I Wish I Had. . .

The unseen and unnamed narrator of this Italian import wishes for many lively and thoughtful things.

That child wishes for the eyes of a blackbird, so to see every blade of grass in the meadow, the “forest of thoughts” that a deer listens to in the woods and the wings of a goose on the first day of flight. The narrator wants to have the “quick heart” of a mouse escaping the cat, the voice of the whale and the gaze of the owl. While these many wishes are sometimes awkwardly phrased in English and don’t have much music behind them, the pictures go a long way toward capturing the magic. The blackbird, a dark matte shape across two pages, is in a meadow of feathery grass fronds and delicately sketched wildflowers. Two mice sip from tiny glasses of orange juice while two others alertly try to hide from the oncoming cat. The lemurs swing from branches that are actually urban apartments. The last wish is for the ears of an elephant “to hear what the heavens say,” and that elephant has images of animals, trees, birds and flowers sketched all over his body, like gossamer tattoos.

Images to return to again and again, with the text a jumping-off point to a sweet philosophy. (Picture book. 4-8)

First published in Italy, this simple, graceful, and even majestic meditation reflects on the beauty and strength of familiar animals. "I wish I had the eyes of a blackbird to see every blade of grass growing in the meadow," Zoboli begins, as Mulazzani offers a striking close-up of a blackbird whose golden eye is fixed on the viewer and who stands in a thicket of delicately drawn grass and weeds. In a spread as richly worked as a medieval tapestry, a deer strides through a dense stand of fruit-laden trees, its antlers morphing into branches thick with birds and leaves. The first-person wishes draw readers into a relationship with the animals, and the paintings add to the magic with dreamy and sometimes funny elements, like the two mice who share orange juice at a small table perched atop a larger one ("I wish I had the quick heart of a mouse as it makes its escape"). With poetic language and paintings that carry something close to the impact of icons, Zoboli and Mulazzani offer an attitude of reverence for the natural world. Ages 4-8. (Mar.)

Copyright 2013 Publishers Weekly, LLC Used with permission.

PreS-Gr 1--An unidentified narrator wishes to possess many different attributes of animals, such as "the contentment of a dog in winter when the snow falls outside," the silence of a tiger in the jungle, the "night-black coat" of a panther, a whale's song, and the "nimble legs" of a hare. Each wish calls for one poetically expressed trait. This concept is then explored by the dazzling full-bleed paintings. Page by page, readers are immersed in a quiet, dreamlike world. The book has much whimsical detail to pore over in each scene, with repeating motifs to suggest an interconnection and tie the spreads together. The gorgeous artwork playfully interprets the text to create a captivating work.--Laura Hunter, Mount Laurel Library, NJ

Copyright 2013 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

AWARDS and RECOGNITIONSPaterson Prize Honor Book (2014)
Society of Illustrators, "The Original Art" annual exhibition (2013) Silver Medal
2013 IndieFab Awards Silver Winner in Picture BooksPublishers Weekly (STARRED review)"This simple, graceful, and even majestic meditation reflects on the beauty and strength of familiar animals. . . . With poetic language and paintings that carry something close to the impact of icons, Zoboli and Mulazzani offer an attitude of reverence for the natural world." Booklist (STARRED review)
"Books inviting children to imagine themselves as animals are ubiquitous and a playful way to encourage imagination, but most don't have the scope of this beautiful Italian import. There is a dignified eloquence at work here, and the narrator's wishes are not merely the desire of a child to be like an animal, but a longing for a tangible connection to an often intangible universe. . . . This is a book of big ideas, sparingly told, and full of wonder."