Ella, a pale-skinned girl who wears glasses, has recently moved into a white farmhouse idyllically nestled beside a red barn. While her mother unpacks boxes beside a roaring fire, Ella peers out a frost-covered window anticipating her grandfather’s arrival. Gramps arrives, clad in a red-plaid coat, and Ella rushes into the snow to embrace him. They ascend into a snowy forest for Ella’s very first solstice adventure. They hope to choose a holiday tree and wish on a solstice star, a family tradition observed for over a century, since “Ella’s great-great-grandparents bought the farmland.” After chopping down their tree, a snowstorm starts, and the pair ride a toboggan sled back to the farmhouse, even though Ella hasn’t made her wish yet. Will her first winter solstice observance be rendered incomplete? The natural calm of this book lovingly echoes Jane Yolen’s Owl Moon, as a family pair navigates simple yet sweeping blue and white landscapes dotted with details like raccoons snuggled in a tree trunk, deer gazing on curiously, and pairs of footprints and sled tracks in the snow. Ogren’s text captures the physical sensations of a winter hike: the “Crunch! Crunch! Crunch!” of tramping through snow, the “Shhh-shhh, shhh-shhh, shhh-shhh . . . PLOP!” as the tree falls. A winter story steeped in a secular, simple family tradition, and a gentle, beautiful read-together. VERDICT A tranquil glimpse of a wintry day, this is an impressively unembellished selection for seasonal collections.
—School Library Journal
