When a young white boy is grieving over his mother's death, a gorilla appears to act as a comforting presence and to answer the boy's questions. "How do you know when someone dies? A person's body stops working. Like their heartbeat? Yes." All the while, the boy's father is in the scene, also obviously grieving quietly on his own. Eventually, he replaces the gorilla as the comforting presence who can answer his son's questions. The gorilla is not anthropomorphized and he's huge, like grief itself, in this lovely, tender story reminiscent of Charlotte Zolotow's Mr. Rabbit and the Lovely Present in the presence of a wise but easy-going animal companion who answers a child's innocent but difficult questions. The soft-edged illustrations perfectly complement the gentle, restrained tone of the narrative. (Ages 4-8)