Reviews

Fly Like a Bird: A Kidlit Bird Book Review

January 13, 2026 by Susan Wroble No Comments
Cover detail of Olga Ptashnik's FLY LIKE A BIRD, with a Chickadee, Owl, Ostrich, Swift and Hummingbird against a blue sky

If you have a young person in your life that you’d love to nudge towards a lifelong love of birds, Olga Ptashnik’s picture book Fly Like a Bird would be a phenomenal place to start. 

The front cover of a children's picture book with a variety of birds set against a blue sky with clouds

Fly Like a Bird is written in the form of a gentle dialogue between a fledgling and an older chickadee. The book begins with an uncertain and worried fledgling: “What if I never learn how to fly?” The older chickadee is reassuring: “All chickadees know how to fly, and you will learn when the time comes! We chickadees flutter from branch to branch with no effort at all.”

From there, the book becomes a global exploration of the various ways birds fly—or don’t, as in the case of the ostrich. On each double-page spread, Olga has differentiated the voice of the chickadees, by using italics in a blue font for the older chickadee, and traditional black text for the voice of the young bird. When the young chickadee decides that a diet of fish like the pelican might not be desired, the older bird suggests looking at the swifts: “They can catch their favorite meal right in the air. They only land to build nests and feed their babies.”

Swifts flying against a backdrop of apartments and skyscrapers
City Swifts in flight from FLY LIKE A BIRD by Olga Ptashnik with dialogue from an older chickadee.
A Swift flying with open mouth to catch a fly.
Swift with open mouth to catch a fly mid-flight with dialogue from the fledgling chickadee.

A Moscow-based book illustrator and naturalist, Olga has a Masters degree in Biophysics. A self-taught artist, she has garnered up an impressive list of awards, including the 2019 “Best of the Best” award from the worldwide iJungle illustration competition and was a finalist at the 2022 Bologna Children’s Book Fair. Illustrations from Fly Like a Bird were selected for the 2025 “The Original Art” show, an exhibition of children’s book illustration, at the New York Society of Illustrators. A link on her website gives a fabulous video of her illustration of Emily Dickinson’s poem “Hope is the thing with feathers.”

Olga Ptashnik is both author and illustrator for this book—her first as an author, and her English language debut. She has five book published in seven languages, including another bird book: Journey Above the Earth: Diary of a Swallow by Pavel Kvartalnov (2019). Scientific illustration is a tradition within her family, but Olga realized that her passion lay in storytelling. The inspiration for this book came from a trip through Asia Minor, where she saw so many birds in a brief period of time and was struck by the fact that each bird is specifically adapted to their habitats. That led, in turn, to trying to convey a message about the uniqueness of each person. 

In Fly Like a Bird, the fledgling gains the confidence to try again after exploring the way others birds fly—and to fly the way chickadees do: “Not very high or very fast, but singing a cheerful song.”

Chickadee fledgling in a try, fluttering wings and then taking off.
Fledgling chickadee in FLY LIKE A BIRD deciding to try again to fly, and to do it the way chickadees do.

Backmatter includes spot art and a short paragraph with more details about each of the eleven types of birds, including the Chickadee main characters, featured in the book. 

Six birds (Hummingbird, Wandering Albatross, Penguins, Pelicans, Swifts and Ostriches) featured in circular illustration bubbles with text with more details about each of the birds.
Backmatter page from FLY LIKE A BIRD by Olga Ptashnik

Fly Like a Bird is part of publisher Eerdmans Books for Young Readers collection of “Spectacular STEAM for Curious Readers” books (STEAM for Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Math). It’s a fabulous book on so many levels—as an introduction to the ways birds around the world use their wings, a gentle encouragement to try again, and a reminder to be true to who you are. The back-and-forth discussion format lends itself to reading aloud, and this book would make a fabulous addition to school, library and home collections. 

Fly Like a Bird details:

Fly Like a Bird, written and illustrated by Olga Ptashnik

Eerdmans Books for Young Readers, 2025

ISBN: 978-0-8028-5645-6

36 pages, age 4-9

Written by Susan Wroble
Susan Wroble has always paid attention to the birds around her, perhaps in part because Burd is her middle name! She is always happiest when outside gardening and listening to birdsong. Coming from a family with a strong commitment to service, Susan started volunteering after college with two years in the Peace Corps in the Independent State of Western Samoa, where she taught high school math and science. Currently, she volunteers as leader of the Rocky Mountain Chapter of the Society for Children’s Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) and at the Colorado Children’s Hospital. She also leads a long-term Denver-area support group for parents of Twice-Exceptional Children. Susan’s degrees are in electrical engineering and foreign affairs, but her great love is children’s books. She writes nonfiction, and tends to focus on stories that share a message of hope in this era of climate change. She has written four children’s books for the school library market. Her book DAWN CHORUS: PROTECTING BIRDSONG AROUND THE WORLD is scheduled for publication with Holiday House in 2026.