Member Reviews

What Feelings Do When No One is Looking
Tina Oziewicz, Aleksandra Zajac, Jennifer Croft (Translator)
Elsewhere Editions
July 19, 2022

What Feelings Do When No One is Looking
Is a children’s illustrated book about feelings. The authors present the feelings as creatures who are displaying how they make people feel. For example, the creature Calm hugs a dog. Hugging a dog helps people calm down. Insecurities builds cages. Cages keep a person’s feelings locked up inside. It’s beautifully simple with delightful illustrations. It’s perfect for children who are experiencing new feelings, helping them look at them in a new way.

I recommend this children’s book for young readers. It’s brilliant.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

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As a mom to three young kids this book is perfect for explaining feelings and emotions to them. I love how different the descriptions of feelings are from other books we’ve read. My favorite one was “calm pets a dog” . It’s perfect.
I also appreciated the feelings in this book being ones other than just happy, sad, mad. This book explores sympathy, shame, freedom, hospitality, and insecurity to name a few.
And the quirky illustrations are the icing on the cake.
Love this book and will be purchasing a hard copy for my kids to love on.
Thanks for the opportunity to review this beautiful title.

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Thank you to NetGalley for this ARC. I loved the illustrations for this book. This was a great book I thought this was a good book for adults and children, this shows most emotions and how you feel. I would recommend!

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I received an electronic ARC from Archipelago through NetGalley.
Creative way to give personas to feelings we all have. Others have said Sendak's wild things would feel at home with these creatures and that comparison works. These creatures take on the emotions they represent - anger, shyness, loneliness, hope, joy, love, etc. and model what the text describes. Young readers can find themselves in these pages and act along with the characters.
A terrific book for families to share as they explore how children are feeling and processing. Also a helpful addition to classrooms and libraries.

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If only time machines were real and I could give this book to my younger self !
What a wonderful imaginative concept of where feelings go to live when not being felt .
Illustrations are adorable and heartwarming. The color pallet the illustrator uses is wonderful as a child I always gravitate towards the muted colors . Many adults could use this book to remember their hearts are not cold !
This book really does touch your heart .
Reminds me of the feelings I had of reading Shel Silverstein as a wee one .
Here though the rhyming of words is not as important as the words themselves .
A great book for a child to approach the conversation of feelings with in general .
Highly recommend it !
This was reviewed through #NetGalley.
I received this copy to review in exchange for my review.

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A super sweet and super cute and yet emotional read. I really loved this. It was pretty open ended when it comes to emotions, I was questioning myself on numerous occasions too. And yet I loved this, I really really did!

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Forget the kids! We adults need to read this book! We need to know what our feelings do when no one's looking. This book brought me so much calm and comfort. Ah, love it. The illustrations made me see the younger innocent me looking towards the adult me to be more understanding towards what I would feel. This made me cry because I know we would still be confused and less understanding of our emotions no matter how older we get.

Okay, the adult thought processing is over.

Gather the kids and read this book out loud. It's going to be so much fun! The kids will learn new words regarding different emotions, even though they might not understand each and every emotion described. But no worries, the one line playful description of each gives a fair idea.

Okay, dear adult, when the kids are gone/went to sleep after reading this read this book for yourself. It's so comforting.

You people at Archigepalo are awesome. Thank you for the advance reading copy.

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I really enjoyed this book with its simple structure and clever words. I know this book would be a hit with all ages - it has so much to look at in each illustration and such a lot of meaning for each emotion. I like how so many emotions are included not just a small selection.

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A picture book with only a few words (each then very valuable) and with many—wonderful, embracing, surprising, some even a tiny bit unsettling—pictures.

The book is all about feelings. Feelings that have become beings, and their actions are the physical representation of the ethereal emotion, of the things we feel.

I’m sure this book will come handy to more than one parent when trying to explain to a young child the different ways in which we feel and how to live with those feelings.

I’m sure, as well, this book would be cherished by many adults as it reminds us that, much like the little beautiful and scary creatures that inhabit it, our feelings as living things that need our attention so they don't grow uncontrollable and dangerous.

Know what you feel is a principle of life. Without knowing what we feel we are at the mercy of that feeling. Well, here you have a book that may help you see better into yourself. No, this is not some mumbo-jumbo psychology self-help, this is just a lovely little picture book doing us the little service of reminding us that we have a bunch of emotions living within ourselves and that is OKAY.

More in the practicalities of the book, I think most of the feelings are very cleverly depicted, but a few are very on the nose (rust building bridges comes to mind as an example). Some of my favorite representations are Courage, Fear and Patience. Some other mentions are spot on, hence a bit upsetting, like Insecurity and Shame. A few others are also spot on but in a very fulfilling way, like Calm and Happiness.

All in all a clever, useful and whimsical book. Read it to a child, or with a child, or read it on your own, and enjoy every word and every picture to your emotions' content.

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An imaginary children's book about the different emotions and how they are depicted. The images are so well drawn and really give a message in what the emotion conveys. This book was creatively written and a joy to look at the photos and read the words associated with each page. I would enjoy reading this to my kids and watching their expressions absorb the messages of this well written book. This is definitely one not to be missed!

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Initially my reaction was to wish there was most color to the illustrations of the feelings, but even with a softer or limited color palette, they're perfectly depicted. Imagination and Shame are my favorite.

This is a great way to begin introducing the names of feelings to kids and describe in a non boring educational way what they feel like.

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I really do like this book and it is illustrated beautifully and each statement could provoke a whole conversation in itself.

I do find the language a little complicated and formal which requires some explanation in itself which distracts the child a little which is a shame

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What Feelings Do when No One's Looking is a book about feelings. This was so, so wonderful to read. It basically personifies all our feelings such as happiness, anxiety, freedom and so many more, and personifies them. One of my favourites is "Hospitality bakes a cake".

The illustrations will remind you of Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are but they deserve a lot of appreciation. I love that the characters are in monotone and there are hints of colour added somewhere in the whole illustration. It's pleasing to the eyes, your attention is not divided by different elements or colours clashing.

I would recommend this book to everyone, children or adults, because it is a beautiful read. A definite must read for children because it explains emotions and feeling in such a simplified and unique manner. Thanks to NetGalley and Elsewhere Editions for the ARC!

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An adorably warm & fuzzy picture book about feelings for young readers. The illustrations are fantastic, richly expressive in a soft and muted palette, and the text is simple and smart (what signifies calmness? Petting a dog, of course. How about happiness? Zipping around in a bubble!), letting the illustrations shine. Absolutely loved it, a perfect read-along book for young children. Just picture me as the Excitement illustration, racing to my friends with this newly discovered book!

Thank you to NetGalley and Archipelago's Elsewhere Editions for the advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

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This was a very creative, insightful book. I read this to my two kids ages 5 and 8 1/2. They both enjoyed it as well as the pictures and even started talking more about feelings as a result. It was nice to see them engage so much in a book. Very well written with some great illustrations. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

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I always enjoy reading books about feeling and emotions to my three year old son. It was fun to read where the feelings were going and what they were doing.

The illustrations are gorgeous and we both really enjoyed the grayscale. I think the lack of bright colors, helps tell the story better and allows more focus on the feelings themselves!

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I have a preschooler that I have been on the hunt to find a book about feelings for. Unfortunately, I think this book probably will not be interesting to her. As an adult, it was fun to read and think about. What do my feelings do? I have been thinking a lot more about finding new words for feelings that I have and my daughter has. This book gave me a couple new ideas.

It’s a cute story about where feelings go and what they do. Some do not make sense to me or feel a little off, but everyone feels their feelings different so maybe it would make sense for someone else. It might be because it is translated, so it may flow a little better in the original language.

The art is really nice, but I’m not sure it would grab a toddler’s interest. It is “where the wild things” ish. I think it’s more so a book for 3-7 year olds or huge young fans of the wild things. My unicorn and rainbow obsessed kid will probably pass, but it still is a worthy read! I think this would do really well for kids who are struggling to name some of their feelings. Once you can name feelings beyond “happy, mad, sad”, it can be easier to understand them. As previous reviewers mentioned, this probably would be a great book for a foster parent or a parent attempting to give their child names for the emotions they are feeling.

Thank you NetGalley for this ARC :)

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What an absolutely lovely & thoughtful book. This book has such a creative way of thinking about the feelings that everyone experiences. It will be a great starting place for families and classes to talk about feelings, what they are like and how they feel. It could also be a great jumping off place for children to imagine and create art about their own feelings. Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book in return for an honest opinion.

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I love the concept behind this book and enjoyed reading it even more. It has wonderful illustrations and a great moral for kids. Highly recommend for all! Loved reading this!

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thank you netgalley for providing me this arc in exchange for an honest review :)

I was in need of a book that would be an easy read and relaxing to flip through and when I saw this title I knew it was the one. Oziewicz and Zajac did an amazing job illustrating what feelings actually do. Feelings are something we all experience. And feelings impact our outlook on life, our choices and our actions. We can make better decisions once we understand how the choices we are given make us feel.

Feelings are emotions we should listen to and understand. This book helps in bettering our understanding of feelings. Plus, the added illustrations really help in visually seeing what our feelings are doing to us; because, we get to see what they actually do! It was really helpful.

This was also a teachable moment for me even though I'm not a child, this is a book I would recommend for everyone to pick up; because we still need the reminders of how important our feelings are. It was eye-opening and enlightening see how certain negative feelings can negatively impact our success and how certain positive feelings can do the opposite.

I know it is easier said than done, but try not to compare yourself to others and to hate because those feelings will just inhabit your potential, darken your accomplishments and destroy connections with others. Try to express kindness, gratitude and patience because those feelings will help you improve your future and provide you with positivity in the present and future!

Thank you for this arc! 5/5 stars Amazing illustrations

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