mother Moon? That's my birth Mother, and she's crying because she is so sad that she left me on the train to be found. That was very, very hard for her to do, and she's very sad wondering if I'm safe or not. And see the otters that are around me? Those are my new family: Anna, Kate, JianXia (sisters), Dad and you, Mom and my aunts and uncles. Everybody is there keeping me safe. And when my birth Mother sees this she feels happy again, because she knows you'll all take good care of me and that I'm safe." I am still misty eyed every time I think about my gentle little boy, who thinks of his birth Mother with such obvious love and care and am I'm so grateful this book came into our lives, giving him the opportunity to express some of his deepest concerns and feelings. Thank you Barbara Helen Berger, for this wonderful gift

This beautifully illustrated book starts out from the moment you open the book when on the first page you see a little boy ( toddler age) dressed for bed in his soft red pajamas. He's carrying his red star book as he goes to find that perfect spot to look at his book. The next page is the title page and on the page next to it is the little boy has found the spot he was looking for ... a big brown box near the on the seashore. Unknown to the young child is that his Ma-ma Mother Moon is looking for him. While searching for a more comfortable position to look at his book, the young boy accidentally drops his book into the ocean and right in front of a sea otter who was just happening to be passing by. I don't want to tell you the whole story, except that it is absolutely beautiful and equally illustrated! To me the pages are different enough and the otters looks so soft and friendly I want to reach out to touch & scratch their bellys! If your child is a girl, I think you could easily say it's a girl with very short hair. What I also love is that the Moon Mother and her son are of Asian decent, which could easily be where other reviewers think the folk lore or stories come from the Chinese story of the Moon maiden & and the cold red which is a very lucky color as well!

Barbara Helen Berger's "A Lot Of Otters" is lovely. We begin seeing, on an open ocean, a little boy in soft red pajamas, floating about in a box! He's has something, which he drops, and soon otters begin to swim around and gather up what he's dropped and what the Moon herself is dropping as well (I can't give away more detail or it will take away some of the fun of the book for you).The illustrations are soft, sumptuous, and absolutely glowing--Berger has somehow managed to make each page look almost as though it's lit from behind. The toddler is rendered realistically, and the otters are shown sleek and lithe as they would be in real life--but everything has a moonglow cast to it, and that makes this book's pictures utterly and completely enchanting. A wonderful bedtime story, especially on a moonlit night!

It's bedtime & Mother Moon calls for her child. Below, a little boy in his pjs with a book under his arms, finds a box to snuggle into & dream of floating on the sea with a lot of otters.A much-loved book in our rural library, with pictures every mother & child can relate to, this tender & lyrical read takes you out into the otters' world of water & charm & comedy.A lovely, whimsical book, a soothing, joyous bedtime story.

"A Lot of Otters" is a lovely new myth, made realistic through paintings which exhibit both virtuosic skill and artistic vision. In the central painting, "down into the deep," the otters almost swim on the page. Even more compelling than the otters is the huggable toddler who goes to sea in a cardboard box, drops his beloved book overboard, then watches as the otters enjoy it. While his mother, the moon, weeps and frantically calls her baby, he is calmiy observing this new world of otter antics. Skillfully and subtlely, the author/artist reveals the toddler's feelings through his facial expressions and body language. His face and posture communicate interest, then surprise, dismay, concern, awe, and finally, delight. His emotions are illustrated, but never exaggerated. Throughout this drama of separation, the gentle colors and soft textures assure us that we are reading toward a happy ending. I took "A Lot of Otters" to a recent family gathering, intending to read it to our young grandsons. After family members saw the book,they requested a reading for all. It was a pleasure to share this lovely story with the assembled family of all ages. "A Lot of Otters" could easily be translated into many languages, for the text is spare and the appeal universal.