Two snow kids travel and spread good feelings in Good Doven’s children’s book Winter Magic Heart.
This story is written with centered text and contains no illustrations. The writing is extremely difficult to navigate. Broadly, the plot revolves around two kids who seem to be made of snow and come alive through the magic of winter. They name themselves Leon (with a lion heart) and sister Deon (with a dove heart). They roll in the snow near a river, where a girl supplies them with branches that become their hands. They have fun with bubbles and deer along the river. Soon, they arrive at a city. At a market, they get cherries for eyes and carrots for noses. Later, they hang colorful cups and celebrate the spirit of winter with others in the city.
The basic story is sweet, but the writing presents numerous obstacles. For example, the word “dellala’ ” is used many times throughout the book, but no definition is given. Leon and Deon wish people and animals “happy delllala’”; without further explanation, this is baffling.
Grammatically, the book is full of errors and certain words with unclear meanings, such as “snowing,” are often used. For example, one passage (lacking quotation marks) reads: “Happy dellala, Deon said, then he picked up some of those snowing balls and started snowing up to the sky and saying, Dellala’ Dellala’ indeed, Happy Dellela’ is winter beauty and light.”
“Rivering” is another example, as seen in this difficult-to-decipher dialogue:
“Leon said, rivering over the river with our two snowing feet, is the dellala of our adventure journey, but the way my feet feels numb.”
Capitalization is inconsistent and punctuation is often missing. Illustrations might have benefited the text by aiding the storytelling, but as is, many sections require multiple readings to get a glimmer of the narrative’s meaning.
The characters are likable and good-hearted, but Winter Magic Heart requires major revision before it can attract an audience.