Will Ladybug Hug?

Will Ladybug Hug? joins Leung’s Will Bear Share? and Will Sheep Sleep? As he did in the earlier two books, Leung uses the board book’s opening spread to establish the central animal character’s current situation. In this case, Ladybug is a “hugger”; however, the following spread sets forth the book’s “problem” – Do all of Ladybug’s friends want to be hugged by her.

And so Ladybug, in turn, encounters Crocodile, Bear, Sheep, Frog and Giraffe, and four of the five do respond positively to her request for a hug. The one exception is Sheep.

Will Sheep
let Ladybug hug?

No.
Sheep does not want
to hug and that’s okay.

Though the book’s young audience will not get the humour in Sheep’s not acting like a sheep and going along with the herd (or flock), Leung makes the very important point that it’s “okay” to say “no”.

The four hugs Ladybug does get are not just your everyday hugs. Alligator provides a cool side hug, Bear a warm hug, Frog a jumping hug, and Giraffe a flying jump hug. When Ladybug wants “a super group hug”, Sheep still stands apart but is willing to participate in a high five with Ladybug. And as the book closes, readers discover why Ladybug wanted all these hugs from her friends. They are all at the airport, and these are “bon voyage” hugs as Ladybug is flying off to warmer climes.

Reader participation is invited on the book’s closing spread:

How do you say hello?
How do you say
good-bye?

As I noted in my review of the previous two books, design-wise, the brief text appears on one page with the illustration being found on the facing page. Given the books’ intended young audience, Leung has appropriately kept his illustrations of the characters quite simple and uncluttered, and he places them on coloured backgrounds. Perhaps Alligator and Giraffe, secondary characters in Will Ladybug Hug?, will feature in future books.

Will Ladybug Hug? would make good home purchase, and libraries serving a preschool audience should add it as well.