Did Your Mother Ever Tell You? Words of Wisdom, Wit, and Love

Flipping common idioms on their head, cookbook author Costello directs readers toward emotional resilience, kindness, and open-mindedness in an advice-packed picture book debut. A setup line (“Did your mother ever tell you”) leads into seven expressions, including “Hold your horses” and “Don’t cry over spilled milk.” Reassuring rhymes follow each, frequently highlighting the support that can arise from a parent (“So talk through those feelings/ with Mom or with Dad./ When you say them out loud,/ worries don’t seem so bad”). Soft coloring and gentle textures give Lucas’s illustrations a mild quality, while frequently humorous depictions of animals add an amusing dimension to the extended advice. Accompanying “Birds of a feather flock together,” matching avian characters march along a fountain while more colorful species soar nearby. Even as lengthy text sometimes strains to execute the book’s conceit, the well-intentioned hopes behind the counsel come through. A final exposition on “when it rains it pours” yields an emblematic send-off grounded in a mother’s love. Characters are portrayed with various skin tones. Ages 4–8. (Apr.)