There’s a relatively new category of children’s books: social-emotional learning, or SEL. These books try to help children deal with difficult emotions.
As a rule, I’m underwhelmed. They are often heavy-handed, and/or simplify the emotional challenges kids face.
However, Morag Hood’s 2026 picture book Seahorse is Furious and There is Nothing You Can Do About It could be considered an SEL book, and it works. The whole book is built around emotions and dealing with them: Seahorse is having a grumpy, no, a furious day, a day when everything is irritating and Seahorse is angry all the way through.
Hood’s bright, colorful, simple (but well-designed) images give readers a series of pages where the text flatly states how upset Seahorse is and how impossible it would be to help him. These images at first show Seahorse and his upsets, but then start showing the world around Seahorse contradicting him (by being bright and smiley), and then actively working to make him feel better.
In the end, though the text says “there is nothing you can do” to help Seahorse, the image shows Seahorse smiling and accepting a hug. Besides being a good interplay between words and images, this design also demonstrates how there can be a gap between the stories we tell about the world and our feelings and the reality.
