Lola Dutch! I Love You So Much, #3 in a must-read series for 3-7

Oh, Lola Dutch, you are too much. If you’ve got a kid who is between three and seven this series of books needs to be on your radar. Lola Dutch!, I Love You So Much is the third book in this series by Kenneth and Sarah Jane Wright. These books will skew a little more for girls than boys, but that’s only because Lola is a girl who wears a tutu. When our son was six he laughed along with us as we read Lola Dutch, the first book in series to him. He’s old enough to where he can read them by himself, laughing as he looks at the art.

For us the art was one of the big hooks into why kids will enjoy the books. Lola is a girl with a massive imagination. She lives in what looks like a French mansion with her friends, Gator, Crane, Pig and Bear. The illustrations are lovingly drawn with watercolors to fill in some of the other spaces. The result gives a rough appearance to some of the characters that allows the colors to not fill in their pre-drawn spaces. This soft affect is dreamy and really works for the big page canvas of Lola Dutch.

I Love You So Much has Lola starting the day with her four friends, but each of them has an issue that’s causing things to get off to a wonky start. She sews an outfit for Gator, a book nook for Crane and more. When Lola reveals the grand surprise that she’s made for each of her friends the art opens up to both pages. This is where the book really excels for us. On these pages the art is so expressive that it really, pardon the pun, illustrates how emotive a children’s book can be.

The background is larger on some of these pages, allowing the character’s actions to speak volumes with very little dialogue. We see Lola and Pig flying a kite while Crane eats an apple and watches them. Then, when it starts to rain all of the friends, except for Bear dance and jump around in puddles. There’s a manic sense of happiness in Lola Dutch that you don’t see in many children’s illustrated books.

The text has moments where it rhymes and periods where it’s presented in simple sentences.  If your child likes Fancy Nancy then this is a logical partner book. Except for our money, Lola Dutch is a better series due to the art and the fact that it’s not quite as babyish, despite the fact that it has fewer words.

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