I requested this book as I was having some trouble with my son at home, especially with the period of being cooped up in the house together during lockdown. Decided to see if reading this to him would help him talk through his feelings, whether happy, sad, angry or upset and seemed to help him explain to me any issues he had, and allowed him to understand about his feeling a lot better.

I was provided a free ARC from NetGalley and the publisher in return for my honest review.

Overwhelming colours and characters but perfect to entertain and boost their attention, creativity and make them smile. Can be used as a spot and found kind of book. A joyful book!

Oh my goodness, what a bright and vibrant picture book to open conversations with little ones about their feelings and emotions. I love that the pages are different bright colours to tie in with the feelings, and my little girl loved looking closely at the illustrations to help her understand the different ways we feel.. The little animals are just hilarious, they really made my three year old laugh and engaged her. I loved the little coping strategies added in to each page too. Fantastic - highly recommend!

The book begins with a generalised introduction about emotions, what are they? How are you feelings? And I liked that the book described and went into detail about how you may not know how you feel, and that's okay. This is particularly important because a lot of pupils within the primary school age range will struggle with emotions and naming their feelings.

The book then went onto naming an emotion such as 'happy' and proceeded through the animals to give circumstances when the animals may feel happy such as when doing something they enjoyed or when eating ice cream. I liked the fact that as well as focusing on the typically negative emotions like anger and worry, the writer also looked at emotions like happiness and excitement because it's also important for children to realise those emotions too. I liked the art style within this book as it's really unique and colourful, and I liked the diversity between all the animals (shoutout to the animal who used sign language to communicate with their friend! That was really good to see within a book). At the back it gives parents information about how to help children deal either their emotions, which as a practitioner I found to be really sweet and useful.

Overall, I really enjoyed reading this book, and I think if used correctly it could be used for any key stage in a school setting. My only negative comment would be that it's a good story to use for one to one, or for when you would like to use the story as a hook, for discussing a topic like emotions. But I would struggle to use this book when reading to a whole class, as the majority of this book isn't written in the usual sentence structure but through an arrange of conversations between the animals.

Rated: 3.5 stars

Thank you to netgallery for allowing me to review this book in exchange for an honest review. As a trainee teacher my opinion does look at how I, or other practitioners, could use this book in a classroom setting so take my review as you will.

Such a joyful book full of colourful illustrations that children can engage with easily.

Covering a wide range of emotions and a whole host of reasons we may feel them.

Short, simple snippets of text explain emotions to young children in a way that is easy to follow and opens up discussions.

This really will be a valuable resource for families and early years settings. I definitely want one for my class.

This book is an absolute delight! I don't think children are ever too young to learn about emotions and We Feel Happy is the perfect place to start. It's full of colourful and fun illustrations of cute animals who together, explore the different ways they are feeling and talk about some of the reasons they feel that way. Every time you open this book you discover something you hadn't spotted before - some of our favourites include a rainbow llama and a baboon wearing pants, this one prompted lots of giggles in our house. I love the way the book is set out simply and clearly which makes it very easy to read and I am so thrilled to see a disabled character (a koala!) - we are so often left out of these things. Another thing I really like is the emphasis on paying attention to not only your own feelings, but other people's as well, this book is filled with compassion and empathy. Finally, there is a section in the back of the book for parents and caregivers with some suggestions on how to talk to children about different emotions, which is lovely because it's not always easy to find a talking point when it comes to this subject.

I've been a fan of Katie Abeys illustrations for a while so when I saw this book I thought it would be a great book to read with my youngest to explore emotions. The illustrations are, as is distinct with Katies work, bright, fun and colourful. The book gives plenty of great examples of why people might feel the way they do and regularly reminds us that its ok to feel the way we feel, that everbody has probably felt that way at somepoint. My little one enjoyed examining the pictures and telling me why she thought each character was happy, sad etc.

Another great thing about this book is it gives breat exercises to explore with your children that could be used with pretty much any primary school aged child. All in all this is a great book and a useful tool to aid with childrens mental health.

I love this book! I like the bright colours and the easy to read text. The animals are cute and the layout is brilliant. I think this is definitely a book to add to my collection. Having read lots of emotion books before, this is one of my favourites. I love all the questions this books ask like What makes you feel calm? Do you feel any sometimes? What helps you feel less scared? Thank you for the opportunity to read and review this brilliant book.

A good start to a young reader's knowledge of emotions – what they are, how they manifest, and how to talk about them. A monkey has gathered a whole host of fellow animals, and for every relevant spread – happy, scared, grumpy – we see them all interacting (or not) and find out how happiness manifests, what causes the blue mood, and so on. Vivid and cartoonish art teaches through example, by literally illustrating the different states of mind, and this is a very clear lesson as a result.