Honey Harvest

Buzzing with the bounty of late summer, Kerr’s rigorously rhyming text and Saunders’s gently hued, thin-lined illustrations detail a honey harvest from start to finish, following a white-presenting father and child through the proceeding. Fond of the “sweet and golden, sticky treat,” but having never peeked inside the family hive, a young narrator initially envisions a factory setting with goggle-sporting bees “all lined up, filling bear-shaped bottles.” Demystifying the backyard operation involves the child’s donning a veil and beekeeper suit with their parent, and subsequent pages follow the duo as they calm the bees with a smoker, remove the hive’s frames, and use the extractor to send the frames on “a nice little spin.” The clear steps, conveyed dually in image and text, shed light on a small, idealized beekeeping operation (there’s nary a sting in sight), along the way underscoring themes of fairness and community connection as the family takes care to leave the bees “their own fair share” for survival, and to distribute the harvest with neighbors and relatives—an ecosystem that mimics the beehives themselves. A back matter FAQ provides additional insight into the honey harvesting process. Ages 3–7. (Self-published)