The Extra Special Baby: The Story of the Christmas Promise

Aimed at very young children, this conversational picture book tells the story of Jesus’s birth and what it represents to the faithful. Rendered in a soft pastel palette, Woodward’s gently scruffy illustrations exude coziness and comfort, but the language of the retelling can be vague to the point of confusing. Words such as census and savior are avoided—instead, “the people had been told to return to their hometown to be counted” and Jesus is referred to as an “Extra Special Baby” throughout—yet gold, frankincense, and myrrh are named. When the wise men, called “very clever men,” arrive in Bethlehem, they explain the reason for their journey: “We discovered a Very Exciting Promise: the birth of the extra special one was written across time.” Parents will need to fill in the gaps, including the reasons for Mary and Joseph’s flight out of Bethlehem—Herod isn’t mentioned either. Ages 3–5. (Aug.)