Emotions can be small or big, loud or quiet. In Dark Cloud, author Anna Lazowski and illustrator Penny Neville-Lee articulate these big emotions so that readers don’t have to feel so alone.

Abigail has a dark cloud that just showed up one day and creates a fog and long shadows everywhere she goes. She’s not sure what this cloud is, why it showed up, and how she can get rid of it. When she feels the comfort from friends and trusted adults, the cloud becomes more manageable.

Dark Cloud is a really interesting new picture book. Sadness and depression are tricky topics to discuss. For parents, its hard to know how to deal with these feelings and for the readers experiencing them, it can be very scary. Anna Lazowski has created a gentle and comforting book that explores sadness and depression in a way that supports readers. Readers who have their own dark clouds can find comfort in knowing that they aren’t alone in those feelings and they can talk about them with trusted adults. Parents can find comfort and assistance in the story, helping to create a dialogue around big feelings.

Penny Neville-Lee’s illustrations are beautiful, morphing from greyscale to full colour as Abigail learns to manage her dark cloud. I love how the illustrations almost appear in three dimensions thanks to Penny Neville-Lee’s layered, collage like style.