Review of "Nurse Florence, What Are Some Healthy Habits?" by Michael Dow

Nurse Florence, What Are Some Healthy Habits? by Michael Dow is the best book in the Nurse Florence series yet!

While this has been a children's book series with its fair share of problems, especially the excessive complexity of the writing, issues with character motivation, awkward framing, and less than optimal illustrations (at times), this book stands out as an improvement in one key regard: the illustrations.

This is arguably the best illustrated book in the series, largely owed to the efforts of the illustrator, Alexa Arostegui. The characters look distinct, colorful, and detailed. The backgrounds are also multi-layered with good depth perception (for the most part), something that was sometimes missing from other books in the series.

One thing about the illustrations that might be considered an issue is that Nurse Florence herself (as portrayed in this book) looks a little disproportionate. She's a big, muscular lady. She kind of reminded us of Raquel Rodriguez from WWE or Abby from The Last of Us Part 2 (video game). However, the one issue with that is her head: it's disproportionately small, in our opinion. She almost looks like a reverse-caricature, instead of having a big head and small body, she has a small head and a big body. On page 33, her head is literally tiny compared to the rest of her.

We think she's supposed to be portrayed as muscular, fit, and healthy, which is cool.

This Nurse Florence (there's a different one in each book) clearly puts a lot of effort into her body. We see that in scenes in which she's lunging, stretching, and flexing. Fitness is a huge part of her life, which makes her a good example for kids and adults alike.

The other characters in this book are some of the best illustrated characters in the series. Each one is diverse (racially and ethically) and distinct. Our favorite illustration in this whole book is just seeing the three girls laughing together. It's so nice to see genuine human emotion and expression properly presented in this series.

Something good about this book is that it applies to everyone, not just a niche group of people with one condition. Everyone can make an effort to live a healthier life. Everyone can learn (or be reminded) of some way to live healthier.

This includes predictable things like sleeping regularly, eating breakfast, and exercising.

However, there are more unorthodox (yet effective) recommendations like practicing mindfulness.
We also love how the narrative of this book is open to alternatives and other options. For example, it acknowledges that some people don't have big appetites during breakfast time, so the book invites readers to consider smaller snacks like fruits and granola bars.

The book also acknowledges that not everyone enjoys exercising or the same forms of exercise, but there are fun things like dance, sports, and tai chi that could help fill the gap.

Gosh, we really wish that the author could work with a co-writer who could help them craft the writing in these books in a more organic and natural way. It often seems contrived and unnatural. Once again, the characters seem to lack adequate motivation. Like, why would they just randomly want to learn about healthy habits? It may have been better if there were an inciting incident like someone getting over illness or the characters noticing how fit and healthy Nurse Florence is (which would've worked in this book considering how buff and jacked she is). All of these books tend to be framed and presented oddly. Like, we're almost always introduced to Jean, Sonia, and Condi who find themselves doing something for some reason. There's rarely a story behind why they're doing it or why they ask Nurse Florence about certain things, they just do it because the book requires it. They're written in this really stilted way. Dow already found a better illustrator, could he maybe find a ghost writer or a co-writer who can tidy this up?

Could you image how much better this book could be if the characters were doing something more dynamic than sitting in one place talking about what they should do?

However, we applaud the improvements in this book.

Check it out on Lulu!