Alma and the Beast surprised me immediately with its flip flop of characters. Hairy Alma lives in a magical and hairy land while hairless beast Mala lives in our world. Lost in Alma’s world the beast needs help to find her way home. Although initially Alma is afraid of the beast eventually she helps her find her way home and she sees how different their worlds are.

Fun and strange descriptive language and magical illustrations make this book fun to read. Teaching children that our differences are not a bad thing!

Very beautifully detailed picture book for little ones who love to do hair. Teaches values to young ones about how lots of people are different and its ok to be yourself.

Thank you #netgalley for giving me a copy of #AlmaAndTheBeast to review. This was a good book about seeing things from another perspective. All the hairiness in Alma's world was a little weird, but it made sense with the story. A cute read that I would recommend to my students looking for something quirky.

This is definitely an imaginative book, set in parallel worlds that are both like and unlike our own.

Despite what you might expect from the title and cover illustration, Alma is, in fact, the "beast" (at least, from a human point of view). This is where I ran into a bit of trouble. The little girl is the beast from Alma's point of view, and since that's the point of view where the book starts, the little girl is continually referred to as "the beast". Now, maybe it's just me, but every time I saw that terminology, I thought of Alma... so I had to continually correct myself as I was reading the story. I get that the beastliness is a matter of perspective, but my brain just didn't want to cooperate.

I really like Alma's world, though, where everything is hairy. In fact, that's how she spends her days: braiding the trees, combing the grass, and petting the roof ("as one does when the days grow chilly and pink"). The parallels between the worlds are cute, too, showing that even though we have differences, we also have similarities.

I think the artwork in this one is going to be hit or miss for a lot of people. The colour palette is interesting, and there are plenty of things to look at, but the style is very distinct and I wonder if some kids might find it a bit creepy (I think I would have as a young reader).

But I do like the message about differences and similarities and perspective. It's a cute book, if you find you're a fan of the illustrations.

This is a cute story of a little girl meeting a beast and experiencing the fact that home is different for everyone. She learns the ways of the beast's home but still appreciates and misses her own home. Cute illustrations.

A wildly unique and linguistically textured book with illustrations that take the page to the very edge. An unlikely pairing of outdoor explorers meet and explore each other’s vastly different worlds with curious and open minds reminding each of us to be open to the unusual and unknown.

This was sweet and I loved how it flipped preconceived notions on their head and showed perception matters (as does empathy and kindness) plus I loved the art :)

Wow okay here we go, this art work....this goddamn art work *bows down*

I can see this book being a child's favorite and they grow up with it and then get the art tattooed on them. It's that kind of art. It's so beautiful and cute and unique I adore it beyond words.

The story is cute too, just kind of simple, but that's fine.

"Alma and the Beast" is a cute picture book about an actual monster that befriends a human. A simple twist on a classic tale. I'll recommend it.