FRANCE

A day in the life of Bébé and Doudou in France.

This board book opens on a busy day when Bébé wakes up. From there, it’s on to breakfast, a walk, and a trip to the park, among other activities. Each page features a different child and their lovey (doudou) along with a sprinkle of French and accompanying helpful phonetic spellings. Words and phrases like bonjour, bon appétit, and bonne nuit are woven into the text in such a way that non-native speakers can manage them. The phonetic spellings encourage correct pronunciation and familiarize little readers with new words. The book concludes with a section called “A Day in France,” which translates all of the French from the text into English. While this is certainly helpful, readers may wish it had come earlier, as it takes some time for context clues to kick in on the word doudou unless readers are previously familiar. Carpentier’s illustrations are bold and striking, depicting rich textures in, for instance, people’s hair or orange peels on a table. Characters are racially diverse. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

Lovely illustrations accompany this quaint, toddler-friendly intro to French culture and language.