The Rainbow Fish

The Rainbow Fish

by Marcus Pfister

This wonderful picture book sends a bright message to all readers when the most beautiful fish in the whole ocean discovers the real value of friendship. The moral of the story is so simple and real to tell readers that beauty is not happiness, but rather friendship is much more important. The illustrations throughout this picture book are wonderful and rather simple with the highlight being placed on the sparkling silver scares that shimmer on each page. Young readers will be attracted to these neat scales, which makes the message of beauty even more clear. The background colors of the pages are well thought out. Throughout the book the majority of the pages are a blueish green, but the day that Rainbow Fish begins to give out his scales and feel at home among the other fish, the background is a happy pink that makes the fish glow. The illustrations also appears as if they are done in watercolor which adds to the setting of the book in the ocean. The language used in the book is simple and yet it has many good descriptive words to help carry the meaning of each page.

Intended Age 4-8