One Eagle Soaring (A First West Coast Book)

One Eagle Soaring is a counting book that introduces youngsters to the numbers from 1 to 10 and uses creatures from nature as the primary things to be counted. And so, youngsters will count an eagle, two moose, three orcas, four bees, five sea lions, six bears, seven swans, eight robins, nine frogs and ten owls. With the exception of the numbers 7 and 8, which share a spread, each number has its own double-page spread. The brief, rhyming text, in addition to identifying the animal to be located and the number to be counted, also has the creature(s) doing something, and so orcas swim the strait and frogs croak and leap. Many of the number pages also offer opportunities for additional counting related to the target number. After children count the four pollinating bees, they might notice that the spread also has four white clouds and four pink and four yellow flowers. The five sea lions who “like it sunny” are bathed in five of the sun’s rays while five stylized birds fly in the sky. The six bears hunting for honey do so in a landscape that includes six bees, six fir trees and six clouds.

Special features of the illustrations are described in promotional materials that were included with the review copy. “Roy Henry Vickers’ vivid illustrations are combined with a glossy, tactile finish that little fingers can run their hands along, as Indigenous motifs reveal themselves to the eyes.” Consequently, fingers can, for example, trace the bees’ seemingly erratic flight patterns while tilting the book reveals a motif within the bears’ bodies. Though many of the board book’s creatures can be found in other parts of Canada, Vickers’ backgrounds clearly indicate that the book is set on the West Coast.

Like Hello Humpback!, (Vol. XXIV, No. 22, February 9, 2018) the first book in the “A First West Coast Book” series, One Eagle Soaring, in addition to being a counting book, serves as visual introduction to an area of Canada, a culture and an art style.