I received a free ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Jocelyn loves socks and loves to use the ones that show her feelings. But it isn't always easy to match them up.

This was a cute book with great pictures and text. It teaches a great lesson about dealing with feelings and enjoying what you love. Cute.

Jocelyn’s Box of Socks by Kristen L. Jackson is a fun story about Jocelyn, a little girl who likes, no, LOVES socks. She seems to have a pair in every color and pattern. (She doesn’t like plain white socks obviously. Is there a true sock enthusiast who does?) Jocelyn wears her socks in layers, on her hands, around her waist as skirts, as hair bands, and in the shower.

One day, a box from Jocelyn’s grandparents arrives for her. It is filled with a treasure trove of socks! There are smiley face socks, frustrated face socks, and socks for every emoji in between. She feels happy, so she puts on the happy socks. As the day goes on, however, Jocelyn is changing her socks so often to match her mood that she decides not to wear ANY socks for “the first time in . . . ever.”

Can Jocelyn figure out a way to wear her socks even when they don’t match her mood? With her older brother’s help, maybe she can find a way to love socks again.

This colorful book, fantastically illustrated by Tino Santanach allows children to explore emotions in an enjoyable way. I’d recommend this to any young child and caregiver, for teachers and their students, and sock lovers. The end matter contains a note from the author about her hopes for her book’s audience, a classroom guide with lesson plan ideas, extra activities that focus on feelings, and a short paragraph about the author.

(If you happen to be teaching in Pennsylvania, there’s a page listing the learning standards for early childhood!)


Thanks to NetGalley and Schiffer Publishing for the opportunity to read this book. My review is honest and unbiased. #NetGalley #JocelynsBoxOfSocks @SchifferPublishing @Schifferbooks

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This book is a perfect catalyst to start conversations about emotions and feelings and how to control them. Emotions come in many categories and it's wonderful to be able to recognize them and figure out how to deal with them when they suddenly appear.

Jocelyn is a small girl who adores socks. They seem to be part of her DNA as she is always wearing them: at bedtime, at the beach with her flip-flops, and once when she took a bath. She seems sock-obsessed.

One day a large box arrives from her grandparents and when she opens it up she discovers socks, socks and more socks with a note attached that instructs her to wear the socks with "feeling."

She notices that each pair has expressions of emotions on them and she decides to choose a pair that coincides with how she is feeling at that very moment. Her feelings rapidly change throughout the day and she becomes super frustrated because she feels obligated to go change her socks to match what she is experiencing. Those socks are a lot of work. She feels happy, sad, scared, angry, calm ( just to name a few ) and when these feelings appear Jocelyn jostles to change her socks one more time. Oh my this is no fun, her socks are wearing her out!

Her big brother gives her some great advice:

"You can wear whatever socks you want. Just because your mood changes, doesn't mean you have to change your socks." Brilliant!

He gives her permission to decide for herself what socks she will wear settling in her mind that she is the boss not the socks. What a great and freeing revelation!


I love the dedication at the beginning of the book:

"--Dedicated to my mom and her love of "fun" socks, the inspiration for this story.

The author has included a helpful parents/ teacher's guide at the end. This is a book I would definitely recommend.

Jocelyn’s Box Of Socks is a cute story. Kids do identify with mood setting like Jocelyn. And it tells children they can have whatever mood they have. And that is okay.

Jocelyn's Box of Socks by Kristen L. Jackson is sooo cute. Little Jocelyn's love to colorful socks is addictive. Very colorful and bright book with a fun story.
The illustration is on point. Every kids would love this book

The book seems to be geared toward preschoolers who are trying to understand feelings. However, it is a little too long for its target audience. Preschoolers will loose interest very quickly.

This is a really fantastic book for children and young people which stimulates lots of discussions about emotions, feelings and how we express them. The illustrations are bright and bold which makes it engaging for children. The text is just the right amount to engage children. It also has questions at the end of the book for questions that could be used within the classroom to stimulate discussions around emotions. A really fantastic book which is great for emotional literacy.

Our emotions can change quickly and it can be hard for young kids to manage them. This cute, colourful book uses fun socks to help kids learn to distinguish their emotions and how to react accordingly. There is also some added info in the back of how you can use this book to teach kids how to recognize their varying emotions. Would make an excellent story time book.

Jocelyn's Box of Socks was a sweet children's book that focuses on emotions. It was bright and colorful and overall a great children's book.

This is a very good book for early years. It’s fun and emotive while being educational. It can be used as independent reading or as part of a class.

I've said before that I love it when picture books teach me things. However, there's one thing I really don't like: when picture books try to teach me things. This book is an extremely transparent attempt at teaching a lesson about feelings, making it suitable mainly for very young children. It doesn't help that the main character is drawn looking like she's about eight years old; shouldn't kids be able to identify emotions by that point?

The story that this lesson is built around is pretty weak. Jocelyn is a kid obsessed with socks. She wears them everywhere. One day, her grandparents send her a box full of socks covered in smiley faces that run the gamut of emotional states. Now, obviously her grandparents don't know her very well, because what happens next makes the box of socks seem like a rather cruel present. Jocelyn thinks she has to wear the socks that match her mood... and because her mood changes so quickly (partly due to the frustration of being obsessed with those socks all the time), she's changing her socks in quick succession. It isn't until her brother suggests that she doesn't have to match her socks to her mood that she stops and calms down. (And, like I said, because Jocelyn isn't drawn as a very young child, it's confusing as to why she doesn't know this already. Does she think there's a sock police or something?)

The illustrations are kind of cute, quite cartoonish and colourful, and it's fun seeing all the socks. But I don't know why her parents are drawn like they just stepped out of the '60s. That's kind of odd.

Overall, I'd probably only recommend this one to parents of very young children. If the illustrations had made Jocelyn look a bit younger, I might not be struggling with this one as much as I am; I just keep wondering what's wrong with her that she doesn't know the basics at her age. I also wonder if preschoolers will be able to relate to a "big kid".