Sadie and the Snowman

Written By: Allen Morgan

Illustrated By: Brenda Clark



When I was looking for a children's picture book in the curriculum materials centre, I stumbled upon Sadie and the Snowman written by Allen Morgan and illustrated by Brenda Clark. A wonderful sense of nostalgia filled me with warmth as I remembered countless hours of reading this particular book as a child. I thought about how special it was that a book could fill me with such happiness and contentment. I was excited to take a trip down memory lane and write a heartfelt response to a beloved story.

"What an awful book!" was my response when I finally had a chance to read Sadie and the Snowman. I sat in utter disbelief and disappointment after reading what I thought to have been the greatest book of all time. I felt a little annoyed when I thought of how I was going to have to return the book and replace it with another. I don't really have an explanation as to why, but I kept renewing Sadie and the Snowman. One day, I picked the book up and I thought to myself " maybe I'll read it once more, there must be something else." I just could not understand how I could feel such an emotional reaction to a book and then wonder why in the world I ever chose to pick it up to read again. Sadie and the Snowman is not a horrible book, I suppose. I can see why children would respond to the story in a positive way. The story is all about a little girl named Sadie who builds a snowman over and over again because the birds and the raccoons eat the carrot nose and the cookie eyes. Twice. The snowman is made once more but the sun melts the snowman away. This melting away of the snowman takes a long time in the story. The snowman is built once more, the birds and raccoons indulge in their trickery again. Sadie finally puts a ball of snow in her freezer and voila, she has the beginning of a snowman for the next winter. Not too much depth one would gather, but maybe that's the point. Children like simple and children respond to hopeful. The illustrations appear to have been created using watercolor and so the images are visually appealing to the eye. The images are also quite detailed and therefore tell the story on their own. I think the blue and yellow border on each page contributes to the dullness of the storyline however. The book does not give me a positive vibe as to the story being overly exciting or stimulating for children.

One day at my mom's house, I showed Sadie and the Snowman to her and asked if she remembered the book. Mom looked at the book with a sad smile and said that she could remember me sitting on the bed for hours at a time reading that book. By this time, Sadie and the Snowman was really starting to annoy me. But then mom said "I should have made more snowmen with you, the only one you ever did make was with your father." And then I knew why Sadie and the Snowman was so important to me. Making that snowman with my father was and is one of the very few memories I have of being with him. My mother and father divorced when I was five years old and I never saw or heard from him again. I read Sadie and the Snowman for hours on end every single day because it was the only thing that connected me to that precious memory I had of my father and I.

I read Sadie and the Snowman one more time and smiled. The story was no longer dull, empty or boring; the story was a reflection of the comfort I found in the power of reading as a child.