WINNER of the Junior Juries Award and Judges Special Award – KPMG Children’s Books Ireland Awards 2024
SHORTLISTED for The Oscar’s Book Prize 2024
SHORTLISTED for the UKLA Book Awards 2024
‘A beautiful, gentle, rhyming exploration of grief and mourning.’ - Joe Coelho, Waterstones Children’s Laureate
The Hare-Shaped Hole is a beautiful, touching and poignant picture book that gently explores themes of grief and loss.
Hertle and Bertle were always a pair, though one was a turtle and one was a hare.
They were utterly buddies, and best friends forever, and whenever you looked, you would find them together… until quite unexpectedly… the end came. When Hertle disappears for good, Bertle can only see a Hertle-shaped hole where his friend should be. He pleads with it, get angry with it, but the hole still won’t bring his Hertle back. It seems like hope is lost… until Gerda the kindly bear finds him.
She explains that he must fill the hole with his memories of Hertle. And slowly… Bertle begins to feel a little bit better.
Powerful and moving text from children’s author and poet John Dougherty is paired perfectly with warm illustrations from the wonderfully talented Thomas Docherty in a thoughtful and sensitive approach to this difficult topic.
This moving picture book will be loved and treasured by children and adults alike. With kids, it can be used to start a gentle conversation about death and grief. And as a gift for a grieving friend, it’s the ideal gesture. Anyone who has lost a pet or loved one will be comforted by Bertle’s journey to acceptance and reassured by the fact that, eventually, things do get better.
dfridd –
This book contains such a wonderful message. As booksellers we are in the priviledged position to be able to offer some support for anyone grieving the loss of a loved one in the form of the right book at the right time.
When Leanne handed me this book and said “You MUST read this” I knew immediately it would be something special and so it was.
The story celebrates a treasured friendship. But the friendship comes to an abrupt end (read into that what you need. Loss, Grief, moving away) It deals with what happens when Bertle (a tortoise) loses his best friend, little Hertle the Hare. It teaches us to fill that hole with all the happy memories. Honestly welling up thinking about it!