PICTURE BOOKS

WHAT WE’LL BUILD by Oliver Jeffers (HarperCollins £14.99, 48 pp)

AWARD-WINNING author Oliver Jeffers wrote this for his daughter, Mari, and its touching evocation of parental love and the need for hope and security is a message that resonates particularly strongly today.

A father assembles a toolkit, both real and symbolic, to show his daughter all the things they can build for the future, from a house to a road up to the stars.

Comforting, while acknowledging uncertainties and challenges, Jeffers’s characteristically bold and wildly imaginative illustrations (look out for the recurring pink pig) are full of meaning.

This stand-alone companion to 2017’s here we Are, inspired by the birth of Jeffers’s son, will be read again and again.

THE BEAR, THE PIANO AND LITTLE BEAR’S CONCERT by David Litchfield (Frances Lincoln £11.99, 40 pp)

THIS final story in the brilliant Bear And The Piano trilogy will bring a lump to the throat as Bear, famed as a pianist, grows older and his audiences decline, forcing him into retirement in the forest.

his regrets are soothed by the arrival of a daughter who finds the abandoned piano and learns of her father’s illustrious past.

But Bear won’t play it again, so the cub sends a message out into the world that results in a glorious, uplifting reunion full of music and memories.

Litchfield’s use of l i ght is unequalled and t his is a triumphant last movement in a great symphony.

JUST ONE OF THOSE DAYS by Jill Murphy (Macmillan £12.99, 36 pp)

Few authors can convey the emotionally charged and physically tiring routine of everyday family life with such honesty and affection as Jill Murphy and this return to the Bear household, last seen 40 years ago in Peace At Last, is a long-awaited joy.

As the parents rush to work, Baby Bear arrives at nursery where tiny things go wrong which, as Murphy sensitively demonstrates, build up to tearful upset for a child.

At the end of the day, with mum and dad exhausted, harmony i s restored, pizza arrives and the overwhelming love rocks everyone to sleep. Another Murphy classic.