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Moomin and the Birthday Button by Tove Jansson

Title: Moomin and the Birthday Button

Author: Tove Jansson

Translator:

Illustrator:

Publisher: Puffin Books

Date Published: 2010

Format: Paperback

Genre:

Book Category: Picture Book

Age Range: Under_5

Original Title: Based on the original creation of Tove Jansson. First written in Swedish

Country of Origin: Finland

Moomin and the Birthday Button

by Tove Jansson
Age Range: Under_5

Moomintroll gets a beautiful gold button for his birthday and can’t wait to show it to his friends. But when none of them seems to remember that it’s his birthday, he wonders if they are really his friends at all! Poor Moomintroll! Will he still manage to have a happy birthday?

Based on the original Moomin stories by Tove Jansson, this picture book introduces the five and under age range to the wonderful world of the Moomins. Whilst the original stories are novels for older children, this new range of picture books uses Jansson’s characters and illustrations to bring the Moomins alive in glorious colour and very simple prose. Aside from the Moomin and the Birthday Button storybook, look out for The Book About Moomin, Mymble and Little My, Moomin’s Lift-The-Flap Hide and Seek, Moomin’s Little Book of Numbers and Moomin’s Little Book of Words.

Colourful and cheerful, this simple story brings the Moomins alive and loses none of Tove Jansson’s spirit. The various characters stay true to their incarnations in the original books and the hopeful and excited Moomintroll is a figure that all children will empathise with and recognise as we see his birthday excitement and then his sadness at being left out by his friends. The way the book looks at friendship is also very appropriate for an under-five audience just starting to make their own friendships and to think about other people’s feelings.

The visual appeal of this novel is also a huge draw and children will want to look at this book. Part of the appeal is the beautiful, bright illustrations with dreamy backgrounds in different colours which give the book a slightly psychedelic quality, but the characters are fascinating too. There’s Sniff, who looks like a cross between a rabbit and a kangaroo, the doll-like Little My and the Moomins themselves, a species of trolls with a strong resemblance to hippos. Curious but at the same time slightly familiar, the Moomins are intriguing and will quickly draw children into their innocent, faintly magical world.

Vibrant, simple, curious and fun, this is a picture book with a warm heart and a cast of wonderful and weird but well-loved characters. Do not miss this chance to meet the Moomins!

Abby Phillips (2012)

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