Snowy, by Berlie Doherty, illustrated by Keith Bowen and published in 1993 by Dial Books for young readers, is a contemporary realistic fiction picture book about a girl and her horse Snowy. I thought the story was ok at times. The illustrations were very good but I was bored with the language of the book and the lack of any character development or even description. The illustrations in this book are very good. They give extra detail to the horse Snowy, and the towns landscape. The illustrations help to bring out the story by giving me, the reader a glimpse into the world of Snowy. My favorite scene is when the children in the main characters class are going to see the horse. The illustrator painted a beautiful bridge with the class walking around it. What amazed me even more is how the author played with his light source and shadows. It is clear by the light on the bridge that he painted this side toward the sun. The author did a great job with the shadows of nearby plants and trees. The language of the book seemed very loose and jumbled. At one point the author would have us in the barge and then all of the sudden we would be in the barn with Snowy. There was no transitional language to take us between the two places. I also felt very bored while reading the book. The language just did nothing to draw me into the book. I always look for character development and description in a book. Unfortunately there was very little to almost no character development or description in this book. If it were not for the pictures I would not know what the main character, Rachel, looked liked. This is a real pet peeve of mine when the book does not describe the physical characteristics of a character. If a character is described then I can better picture that person in my head. In this book I kept thinking, what does Rachel look like? What does she wear? How tall is she? If I have a description of the character in my head then I can understand the story better. Also there was very little development. From what I could tell when I was reading this book is that Rachel does not have very many friends at school. I wondered what happened to that after they meet her horse. Did she gain any friends and did she develop any type of personality? Friendship is at the center of the big idea for this story. Snowy and Rachel have an undying friendship that will last for a long time. ( )