When Aunt Mattie 
Got Her Wings
by Petra Mathers; illus. by the author
Primary    Beach Lane/Simon    32 pp.
9/14    978-1-4814-1044-1    $17.99
e-book ed.  978-1-4814-1045-8    $10.99

Best (bird) friends Lottie and Herbie (Lottie’s New Beach Towel, rev. 5/98; A Cake for Herbie, rev. 5/00) help each other cope when Lottie’s beloved (and intrepid and fun-loving) aunt Mattie dies. “I miss Aunt Mattie. It hurts right here.” “Me too. It’s heartache, Herbie. Come sit by me. I am so glad you are here.” After a few days in the city, the friends pick up Aunt Mattie’s ashes and return home to their seaside community, to scatter the ashes — per Aunt Mattie’s request — in the sea near their favorite picnic location, Pudding Rock, where she’ll always be close by, “mixed in with sand and sea.” Because Mathers portrays death as a welcome next step for ninety-nine-year-old Aunt Mattie — she is last seen floating up from her hospital bed toward the adventure of her (after)life — the book focuses on those left behind, with Lottie and Herbie grieving, sharing memories, and counting on each other’s friendship to get them through. Mathers’s trademark jewel-toned panels use a warm palette to capture scenes of happy memories with Aunt Mattie and a cooler palette to depict sad scenes — but the bright golden-yellow of the flashlight beam that welcomes Aunt Mattie to her flight aboard Out of This World Airlines cuts through them all.

From the September/October 2014 issue of The Horn Book Magazine.