Why Am I?
Victor James Owner
ill. H.J. Grimes

By Alyce Wilson

In the children's book Why Am I? the many characters, all inanimate objects like a star and the wind, personified as people, pose that question over and over. They puzzle over their purpose in life in the midst of playing or in the middle of casual conversation.

Nobody can offer a solution until the Morning Dew reads to them from her Great Gold Book, which explains that the star provides light on cold winter nights.

While the book reads very much like a veiled religious tale, it's not certain what lesson children are supposed to take away. Is it that they can gain knowledge from books? Or is it that they should seek their purpose from the tome Christians call the Good Book, the Bible?

H.J. Grimes' illustrations are simple and childlike but not striking enough on their own to save the book from its muddy story. Readers of the book, children and adults alike, are likely to wonder, "Why read this?"

Rating: * (Save Your Money)

Synergy Books, 2006 (ISBN 0976498189)