Bold black and white pictures are strikingly beautiful, and effectively capture the mood and the setting. Rambling through a snow-covered forest on a cold day, a boy is being watched by a black wolf. Snow starts to fall, and he picks up his pace while the wolf continues to stare at him. The wolf bares his teeth, the boy turns and notices him, and the wolf pounces! The reader is temporarily in shock, because a tree has fallen at the same time, and it takes a moment to make sense of what has happened.
In the final scene, the boy and the wolf are hugging and smiling, and the reader realizes that the wolf did not have bad intentions, but was saving the boy from being injured or killed by the falling tree. Perhaps this story was created as a reminder to be careful of having preconceived notions?
Loup Noir [Black Wolf] by Antoine Guilloppe. France: Duculot/Casterman, 2004. [9782203553064]
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