Ilene Cooper (Booklist, October 1, 1998 (Vol. 95, No. 3))
From the time he was a little boy, Wilson Bentley loved snow. Yet snow was frustrating to him. He could pick flowers for his mother or net butterflies, but he couldn't hold on to snowflakes. First, Bentley tried drawing snow crystals, but they would melt too quickly. Then, as a teenager in the 1870s, he read about a camera with a microscope. His family were Vermont farming folk, but they scraped together the money to buy him the camera. From then on, there was no stopping Bentley, who was nicknamed Snowflake. He spent winters photographing the intricate flakes. At first no one cared ("Snow in Vermont is as common as dirt"); but Bentley found fame as a nature photographer, and even today his photo book of snowflakes is considered a primary source. Martin has chosen her subject well; Bentley's determined life will have innate inspiration for children. Just as important, all parts of the book work together beautifully. The text is crisp and engaging, using word imagery to good advantage: "[his new camera] was taller than a newborn calf and cost as much as father's herd of ten cows." Azarian's woodcuts are strong and sure, just like Bentley himself, and also, like him, show a love of nuance and detail. The book's design allows for snowflake-touched sidebars that offer more specific details about camera technique or Bentley's experiments with snow. There will be so many uses for this book--not the least of which is simply handing it to children and letting their imaginations soar like Bentley's Category: For the Young. 1998, Houghton, $16. Ages 5-8. Starred Review.

Marilyn Courtot (Children's Literature)
Willie Bentley loved snow--he was passionate about snow. He was fascinated by the beauty of snowflakes and wanted desperately to be able to share their beauty with the world. However, it was not until his parents spent their savings to buy him a camera with a microscope attachment that his desire was finally fullfilled. He took pictures, hundred of pictures of snowflakes, and eventually became a world-renowned expert. His photographs graced the pages of magazines and books and were used by artists and professors. Willie became known as "the Snowflake Man." A monument to Willie stands as a testament to his dedication and his desire to share the beauty of snowflakes with the world. At the end of the book, readers see Willie at work and several examples of his snowflake photographs. Azarian's hand-tinted woodcut illustrations, the snowflake motif, and the wintry scenes and hues are a perfect match for the story. 1998, Houghton Mifflin, $16.00. Ages 5 to 12.

CCBC (Cooperative Children's Book Center Choices, 1998)
In the days when farmers worked with ox and sled and cut the dark with lantern light, there lived a boy who loved snow more than anything else in the world." That boy was Willie Bentley, who lived in a part of Vermont where the annual snowfall is reported to be 120 inches. He was eager to learn, reading every volume of the family encyclopedias and keeping a record of the weather. He was especially fascinated by snowflakes. At 15, he began trying to capture the elusive snow crystals by looking at them under an old microscope and then drawing the beauty and individuality he observed. Bentley's passion about snowflakes was often misunderstood. "Neighbors laughed...'Snow in Vermont is as common as dirt,' they said. 'We don't need pictures.' Willie said the photographs would be his gift to the world." He felt called to photograph a leaf or spider web hung with dew. On the final page, Bentley's own words point out that although there were always others who would rise at dawn to milk dairy herds, his early morning work gave people something they otherwise would never have. Children may read either a story or a biography about this self-taught expert who developed his own technique of microphotography, because this book has two narratives. On the left and/or right side of most pages of the fiction, there is easy-to-read biographical information. Azarian's woodcuts, hand tinted with watercolors, serve as illustrations for everything in this intriguing picture book about a man who "loved the beauty of nature in all seasons." CCBC categories: Biography / Autobiography; Picture Books for Older Children; The Arts; Historical People, Places and Events; Seasons and Celebrations; The Natural World. 1998, Houghton Mifflin, 32 pages, $16.00. Ages 4-9.

Kirkus (Kirkus Reviews, 1998)
Wilson Bentley (1865-1931) was fascinated by snow, in childhood and adulthood, and, practically speaking, is the one who "discovered" snow crystals, by photographing them in all their variation. As a youngster, he was so taken with these little six-sided ice crystals that his parents scraped together their savings to buy him a camera with a microscope. From then on, despite his neighbors' amusement, he took hundreds of portraits of snowflakes. As an adult, he gave slide shows of his work, and when he was 66, a book was published of his photos--a book that is still in use today. Martin chronicles Bentley's life and his obsession in a main, poetic text, but provides additional facts in careful, snowflake-strewn sidebars. The deep blue snow shadows and fuzzy glow of falling flakes in Azarian's skillfully carved, hand-tinted woodcuts recreate the cold winter wonderland of "Snowflake" Bentley's Vermont. This is a lyrical biographical tribute to a farmer, whose love of snow and careful camera work expanded both natural science and photography. 1998, Houghton Mifflin, $16.00. © 1998 Kirkus Reviews/VNU eMedia, Inc. All rights reserved.

Janice M. Del Negro (The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, December 1998 (Vol. 52, No. 4))
It’s hard to know what strikes creative fire into someone’s heart; it’s even harder to explain it in a way young children can understand, but Martin does a fine job of it in this picture-book biography of Wilson Bentley, self-taught scientist and photographer. Bentley grew up in Vermont, “in the days when farmers worked with ox and sled and cut the dark with lantern light,” and he loved snow. When his mother gave him an old microscope, he began to more closely observe snowflakes, studying the icy crystals and their beautiful, intricate patterns. His attempts to draw the fragile crystals resulted in failure, but he finally managed to photograph them after months of experimenting. His efforts were viewed with some disdain (“Snow in Vermont is as common as dirt”), and he gave away his snow-crystal pictures or sold them for a few cents until, in his later years, his photographs were recognized for the artistic and scientific marvels they are. Azarian’s hand-colored woodcuts are just the right complement to Martin’s text: the single and double-page spreads are outlined in black, with repeating vertical blue borders (on the right or left or both sides of the frame), decorated with snowflakes, and framing masterfully balanced compositions and figures that stretch the art of woodcuts with their vigor and sense of motion. The borders serve a double purpose, providing a recurring motif and a place for more detailed exposition of incidents in Bentley’s life. The writing is poetically understated, with an attention to domestic detail that will attract young readers to this life story of a gentle eccentric. Review Code: R* -- Denotes books of special distinction. (c) Copyright 1998, The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois. 1998, Houghton, 32p, $16.00. Grades 2-4.

Mark I. West (The Five Owls, March/April 1999 (Vol. 13, No. 4))
Every year, thousands of book lovers try to predict which book will win the Caldecott Medal. Few picked Snowflake Bentley, not because the book is unworthy but because its focus on an obscure photographer led many people to see it as one of those narrow niche books that generally gets overlooked by award committees. Since the winner of the first Caldecott Medal was announced in 1938, only a couple of biographies have won the award. Picture books that deal with snowy winters have fared much better, however. White Snow, Bright Snow won in 1948, The Big Snow in 1949, The Snowy Day in 1963, and Owl Moon in 1988. Perhaps if the children's book world had taken into consideration the special role that snow books have played in the history of the Caldecott Medal, they wouldn't have been so surprised when Snowflake Bentley was announced as this year's winner. Mary Azarian's hand-colored woodcuts are certainly deserving of the medal. The pages of Snowflake Bentley are filled with images of the Vermont countryside where Bentley lived from 1865 until his death in 1931. The bold lines that Azarian achieves through woodcuts give these images the look of folkart, but her subtle use of watercolors adds a level of sophistication. She is especially adept at capturing the wintry interplay of blue and white. The life of Wilson Bentley makes for an interesting story. As Jacqueline Briggs recounts, Bentley developed a fascination with snowflakes while growing up on a farm outside of Jericho, Vermont. He often peered at snowflakes through the lenses of a microscope and tried to draw their intricate patterns before they melted. He later began taking photographs of snowflakes, not an easy feat during the pioneering days of microphotography. He continued to photograph snowflakes, and in the last years of his life he published a collection of these photographs in a book titled Snow Crystals.What I like most about Snowflake Bentley is the way it simultaneously celebrates Bentley's artistic and scientific passion for snowflakes. As this book makes clear, there is something inspiring about Bentley's life-long dedication to capturing the fleeting beauty of snowflakes. Perhaps, after reading this book, children will carry away a better appreciation of all the passionate eccentrics who help us to see the beauty in our mundane world. 1998, Houghton Mifflin, 10-1/2 x 10, 32 pages, $16.00. Ages All.

Horn Book (The Horn Book Guide, Spring 1999)
A warm period look at a cold subject--snow--and one self-made scientist, Wilson A. Bentley, the man who discovered, among other things, the fact that no two snowflakes are alike. Bentley's dedication to his research is clearly evident, and the ridicule to which he was sometimes subjected is appropriately down-played for a young audience. The book exhibits a beautiful blend of Azarian's splendid woodcuts, a lyrical text, and factual sidebars. Category: Nonfiction-Science. 1998, Houghton, 32pp, $16.00. Ages 5 to 9. Rating: 2: Superior, well above average.