Book Tour: The Rainbow Flamingo

This post contains gifted items. All views are our own.

We are delighted to be joining the book tour for the newly released The Rainbow Flamingo, written by Catherine Emmett and beautifully illustrated by Claire Powell. It’s a heartwarming story with a message about finding pride and joy in just being yourself at its core, and if you’ve been following this blog for a while you’ll know that this is right up our street!

But let’s start at the beginning. The rhyming story opens with a stunningly illustrated double page spread, showing a flamboyance of pink flamingos gathered around the shore of the Great Zumbo Lake. Readers soon learn that one among them, a young flamingo named Adele, is harbouring a bit of a colourful secret:

But one young flamingo, Adele was her name,

Knew under HER wings something wasn’t the same.

Whilst quite unremarkably pink from outside,

Inside were some colours she struggled to hide!

Well, it’s not that much of a secret if you paid attention to the book cover, but the other flamingos have no idea what is hiding under Adele’s wings, and she is worried what would happen if they found out. She’s too afraid to even confide in her mother. She does her best to turn her colourful feathers pink by eating more shrimp, and lots of other pink things too, but this only leads to making herself sick. Eventually, she pours her heart out to her mother after all, who reassures her that she is loved no matter what.

Her mum sat and listened, “Adele, we love YOU.

We couldn’t care less if you’re green, pink or blue!”

All’s well that ends well, when Adele takes to the stage at the yearly flamingo celebration and shares her secret with everyone. She discovers that not only do the other flamingos react positively, some of them were hiding their own colour secrets too. Adele no longer has to hide her true colours, and finds happiness just being herself.

So, don’t be afraid, wear your feathers with pride,

We ALL have some fabulous colours inside!

We absolutely LOVED this book, and I cannot say enough how much the message of the book resonated with us. Many children – and grown ups – will have experienced the feeling of wanting to fit in and be like everyone else, but this book celebrates the pride and joy that can be found in just being yourself!

My son’s favourite page was when Adele eats so many different things, she turns green instead of pink! But he also really loved her rainbow wings. All in all, this is a beautiful book with a great message, and I have no hesitation in recommending it.

For an extra treat, here is Ian Eagleton, author of Nen and the Lonely Fisherman and Glitter Boy (two other books that we both love!) doing a special reading of The Rainbow Flamingo:

The Rainbow Flamingo is available from all well stocked independent booksellers, and if they don’t have it you can probably order it.

Disclosure: We were gifted a free copy of The Rainbow Flamingo in return for an honest review. All opinions are our own. Many thanks to Simon and Schuster for inviting us to be a part of this book blog tour.