Swedish author/illustrator Cecilia Heikkilä's The Slightly Spooky Tale of Fox and Mole is a lightly gothic tale that illustrates the dual perils of taking more than we give and not asking for what we need.
Fox and Mole are countryside neighbors. In autumn, Mole comes round to Fox's every evening to enjoy a cozy spread and a storybook about a raccoon "transformed" into something monstrous. Eventually, Mole eats all of Fox's provisions and forgets Fox's birthday, too. "Something thorny found its way to Fox's heart," and Fox is transformed.
Heikkilä's digitally edited watercolor, gouache, and pastel illustrations track her narrative's theme of transformation perfectly, primarily through color. Bright reds, lovely sky blues, and pure emerald greens vanish from her spreads as Mole and Fox's friendship tips off balance, replaced by cooler-toned creams, browns, and olives. Heikkilä's narrative seems informed by Aesop's fable of the ant and the grasshopper, but her moral takes a notably different direction: only by restoring the balance of mutual care in their friendship do Fox and Mole set each other to rights again. That's not spooky at all. --Stephanie Appell, freelance reviewer