This book is a great rhyming story that reminds us it is ok to be different. The illustrations went great with the story. This will be a great addition to our elementary library.

The Day I Met Bigfoot is a sweet and simple story about friendship and being okay with being different. The illustrations were soft and a lot of fun. My kiddos enjoyed the story and message behind it.

Thanks to Fox Chapel Publishing and NetGalley for an eARC of this book for an honest review.

A rhymed narrative of a kid who goes for a hike in the woods by himself, but ends up much less alone than you might think, when he discovers a mahoosive footprint and gets to befriend Bigfoot. The narrative is a touch awkward, when they prove they can accept each other and then immediately have to part as the sun is going down – the hike was started early, so it's been a very short day. But then perhaps the kid shouldn't have been hiking through the forest alone. The rhyming isn't too bad, until it does crunch to a halt at one failing couplet, before resuming well. I did think the visuals were a touch unable to keep the scale of the footprints with the feet that caused them, but on the whole this was done successfully – and the pages are ever-lively, with cats in the lad's home, and rabbits and cardinals watching him in the woods.

Ultimately, this is fine, but not great. The two characters infer a difference, when that is more or less that the two are individuals and loners ("I'd rather be lonesome than misunderstood…" indeed), which of course invites the kid to be all cloyingly woke and saccharine about the mis-maligned monster. While books like this that prove being your own true self is best are ten-a-penny, this probably won't survive to thrive on such an overburdened shelf, but it's not worth completely dismissing. Three and a bit stars.

Publication date: Febraruary 1st 2020

The Day I Met Bigfoot is a lovely rhyme book celebrating our differences and the need to be brave in the world. Very sweet with lovely colorful illustrations.