Tansy has a cloud that just won’t go away, no matter what she or her friends and family try. But a friend helps distract her from it and she eventually sees some sunshine and a rainbow through it. But it’s still there at the end.
This seems to be a rather odd subject for the picture book form. It is about depression, in the form of a cloud, and learning to live with it.
In the afterword, the author and illustrator both mention the clouds in their lives in their bios. The author mentions that mental illness runs in her family and emerges as anxiety, depression, eating disorders or bad intent. “Much like a wind, cloud, or rainbow, it is a force of nature I cannot control. Yet, even when it feels heavy and endless, when I feel despair or panic, I can choose how I react to a challenging situation.” I don’t know if she is talking to the child reading it or the parent reading to the child.
I wonder if she is trying to explain her own mental illness to her young child who has to experience it with her. It feels to me like it would be difficult for most children to understand. It looks like a cute book at first but just gets more depressing and resigned. I am not sure it succeeds in its mission as there is no resolution except acceptance. Although acceptance is an important aspect of a disabling condition, I see this book not in a school library but as a coffee table book in a therapist’s office.
Word Seeds 