Diary of a Bee

Gr 1-3–This informational picture book follows the fictionalized life cycle of Matilda, a honeybee, as she develops from a larva to an industrious worker bee. Although the book is brimming with factual information, the realism is offset with touches of whimsy in the text and illustrations. Matilda carries woven baskets to gather pollen and envies the restful life of a male drone, who is later shown wearing a tuxedo for his “marriage” to the queen. The digital illustrations have a painterly quality, capturing the golden light of the hive and the “sunlit meadow” in layered hues reminiscent of watercolor. The translation from the original Czech is stilted at times, and lines such as “It’s only proper that the queen has a grander chamber, as befits her status” may need to be rephrased or explained to young readers. With multiple scenes depicted on a page and text that is a mix of paragraphs, speech bubbles, and diagram captions, this book is best suited to one-on-one sharing. A better match for groups is Candace Fleming’s Honeybee: The Busy Life of Apis Mellifera.