Chloe's Lunar New Year by Lily LaMotte, Michelle Lee
Published by HarperCollins on January 3, 2023
ISBN: 0063076519
Pages: 40
Genres: Realistic Fiction
Format: Picture Book Fiction
Goodreads

Chloe, her younger brother, and her parents prepare a New Year dinner for themselves and her aunt and uncle. Text is simple, touching on their traditions of cleaning and preparing three special dishes. Illustrations mostly follow along with text, with a strictly illustrated “side plot” unfolding where the children are honoring their beloved A-ma (grandmother), who readers will be expecting to see attending the dinner until the end of the book, when family members surround her altar and it becomes clear that she has passed away.

The book is a very simplified introduction to Lunar New Year overall, so readers who pick this up hoping for a more information-filled story might be disappointed. The traditions and food, which make up the bulk of the story, are not described in much detail; the illustrated subplot of the beloved grandmother having passed away would likely pass unnoticed by younger readers if not described by the person reading the book aloud, and the necessary side conversation feels like it would be awkward and out-of-context-with-the-story; this device feels better suited for graphic novels, where the reader is able to interpret pictures themselves as they go along, rather than having it be a major part of the storyline in a read-aloud.

Reviewed by Jenny Martinez Nocito, Maine State Library