The Snow Theater [Hardcover]

From Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award winner Ryoji Arai comes a gorgeous picture book about a child learning to accept mistakes, while having a magical experience in the wild, beautiful snow.

Selected for USBBYs Outstanding International Books List, 2026! 
One ofBookPages Most Anticipated Books of Fall 2025!

After accidentally ripping the pages of his fathers favorite book, a pensive, heavy-hearted boy leaves his cozy, warm house to ski through the snow. There, in the quiet and the cold, he stumbles upon a small stage thats all lit upa tiny snow theater, with tiny snow people and tiny ballerinasthat soon transforms into a large snow theater, presided over by the majestic snow queen.

As the boy joins the chorus of snow children, the snow queen lifts up her arms and snow falls and falls and falls, until all the boy can see is whitea snowstorm! And its at that precise moment that the boys father, who let his son go off alone but never lost track of him, is there to take his hand as they return home together.

Originally published in Japan and written and illustrated by one of the countrys most important picture book makers,The Snow Theateris a quietly enchanting tale about the wild beauty of nature, the powers of the imagination, and the unconditional love of a parent for their child.

Ryoji Araiwas born in Yamagata, Japan, in 1956. He has an illustrative style all his own: bold, mischievous, and unpredictable. Arai studied art at Nippon University. His art is at once genuine and truly poetic, encouraging children to paint and to tell their own stories. He took the Japanese picture book world by storm in the 1990s. Since then, he has won multiple awards, including the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award in 2005, and was Japans nominee for the prestigious Hans Christian Andersen Award in 2022.David Boydteaches translation at Kobe City University of Foreign Studies. lC%