Bees are so important for pollinating the food we eat and the flowers we love to smell, as well as for so many other reasons. Bees Are Our Friends, a picture book by Toni D’Alia and Alice Lindstrom, introduces young readers to the work bees do and helps them to see how bees benefit the world.

Gorgeously illustrated with paper collage using a cut-and-paste technique, the book follows a honeybee as she goes about her day. The words rhyme, and flow on the page.

“Down in the garden, up high in a tree,

is a busy beehive and one little bee.”

When the words are read out loud, the cadence matches perfectly with the flight of a bee. She flies along collecting nectar from flowers and helping to pollinate a vegetable garden so it will grow. She stores nectar to make a honeycomb in her hive.

The book ends with an illustration of happy honeybees asleep in their cells within the hive. The image makes for a great end to a bedtime book.

The publisher provided me with a copy of this title in exchange for my honest review.