Book Review: I Will Love you Forever by Tatsuya Miyanishi

I Will Love you Forever is a picturebook by Tatsuya Miyanishi, which is currently scheduled for release on June 1 2017. A female Maiasaura finds a lost egg in the forest and decides to look after it with her own egg. Surprisingly, a baby Tyrannosaurus hatches from the egg. The greathearted mother accepts and raises him as her own son, Heart. One day, Heart goes to pick berries and comes across another Tyrannosaurus. The foster son of the Maiasaura discovers his real identity. The fourth title in this acclaimed Tyrannosaurus series, I Will Love You Forever delivers a heartwarming story about adoption with vivid, brightly colored illustrations and endearingly drawn characters.

I Will Love you Forever is a book that left me with mixed feelings. I was not fond of the art style, it seems a bit harsh- but the story came across as a little off to me as well. Perhaps something was lost in the translation from the original Japanese? It starts off fine, a dinosaur mom adopting an egg she finds and raising the Tyrannosaurus that hatches from it as her own, teaching him to be kind. Fine so far, but the disparaging of his species and the grieving mother that lost said egg, and the confusion and trauma all around by the end of the book shook me more than a little. I cannot imagine that anyone taking part in adoption (in any capacity) would find this book anything but painful.

I some how missed the fact that I Will Love you Forever is part of a series. I am not a fan of the art or writing style- although some of that could be because of translation problems or cultural differences. While some might enjoy the read, I just was not one of them.