Owl Moon by Jane Yolen (Father’s Day Gift Idea)

Little B was just 6 months old when it was time for her very first Father’s Day. How much do we cherish the very first! And how much do we long to make our very first the most memorable one!

We are a family of book lovers – Mr. B is a book lover, I am a book lover and we were trying our best that Little B would also grow up to be a book lover. Therefore, I was certain that the first gift Mr. B will receive as a father would be a book. I started researching and one name kept cropping up again and again – Owl Moon by Jane Yolen. I ordered it.

Owl Moon is a story of an adventurous winter night when a father and a daughter go out in a snowy dark meadow to find an owl. The story builds up anticipation till finally the daughter is able to see her father communicate with a great horned owl and she sees it up close.

What touched me was the gentle touch with which Jane Yolen writes about the relationship that a father and a daughter share. The author doesn’t coats words with sugar or doesn’t uses any unnecessary patronizing words that children’s books often carry. Instead she tells the story as it is.

If a mother takes a daughter for owling, chances are that the mother will hold daughter’s hands or she will keep inquiring if the daughter is feeling cold or will keep holding her daughter tight if a dark patch appears in the woods.

A father on the other hand, might not hold hand, might not ask again and again if the child is cold and probably do not shower any ‘beside the point’ love. But that doesn’t mean that the father is not caring.

Fathers don’t share emotions. But they share experiences that are closest to their hearts. And that’s how they love.

Children also react differently when they are with their fathers than their mothers. Little B might feel scared of something when she is with me. She might ask me to take her in my lap or to hold her hand tight. But with her father, she acts confident, sure and brave.

Before gifting the book to Mr. B, I personalized it using Little B’s hand print.

Whenever Mr. B reads out Owl Moon, Little B listens to it with patience and at the same time, with excitement. Little B especially love Mr. B’s hooting ‘who hoo, hoo hoo hoooooo.’ This was the first animal sound that Little B learned.

Thanks Jane Yolen for your Owl Moon, and for giving those special memories that we treasure!

Owl Moon with Little B’s childhood buddy moose

Here’s where you can buy the book from –