posted on 19 Jul 2018

You Are My Best Friend by Tatsuya Miyanishi

Tatsuya Miyanishi is one of Japan’s most popular and best-selling children’s picture book authors but you'd have to be forgiven for never having come across his work before. I have to be honest and say that You Are My Best Friend is actually the first of his books that I’ve seen and so I suspect his reputation has been built in Asia and the USA but he’s not yet penetrated the UK market to any significant degree. 

I did a bit of internet research and found the website of Kinokuniya USA that describes Miyanishi’s popularity in this way:

“Miyanishi's books have a passionate fan base of all ages that enjoys his range of endearing characters in many genres, from superheroes to dinosaurs, all illustrated with bright colors. He has won the Kodansha Cultural Award for Picture Books, as well as the Kenbuchi Picture Book Grand Prize.”

This book is in fact part of his Tyrannosaurus Series which now runs to a dozen books, although only a small number of them have been translated into English. On the strength of what I’ve seen here in You Are My Best Friend, much better recognition in the UK can’t be far away.

The story is a simple one and the illustrations  - which themselves seem colourfully naïve – pack a real visual punch. Tyrannosaurus has a reputation for being the biggest, baddest dinosaur on the block and he terrorises all the small creatures that live on the prehistoric plains. And then one day disaster strikes Tyrannosaurus and he falls into the sea – he can’t swim and so his days look numbered as he sinks to the bottom. But he’s saved by a friendly Elasmosaurus who doesn’t know about his reputation on land as a fierce bully and an unlikely friendship springs up between them.

As a result of his experiences Tyrannosaurus is a changed dinosaur and he starts hunting berries instead of other animals and he’s actually friendly to the creatures he lives amongst – much to their surprise. And then one day, when he goes back to the sea to visit his new friend, he discovers a mean, aggressive water-based dinosaur has attacked his friend and Tyrannosaurus is able to return the earlier favour and save Elasmosaurus’ life.

Distressed by what he has witnessed, he confesses that, in the past, he too has had a reputation for being a bully on land -  but Elasmosaurus isn’t bothered by that because he knows now that the two will be friends forever.

For younger children the moral is simple to pick up and the storyline easy to follow but I think the thing that will capture them will be the vibrant illustrations. Not only are they striking but they are not overly complicated and I can easily imagine children who read the book will want to have a go at copying the drawings. There’s certainly more than a hint of the popular comic or graphic novel in the book and that will add to its appeal.

The book was published by Museyon, New York in 2016 and I’ve never seen a copy in a bookshop I’ve visited. You can, however, order it on line and expect to pay anything from £10 - £12 for one.

 

Terry Potter

July 2018