Review: The Raindrop by Brian D. McClure

    I was very excited to review The Raindrop. I love children's books, they are always very cute, colorful, happy and yet carry a powerful meaning. I was very disappointed with this particular children's book however.

     The illustrations by Buddy Plumee was the best thing about this book. The Raindrop had some very cute rhymes sprinkled sparsely throughout. But, if you are going to rhyme some of the paragraphs, you need to rhyme them all.

     As a story for 4-8 year olds, the book had some hard words and phrases! For example, on the first page of the story, the cloud tells the raindrop, "I urge you to rethink the state of your worth". Are we reading a stuffy classic in our old high school English class, or are we reading a cute, colorful children's story??

       I like the idea of teaching young kids through stories. This story teaches kids about how the water system works. The author would have done well to remember he was writing to an audience of 4-8 year olds. He had too much information! Information children of their age would never understand or retain. For example, the breaking down of oxygen and hydrogen particles.  The book is also too long for young children to want to sit through.  At 36 pages, with large chucky chapters on each page, kids will not care to hear the story.  They will not sit still long enough.

      Also, I did not find a few parts of the story appropriate for children. At the end of the story, a cloud is sad. The wording comes across to me like the cloud would like to commit suicide. Hey, buddy, this is a children's story, remember??? The cloud says, "I am just a cloud, up in the sky, I am no use at all, oh me, oh my. Why am I here? What can I do? I have no purpose for living, I wish I were through." What a wonderful thing to teach children, that if they ever feel out of place, that they probably shouldn't be there. Children, who have very delicate psyches anyways, should not be hearing such adult words, especially between the ages 4-8! Children are impressionable. Just what we need, for depression to set in even earlier in children!

I think it is safe to say, I did not like this story.   I will definetly not be reading this to any child of mine or in my care.

For more information about The Raindrop you can check it out here on amazon.com