Sweet picture book which details Frida Kahlo early childhood, after she recovered from polio and the imaginary friend who helped her escape her sadness and inspired her artistic life. Vibrant illustrations by Anthony Browne accompany the story. ( )

Browne’s illustrations in this little book about Frida Kahlo as a young child are stunning; however, I found his text on how, after a bout of polio at age six, she met her imaginary friend pretty flat and underwhelming overall.

Browne provides a simple first-person account of Frida’s experiences around the time she contracted polio. In it, Frida tells how the disease withered her right leg, prevented her from running, and made her the target of bullies. Her close relationship with her father, who had her work as a photographer’s assistant, is addressed, as is her sense of separateness from others and her desire for the freedom of flight. The text and illustrations suggest that Kahlo’s imaginary friend, who could dance and move in a way Frida could not, was her deep, inner self. (Browne explains how Frida first met this friend: After going through a door that she drew in the condensation on window glass, she found herself in a desert. A second door in a dairy opened for her, and, after passing through it, she fell deep into the earth [seemingly metaphorically into the core of her being] where the magical girl in white—another more able self—was met.) This other Frida (a twin) later figured in the artist’s paintings.

Compared to Jonah Winter’s marvellous, surreal, and richly illustrated picture book biography of Kahlo, Browne’s work disappoints. Its focus is just too narrow, and his images of Frida as a child bear little resemblance to the mature woman.

This is an interesting but hardly essential book. The illustrations rate five stars; the text, barely two. ( )