Have You Seen my Dragon? by Steve Light
The dragon from Have You Seen My Dragon? with a Haba dragon; In thumbnail picture, the dragon is reading on a student desk handmade by my in-laws when my husband was younger.
Have You Seen My Dragon? By Steve Light (published 2014)
Most of the books that I review on here will be recent publications—meaning published within the last year or so. I’m making an exception right at the start (oh boy! Breaking my own rules already….) to include Steve Light’s Have You Seen My Dragon?
Why am I breaking the rules? Maybe I have dragons on my mind as my girls have been playing with their latest Lego Elves Dragon sets. Have you seen them? The baby dragons are super cute (and, like most Lego, a big choking hazard so watch out for your little ones!) and the ‘adult’ dragons are amazingly detailed, with completely articulating legs and heads and wings. The newer Lego sets—the ones that my husband and I didn’t grow up with—have all these newer pieces that allow for lots of movement. As a side note, the newer Lego pieces also allow for Lego robotics, a fun programming/engineering/architectural activity.
Have You Seen My Dragon? has the rare combination of telling a good story AND having awesome pictures. I’ll be honest and say I usually only like one or the other in picture books. So to have both? It’s like finding a dragon in a city. (In other words, a welcome surprise.)
In Have You Seen My Dragon?, one little boy chronicles his journey along a city on his way to find his dragon. The illustrations are done mostly in black and white so the dragon blends in. Young readers will have a lot of fun not only spotting the dragon, but counting up to 20 and finding specific objects on each page. As a bonus, there is a map on the end flaps re-tracing their journey.
Steve Light combines architectural details and idiosyncrasies of blending the old with the new making this book an honest delight to read and savor.
Little Lion Bookworm Review: Definitely yes!
Rating: the floor or lowest bookshelf. Little hands will want to count the items over and over again. Big hands will want to admire the illustrations repeatedly. You can even incorporate some math if you like or practice learning basic colors.
Rating: Mini Me bookworm says, ‘Buy It!’ I agree. Or you risk having to renew it repeatedly at the library. A must-have for all dragon lovers and non-dragon hunters alike.
