Clever wordplay immediately elevates Smith\u2019s story beyond mere moralizing about the value of a growth mindset: \u201cHabit\u201d is the name of a tropical island, home to the eponymous creature, a large, rabbitlike being who prefers the tried-and-true to the new and unfamiliar. A \u201cvery small creature,\u201d a bespectacled blue sphere with skinny limbs, encourages the very big creature to stretch himself, first by finding a way for the two of them to leave the island for a snowy place with \u201ctrees shaped like triangles. And rocks covered in moss. And snow that [falls] from the sky like dust, like magic, like stars.\u201d Here, the very small creature excels at trying new things, such as climbing trees and riding a bicycle. The very big creature struggles and fails to do the same, much to his disappointment, but a shift in his thinking makes all the difference. The very big creature soon realizes that attempting to be the best is fruitless; it\u2019s better to try to be the best at trying. Throughout, Espinosa\u2019s comic-style illustrations have a retro feel that will appeal to fans of Zachariah Ohora and Bob Shea, with an expressive flair that captures a range of emotions from frustration to triumphant glee.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Clever wordplay immediately elevates Smith\u2019s story beyond mere moralizing about the value of a growth mindset: \u201cHabit\u201d is the name of a tropical island, home to the eponymous creature, a large, rabbitlike being who prefers the tried-and-true to the new and unfamiliar. A \u201cvery small creature,\u201d a bespectacled blue sphere with skinny limbs, encourages the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":1137,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interesting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1136"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1136"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1136\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1137"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}