Review by Ian Keogh

Avery is a young school-age girl who was exploring the new neighbourhood she’d moved into when we last met her in Avery and the Fairy Circle. It turned out to be far more magical than expected. Here she’s counting down the days until she can head back to the fairy world to meet her friend Birch again.

Rowan Kingsbury presents comforting, brightly coloured adventures for very young children, so the levels of adventure, discovery and wonder are set high, while the dangers are minimal, hardly upsetting and easily overcome. This time the brief threat is a raccoon, easily appeased by a button.

What the squirrel in the title is delivering is nominally a salve to treat animals, but Avery and Birch accompany new friend Sorrel to his distant village to see he gets home safely. This isn’t unlikely considering Sorrel has Douglas the squirrel for transportation, but it is the means to a new adventure. Along the way Kingsbury educates by pointing out berries and cones via large illustrations, with more identified after the story. The instructional method of resolving difficulties between children is hardly subtle, though, even taking the young audience into account. The fallout reflects infants wearing their hearts on their sleeves.

The art is imaginative, both in promoting the wonder of nature and the joys of being in the countryside. It’s amplified by Kingsbury designing and pacing the story to open up into a spread every few pages, and these can be joyfully explored by children with greater imagination.

The quiet warmth of Avery’s adventures accompanies a simplicity and a fully realised magical alternative to reality.